About Bookstores

The City Lights Bookstore in Sylva, North Carolina, takes its name from the same source as San Francisco's City Lights -- the eponymous Charlie Chaplin movie. But instead of a city of 800,000 on the bay, Sylva's City Lights is in a rural town of 2,500 between the Great Smokies and the Balsams, two mountain ranges in the highest part of the southern Appalachians. And rather than beat poetry, owner Joyce Moore made the store's specialty the literature of the Appalachian region.

After a long and valiant battle, Ruminator Books of St. Paul, Minnesota, has come to the end of its existence. Owner and founder David Unowsky, a venerable voice for independent bookselling, has tilted at his last windmill: He plans to file for Chapter 7 bankruptcy this week -- liquidating the business rather than reorganizing it. Unowsky told BTW that the final blow came when the store's landlord, Macalester College, withdrew from negotiations.

Alibi Books in Glenview, Illinois, is a six-year-old testament to family synergy. Sisters Lori Kraft and Sheri Zalewski are the store's co-owners and their mother, Roberta Kraft, helped plan the store and works there as well. Alibi specializes in mysteries and also carries general fiction, bestsellers, and children's books, in a space measuring under 1,000 square feet.

Other Tiger Bookstore in Westerly, Rhode Island (above), will soon open a summer annex near the Atlantic shore.

The owners of Westerly, Rhode Is

The Haverford College Bookstore in Haverford, Pennsylvania, is a 6,000-square-foot independent offering a "hand-selected inventory of reading that runs wide and deep," as well as textbooks and pretty much anything else a student needs to get through a semester. This article, which originally appeared in Founders Green, the college's parents' newsletter, takes a look at how the store successfully competes with larger stores by meeting the needs of the college community and beyond.

This is not Mom and Dad's college bookstore.

This fall, one of the largest independent bookstores in the U.S. will open a second, even larger location. Larry and Gloria Abramoff, founders and co-owners of Tatnuck Bookseller & Sons, the 29-year-old, 24,000-square-foot institution in Worcester, Massachusetts, will open a 31,000-square-foot store in a former supermarket in the Westborough Shopping Center. "I'm so excited, I can't wait," said Larry Abramoff, who hopes to open the store in November.

Some 228 years ago this July 4, a coalition of independent thinkers raised the awareness of Americans, loyalists, and King George by penning the Declaration of Independence. And while independent business alliances and retailers across the nation aren't looking to do something so grandiose as declare their independence from a tyrannical king, this Fourth of July week, they are looking to raise the awareness in their respective communities regarding the intrinsic and economic value of their local independent businesses by celebrating Independents Week.

At 27 years old and 16,000 square feet, Little Dickens and Givens Books is the oldest and largest independent bookstore in historic Lynchburg, Virginia.

Brad Pitt may miss the fall grand opening of bookseller Susan Novotny's new store in upstate New York. He'll be losing a good opportunity for a cross-promotion.