Independent Bookstores #1 in Ranking in Consumer Reports
Consumer Reports magazine, perhaps the country's most influential buyers' guide, notes in its January 2002 issue that 88 percent of the readers responding to a survey said they were either completely satisfied or very satisfied with their shopping experiences at independent bookstores. The magazine noted that such high approval for independents "puts those stores on a par with the highest-rated stores from any Consumer Reports survey in recent years."
There was cause for celebration in Arkansas this September as That Bookstore in Blytheville at once reached a milestone and gained a colleague: That Bookstore has become those bookstores. The day owner Mary Gay Shipley held a party to mark That Bookstore in Blytheville's 25th anniversary, her protégé MaryAlice Hurst, new owner of That Bookstore at Mountebanq Place, opened for business in Conway, Arkansas.
For Wally Amos, gourmet cookie guru and founder of Famous Amos Cookies, the cookie is a metaphor for life. That's why his new book (written with Eden-Lee Murray), The Cookie Never Crumbles: Inspirational Recipes for Everyday Living (St. Martin's), serves up recipes from his own personal kitchen that can help others lead gourmet lives. 
R.J. Julia Booksellers, an independent bookstore in Madison, Connecticut, is branching out--or at least trying out a new offshoot. Owner Roxanne Coady told BTW that the store opened a "big, beautiful, mahogany book kiosk" in New Haven, Connecticut, on December 3.