God Is Nigh -- Book Sense Is in the Details at TV Bookstore

Stores with Book Sense attract readers of all ideologies, creeds, and tastes. But is it possible that the six-year-old branding program for independents has convinced even the Supreme Being -- the primary promoter of the bestselling Good Book -- to stop in?

The bookstore in question is actually an elaborate set for the CBS series Joan of Arcadia. Skylight Books -- named after the real bookstore in Los Angeles, where initial episodes of the show were filmed -- has been the site of many a scene this season. And viewers, particularly those in the book business, have noticed the increasing prominence of orange and blue Book Sense banners in the background.

Completing its second season this month, Joan of Arcadia, is an hour-long series about a typical high school girl with school, family, and romance problems exacerbated by chronic, embarrassing visits from God, who appears only to her and in many guises.

One of the first of God's weekly assignments for Joan was to secure gainful employment, which she did by applying to Skylight Books in her hometown of Arcadia, Maryland. Well-designed and full of books and displays, the bookstore isn't usually crowded with paying customers, other than Joan's love interests and God -- none of whom pay cash.

During the show's development, designers from Canterbury Productions, which produces the show, approached ABA for information about dressing a bookstore set with maximum verisimilitude. Jill Perlstein, ABA marketing director, supplied them with Book Sense banners, shelf-talkers, counter cards, and lists, and, according to production designer Bill Eigenbrodt, these give the bookstore a "visual personality."

In a final episode, Joan had a lengthy confrontation with a young man, quite possibly the embodiment of evil, with a large, clearly visible Book Sense banner directly behind her. She told the young man that she would triumph in any competition with him, because she "has God on [her] side." With the added strength of the nation's finest independent bookstores, how could she lose? --Nomi Schwartz

For more on Book Sense and Joan of Arcadia (whose third season has not been confirmed), go to news.bookweb.org/read/1755 and news.bookweb.org/read/2919.