Around Indies

Blue Ridge Books Celebrates Five Years

This Friday, Blue Ridge Books in Waynesville, North Carolina, is marking its fifth anniversary. The store is holding several in-store promotions and will be celebrating throughout the weekend with author appearances — Kimberly Brock (The River Witch), Erika Marks (Little Gale Gumbo), and Kathryn Magendie (Family Graces) — and musical acts.

Blue Ridge Books opened in 2007 under the ownership of Robert Baggett. When Baggett retired in June 2010, former managers Allison Best-Teague and Jo Gilley assumed ownership.

Bookmans Becomes Wedding Venue

Last weekend, loyal customers Daphne and Andrew tied the knot at Bookmans Entertainment Exchange in Mesa, Arizona. The bookstore had been the location of the couple’s first date. Wedding festivities included a book-themed cake bearing a few favorite titles.

“We are honored to be part of their story,” reads the announcement on the Bookmans website. “The Bookmans family wishes Daphne and Andrew a lifetime of happiness and dragon slaying.”

Bookshop Santa Cruz Unveils Espresso Book Machine

Bookshop Santa Cruz in Santa Cruz, California, recently started offering the services of an Espresso Book Machine (EBM). “If you walk in and want a book, and if we don’t have it on the shelf, we’ll print it out right there,” owner Casey Coonerty Protti told the Santa Cruz Sentinal.

The EBM is able to print eight million titles in its database and provides local authors with the opportunity to self-publish.

As a way to demonstrate what the EBM can do, the bookshop held a launch party at which it printed specially designed copies of Leaves of Grass, which was self-published by Walt Whitman in 1855.

The event also featured a panel discussion with Sentinel writer Christa Martin and Bookshop’s Nici McCown on opportunities for self-publishing.

A Sendoff for Mystery Lovers Owners

To celebrate the retirement of Mary Alice Gorman and Richard Goldman, who sold Mystery Lovers Bookshop in Oakmont, Pennsylvania, to Laurie Stephens this past May, the bookstore planned a full event schedule for the month of July.

Wednesday, July 11, which is also Gorman’s birthday, was the former owners’ last event at the store. They had stayed on to help Stephens through a transition period. Authors Andrew Gross and Alafair Burke visited the store for a talk and signing of their new books.

Gorman and Goldman opened the bookstore in 1990 and grew it into one of the largest specialty mystery book stores in the country.

Greenlight Partners With Museum

Greenlight Bookstore in Brooklyn, New York, is collaborating with the Museum of Contemporary African Diaspora Arts (MoCADA) for a new reading series in conjunction with  the museum’s fall exhibition.

The series and the exhibition will highlight the issues of revolution, media, and the Black experience in contemporary political history. Featured authors will bring fresh perspectives and first-hand experiences to the discussion.