About Bookstores

"Books saved my life," said author Luis J. Rodriguez in a recent interview. The 47-year-old author is a former Los Angeles gang member whose love and talent for poetry and prose convinced a judge to give Rodriguez a crucial break 26 years ago when he placed him, not back in prison, but on the road to a writer's life. Eventually a newspaper job took Rodriguez to Chicago. There, he started his own poetry publishing house and wrote the award-winning 1994 memoir, Always Running: La Vida Loca: Gang Days in L.A. (Touchstone Books).

On January 7, Hawley-Cooke announced that it was closing its Glenview Pointe store in Louisville, Kentucky. A statement signed by the store's four owners, Graham and Martha Neal Cooke, Audrey Schuetze, and William Schuetze, read in part, "It is with great sadness, but with a voice of confidence in the future of Hawley-Cooke Booksellers … [that we make this announcement]. We are proud of the Glenview Pointe store and the wonderful staff who made it a remarkable experience for all of us for over five years….

Baltimore has a new independent bookstore serving some of the northern suburbs of Baltimore County--Cross Keys, Roland Park, and Ruxton. The Ivy Bookshop, owned by Baltimore area native, Darielle Linehan, has been open since November 28, when eager customers were waiting for her to unlock the doors.

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.

Jill Johnson, owner of Beagle Books Beagle Books owner Jill Johnson spent most of her adult career in the medical field, so when she found the 1937 former medical clinic, she felt sure it was the right place to open a bookstore.

On Wednesday, December 5, the Colorado Supreme Court heard arguments in the Tattered Cover Book Store's appeal to protect the privacy rights of bookstore customers. Law enforcement authorities have tried to obtain the Denver bookstore's records, asserting that they would assist in a case involving the manufacture of methamphetamines.

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.

Two venerable bookstores, unrelated, but with a great deal in common, celebrated major anniversaries this fall. The Booksmith in San Francisco and the Brookline Booksmith in the Boston area are both still owned by the people who founded them 25 and 40 years ago, respectively, and they both are just about the oldest businesses in their neighborhoods.