'Readers Are Staying Loyal' to Indie bookstores

Shelf Awareness

"Area independent bookstores appear to be surviving--even in the midst of the e-reader craze and the proliferation of online booksellers," the Houston Chronicle reported after checking in with several of the city's indie booksellers.

Ellis

"A bookstore has to say, 'This is what I do best. This is what I can communicate,' " said Jeremy Ellis, general manager of Brazos Bookstore. "Digging into that--that's the trick. And that's the hardest thing."

Murder by the Book owner McKenna Jordan agreed: "We have to make sure that we're on top of our game."

Koehler

Valerie Koehler, owner of Blue Willow Bookshop, said she has "seen the industry change so much, it's unbelievable. It's changed a lot, but that's not a bad thing.... It's just a matter of finding what you do well and honing in on it.... People come to us because they trust us. We're doing fine. We're busy."

GeekWire Columnist: 'Why I Hope Bookstores Stick Around'

GeekWire columnist Mónica Guzmán was filming her baby's "small, assisted zig-zag steps" between the shelves at the Ravenna Third Place Books, Seattle, Wash., when she "looked at him and said something surprising: 'I hope bookstores still exist when you're old enough to read.' Immediately I checked myself. Did I mean that? Yeah. Apparently I did."

Admitting that for years she has "subscribed to the practical notion that e-books are probably the future," she decided she had "been missing something. Something books and bookstores have that digital itself can't replace. Something I've sensed and respected more in the last few months than I have in years. In a word, weight."Subsequent trips to the Harvard Coop, Cambridge, Mass. ("I don't know why I've hesitated to acknowledge the reverence I feel when I open the door to a bookstore and step in. All those words. A few steps in and you're surrounded.") and Seattle's Elliott Bay Book Company ("The more I think about it, the more true it seems: Bookstores are not just exhibitors of merchandise. They are temples to human thought.") confirmed her insight.

While not ready to abandon the digital book world completely, Guzmán wrote: "I never would have predicted this, back when I started reading so much on my Kindle, but I like going to bookstores now not just to discover books I haven't read, but to make contact with the books I have read and to share a space with great stories. The bookstore in my pocket is easy enough to use. But it's not this easy to feel.... I do hope bookstores stick around. But not out of a preference for bookstores or for printed books. I just think we need a place where, in our rush to condense and contain, our biggest ideas can be bigger than us."