5 Questions for Brookline Booksmith

by ZYZZYVA

Brookline Booksmith opened its doors in 1961, during John F. Kennedy’s first year in office—three blocks from where the future president was born in 1917. Named for its founder, Marshall Smith, who died in 2022, the Booksmith has been a vital and valued part of Brookline’s Coolidge Corner community, just up the hill from Boston. Lisa Gozashti is now the store’s owner, along with Peter Win. ZYZZYVA: What’s the coziest spot in your store for reading?   LISA GOZASHTI: We have two comfy midcentury modernish chairs in front of a large window that faces the street, with a small table to […]

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5 Questions for Christopher’s Books

by ZYZZYVA

Every neighborhood deserves at least one good bookstore. For Potrero Hill, a desirable residential area with commanding views of nearby downtown San Francisco, that store is Christopher’s Books. The small street corner shop has been in business since 1991. Jackson Tejeda is its assistant manager. ZYZZYVA: What’s the coziest spot in your store for reading? JACKSON TEJEDA: My favorite spot is in this comfy old wooden chair that we set outside the door on sunny days. Customers sometimes buy books and then sit in the chair in the sun and start reading. This is particularly enjoyable for me as a bookseller when they’ve just […]

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5 Questions for Politics and Prose

by ZYZZYVA

Politics and Prose, Washington, D.C.’s, premier independent bookstore, has been in business since the Reagan Administration—to be precise, the fittingly novelistic year of 1984. Since that time, the store has grown from two employees (the original owners, Carla Cohen and Barbara Meade) to a staff of more than 100 in three locations. Among the store’s many patrons are two local authors: Barack and Michelle Obama. We talked to Wendy Wasserman, the store’s director of marketing and communications. ZYZZYVA: What’s the coziest spot in your store for reading? WENDY WASSERMAN: Cozy can mean so much. For the little ones, we have […]

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5 Questions for Vroman’s

by ZYZZYVA

In 1894, the first-ever commercial motion picture house—a Kinetoscope parlor—opened its doors in New York City. That same year, in the region that would become the movie capital of the world, Adam Clark Vroman opened a bookstore in Pasadena, California. That business, now with two locations in Los Angeles County, remains open to this day—Vroman’s is the oldest and largest independent bookstore in Southern California. Guy Lopez is one of the store’s booksellers. ZYZZYVA: What’s the coziest spot in your store for reading? GUY LOPEZ: The whole store is cozy, but the coziest spot that comes to mind is a lovely […]

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5 Questions for Elliott Bay Book Company

by ZYZZYVA

Elliott Bay Book Company opened as a small shop in Seattle’s Pioneer Square in 1973. A half-century later, Elliott Bay, now in the Capitol Hill neighborhood, is the city’s largest independent bookstore, housing more than 150,000 titles. Tracy Taylor is Elliott Bay’s co-owner (along with Joey Burgess and Murf Hall). ZYZZYVA: What’s the coziest spot in your store for reading? TRACY TAYLOR: Inside the castle in the kids’ section. It’s hidden and carpeted and when the store is quiet, it’s bliss. Z: What’s a little-known fact about your store? TT: Most of the windows at the bookstore were broken during […]

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5 Questions for City Lights

by John McMurtrie

City Lights, the San Francisco bookstore cherished the world over, is celebrating its 70th anniversary this year. Founded by Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Peter D. Martin as the first all-paperback bookstore in the country, the North Beach landmark today stocks a great variety of titles (no longer just paperbacks) on three floors. Elaine Katzenberger, the publisher of City Lights Booksellers & Publishers, has worked at the store since 1987. ZYZZYVA asked her to inaugurate our new weekly feature devoted to independent bookstores. She answered our questions from New York City, where she accepted the National Book Critics Circle’s Toni Morrison Achievement […]

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