Read This!: Handpicked Favorites from America's Indie Bookstores

by Hans Weyandt (Editor), Ann Patchett (Introduction)

Overview

“There is no greater joy for a bookseller than introducing a reader to a book they will love for the rest of their lives. Those of us in this business are, after all, matchmakers at heart. So consider this little book you now hold in your hands a sort of catalog of matchmakers.”—Ann Patchett

"If I were still a bookseller, I'd be thrilled to share this wealth with my customers. As a reader, I'm deeply intrigued by the range of selections. . . . Do yourself a favor. Add Micawber's Top 50 project to your must-read list."—Robert Gray, Shelf Awareness

This book offers lists of favorites that have flown under the radar, but off of bookstore shelves. First published on Hans Weyandt's blog for Micawber's Books, each list includes a bookseller's top fifty books, anecdotes, and interviews about the life of being a bookseller, reader, and engaged citizen. All proceeds will go to American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression (ABFFE).

Contributing bookstores include Book Passage, Tattered Cover Book Store, Three Lives & Company, Boswell Books, City Lights Bookstore, BookCourt, Harvard Book Store, Carmichael's Bookstore, Prairie Lights, The King's English Bookshop, Square Books, Magers & Quinn, Micawber's Books, Unabridged Bookstore, Regulator Bookshop, Subterranean Books, Faulkner House Books, Skylight Books, Maria's Bookshop, Inkwood Books, Rakestraw Books, RiverRun Bookstore, Sherman's Books and Stationary, Iowa Book, and Fireside Books.

Hans Weyandt is a co-owner at Micawber's Books, an independent bookstore in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Ann Patchett is the best-selling author of five novels, including Run, Bel Canto, and most recently, State of Wonder. She owns Parnassus Bookstore in Nashville, Tennnessee.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781566893138
Publisher:	Coffee House Press
Publication date:	08/21/2012
Series:	Books in Action
Pages:	200
Product dimensions:	4.40(w) x 6.40(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Hans Weyandt: Hans Weyandt is a co-owner at Micawber's Books, an independent bookstore in St. Paul. He lives in Minneapolis.

Table of Contents

Introduction by Ann Patchett
Preface by Hans Weyandt
Book lists, annotations, and anecdotes from Sheryl Cotleur (Book Passage), Neil Strandberg (Tattered Book Cover), Toby Cox (Three Lives & Co.), Stacie Williams (Boswell Books), Paul Yamazaki (City Lights Bookstore), Emma Straub (BookCourt), Megan Sullivan (Harvard Book Store), Michael Boggs (Carmichael's Bookstore), Paul Ingram (Prairie Lights), Jenny Lyons (King's English), Cody Morrison (Square Books), Jay Peterson (Magers & Quinn), Hans Weyandt (Micawber's Books), Stean Moorehead (Unabridged Bookstore), Tom Campbell (Regulator Bookshop), Kelly von Plonski (Subterranean Books), Joseph DeSalvo (Faulkner House Books), Emily Pullen (Skylight Books), Libby Cowles (Maria's Bookshop), Carla Jimenz (Inkwood Books), Michael Barnard (Rakestraw Books), Liberty Hardy (RiverRun Bookstore), Josh Christie (Sherman's Books and Stationary), Matt Lage (Iowa Book LLC), Eowyn Ivey (Fireside Books).

Editorial Reviews

Selected as the nonfiction pick in the Fall 2012 Great Lakes Great Reads by the Great Lakes Independent Booksellers Association!

Late Night Library, Recommended Books for February(2/1/13)

"There is no greater joy for a bookseller than introducing a reader to a book they will love for the rest of their lives. Those of us in this business are, after all, matchmakers at heart. So consider this little book you now hold in your hands as a sort of catalogue of matchmakers." —Ann Patchett, From the Introduction

“[R]ead This! Compiles ... Expertise of booksellers from all over the country into one cheerful red volume.”—Los Angeles Times

“Read This! Is a handy guide . . . Compil[ing] lists of recommendations from booksellers across the country. Along with each list, booksellers offer short essays that give you a sense of their taste and perspective. It’s a smart approach that guides readers through a subjective minefield. With only so many hours in our lives to read, who wants to waste time on a book that isn’t quite meant for them?”—Chicago Tribune’s Printers Row Journal


"These professionals demonstrate exceptional curatorial care and a discernible passion for the art of bookselling, a craft Weyandt calls a 'combo platter of bartender/barista and priest.' [E]ntertaining, informative, satisfying and fun—everything books should be."—Kirkus

“Not sure which book to buy? Stop in Micawber’s and they’ll tell you. They’re so good at recommending books that co-owner, Hans Weyandt, just released his own book called Read This! Handpicked Favorites From America’s Indie Bookstores. [I]f you really want to be a good gift-giver this season, pair this book with one of your favorites.”—Southwest Journal

“If books are conversations between people through the ages, then our booksellers are those keeping the communication alive. That’s why Read This! is a deceptively powerful book.”—The Rumpus

“Read This! . . . will make a perfect curl-up-under-the-covers autumn companion for your favorite bookworm.”—Twin Cities Daily Planet

"If I were still a bookseller, I'd be thrilled to share this wealth with my customers. As a reader, I'm deeply intrigued by the range of selections. . . . Do yourself a favor. Add Micawber's Top 50 project to your must-read list." —Robert Gray, Shelf Awareness

“I love this little book, and I think you might, too. . . . I guarantee you’ll come away with a whole slew of things on your ‘to-read’ list and a renewed affection and appreciation for your neighborhood bookslingers.” —Knight Arts Blog

“Although Weyandt is now often introduced at events as an editor or author, he said (with a generous measure of bookish intensity): ‘First and foremost, forever and always, I will be a bookseller.’"—Shelf Awareness


“Hans nails what I think is the point of this book on the head: let’s talk about how independent bookstores are succeeding, let’s talk about the ways in which they are thriving . . . Let’s celebrate the books, and the people that bring us together over those very same books.”—Hazel & Wren

“Take it with you as a tour guide on your next visit to one of the cities, or use it to figure out which book you’re going to pick up next. A gem among gems.”—Hazel & Wren, “The Liter-nerdy Holiday Gift Guide”

“[A]n INDISPENSABLE book guide.”—Books are my Boyfriends

From the Publisher

Selected independent booksellers offer their Top 50 lists. "The desire to share books is the natural outcome of loving them," writes award-winning novelist Ann Patchett in her lively preface to this lovingly rendered "catalogue of matchmakers." Editor Weyandt, co-owner of Micawber's Books in St. Paul, Minn., developed the idea after a customer asked him to share a list of personal favorites. He continued the tradition, asking booksellers from across the country to contribute their lists and offer insight into whom they trust to recommend books, the reading material on their own nightstands, and the keys to operating a successful independent bookstore in today's challenging marketplace. These professionals demonstrate exceptional curatorial care and a discernible passion for the art of bookselling, a craft Weyandt calls a "combo platter of bartender/barista and priest." They include many family-run establishments like BookCourt in Brooklyn, N.Y., with two floors and three help desks, and Fireside Books in Palmer, Alaska, home to the "world's first bookish, blogging bear." Some offer specialty products, like Chicago's Unabridged Bookstore and eclectic Skylight Books in Los Angeles, which stock extensive collections of gay and lesbian material. The diverse best-of lists ably represent Weyandt's varied cross-section of literary connoisseurs. Classics appear alongside older and newer perennial favorites by authors like Donna Tartt, Toni Morrison, Lorrie Moore, Jonathan Franzen, Jeffrey Eugenides and Zadie Smith. Proceeds go to the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression, a group that fights literary censorship and supports struggling bookstores. In sharing titles and ideas, handselling becomes, as bookseller and author Eowyn Ivey of Fireside Books remarks, "a small but heartfelt gift, one reader to another." Entertaining, informative, satisfying and fun--everything books should be.

Kirkus Reviews