Category: Newsletter

Independent Bookstore Day is back where it belongs on the last Saturday in April. Along with independent bookstores across the country, we’ll be celebrating indie bookstore resilience and thanking all of you, our wonderful, steadfast customers!

Our party will include:

·        Free Glazed doughnut with bookstore purchase of $20 or more for the first 24 customers (1 doughnut coupon per transaction, per party) – in-store only

·         Free book with any purchase plus other assorted freebies.

One of the most exciting things about Independent Bookstore Day, are the special, limited edition products that debut that day. We will be selling the IBD exclusives in store and by phone — they won’t be on the website until after IBD and we expect many of them will sell out. If there is something you’re looking for and you won’t be shopping in person on Saturday, give us a call.

This year’s IBD exclusives include:

– Oracle cards based on Jenny Lawson’s new book, BROKEN (IN THE BEST POSSIBLE WAY) free with purchase of at least $30, in-store and by phone while supplies last.

– An IBD exclusive edition of “In the Tall Grass” by Stephen King and Joe Hill ($12.99). A short story never before in book form. Originally
published by Esquire magazine and released
as a film on Netflix in 2019. We will have 2 signed copies.

– A signed edition of SHARKS IN THE TIME OF SAVIORS by Kawai Strong Washburn ($17.00), featuring an IBD-exclusive cover.

– An exclusive signed edition of Cook, Eat, Repeat by Nigella Lawson ($31.99).

And other exclusives and surprises. . . .

For example, get a free audiobook from Libro.fm. This weekend only when you spend $15 or more at Books & Books @ The Studios of Key West (4/24–4/26) and submit your receipt to Libro.fm, you can pick a free audiobook from these featured titles. (Click for details). 

We can all use a reason to celebrate, and supporting your local, indie bookstore is as good a reason as they come.

Find the list of participating indie bookstores at: https://www.indiebound.org/independent-bookstore-day/map

One of the things we’ve missed the most this last year at the store is having visiting authors come read to a live audience.

Though we might be able to see a light at the end of the tunnel we’re still not ready to gather for in person events. Luckily, through the power of the Internet, Books and Books and our partnering organizations can bring your favorite (and new favorite) authors to the comfort and safety of your home.

January, February and March we were proud to co-sponsor the Friends of the Key West Library Lecture Series. The recordings of all six author talks can be found here.

As we enter April the store is partnering with The Studios of Key West, Books & Books in Miami, The Key West Public Library and College of the Florida Keys to continue a great lineup virtual events.

~ Emily Berg, Store Manager

Michael Patrick F. Smith
Saturday, April 3rd at 7:00pm
In partnership with The Studios of Key West

Michael Patrick F. Smith is a folksinger and playwright and current Studios of Key West Artist in Residence from central Kentucky. Like thousands of restless men left unmoored in the wake of the 2008 economic crash, Smith arrived in the fracking boomtown of Williston, North Dakota homeless, unemployed, and desperate for a job. Renting a mattress on a dirty flophouse floor, he slept boot to beard with migrant men who came from all across America and as far away as Jamaica, Africa, and the Philippines. They ate together, drank together, argued like crows, and searched for jobs they couldn’t get back home. His memoir The Good Hand  is a saga of being hired on in the oil patch where he toiled fourteen hour shifts from summer’s 100 degree dog days to deep into winter’s bracing whiteouts, all the while wrestling with the demons of a turbulent past, his broken relationships with women, and the haunted memories of a family riven by violence. Smith will be in conversation with actor Shawn Hatosy.

Register Here

Buy the book: The Good Hand

Libby Copeland
Tuesday, April 6th at 6:00pm
In partnership with The Key West Public Library

Libby Copeland is an award-winning journalist and author who writes from New York about culture and science. As a freelance journalist, she writes for such media outlets as The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Atlantic and Smithsonian Magazine. Her book, The Lost Family: How DNA Testing is Upending Who We Are, explores the rapidly evolving phenomenon of home DNA testing, its implications for how we think about family and ourselves, and its ramifications for American culture broadly. Copeland will be in conversation with store manager Emily Berg.

Register Here

Buy the book: The Lost Family: How DNA Testing is Upending Who We Are

Jenny Lawson and Judy Blume
Tuesday, April 13th at 8:00pm
In partnership with Books & Books of Coral Gables and the National JCC Literary Consortium

As Jenny Lawson’s hundreds of thousands of fans know, she suffers from depression. In Broken, she explores her experimental treatment of transcranial magnetic stimulation with brutal honesty. But also with brutal humor. Jenny discusses the frustration of dealing with her insurance company in “An Open Letter to My Insurance Company,” which should be an anthem for anyone who has ever had to call their insurance company to try and get a claim covered. She tackles such timelessly debated questions as “How do dogs know they have penises?” We see how her vacuum cleaner almost set her house on fire, how she was attacked by three bears, business ideas she wants to pitch to Shark Tank, and why she can never go back to the post office. Of course, Jenny’s long-suffering husband Victor―the Ricky to Jenny’s Lucille Ball―is present throughout. A treat for Jenny Lawson’s already existing fans, and destined to convert new ones, Broken is a beacon of hope and a wellspring of laughter. Lawson will be in conversation with author and store founder Judy Blume.

Register Here

Buy the book: Broken (in the best possible way)

Ross Gay
Thursday, April 29th at 8:00pm
In partnership with The College of the Florida Keys

 The College of the Florida Keys and the Florida Humanities Council host nationally acclaimed poet Ross Gay. Gay is the author of four books of poetry: Against Which; Bringing the Shovel Down; Be Holding; and Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude, winner of the 2015 National Book Critics Circle Award and the 2016 Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award.

Learn more & register here.

Find Gay’s books here.

Gianelle Rodriguez

Time for a bit of changing of the guard at the bookstore. Our charming, energetic and thoroughly delightful Assistant Manager Gianelle Rodriguez will be accompanying her Navy husband as he relocates to a new posting in Virginia. Gianelle was a walkup hire at the store, initially brought on for part-time back office work. But we quickly discovered we had a surprise gem and convinced her to join us full time with an ever expanding range of duties. She now tells us she’ll try to enroll full time in an MBA program, and we’ve sent her off with a glowing recommendation. We expect to see her as a CEO somewhere in the not-to-distant future.

Riona Campbell

We’re happy to announce that we’ve brought on a new full-time bookseller to cover the gap in our staffing. Riona Jean Campbell is a current resident of Islamorada, but is moving down here. She’s got a stellar background, including a Masters in Art History and Display from the University of Edinburgh, and experience in managing the Florida Keys Brewing Co. in Islamorada. And she’s a live wire. Riona jumped at the chance to join us and transfer her skills to her deep love of books. So please give a “Hi” to Riona when you’re next in the shop.

The shop is continuing with our Covid reduced hours, 12 to 5 every day, but we’re looking forward to expanding hours in near future. For the time being, the 10 to 12 period each day is reserved for browsing by appointment. Give us a call a day in advance if you’d like to set one up.

Hope to see you soon,

~ George Cooper, Store Co-founder

Some of Riona’s favorite books

We are back working at the store and SO happy to be there after a year of isolating.  We’re double dosed but masked, of course.  Recently I’ve read WE RUN THE TIDES, a novel by Vendela Vida.  I actually picked it up because George was reading it and I heard him laughing.  That caught my attention.  He said, “You are going to Love this book!”  And I did.  It’s set in the Sea Cliff section of San Francisco in the 80s.  It’s as “achingly beautiful” as it is funny.

I listened to THE FOUR WINDS by Kristin Hannah, a master storyteller.  She tells us about a family during the Dust Bowl and it’s a story filled with unforgettable characters.  My ears started to hurt from not taking out my air pods.  But I had to keep listening. (Get the digital audiobook.)

Now I’m excited to have an Advanced Reader’s Copy of the first 200 pages of Blake Bailey’s biography of Philip Roth, publishing in April.  If you’re a Roth fan as I am (some might say I’m obsessed) you have to read this book.  “Don’t try to rehabilitate me,” Roth told his biographer, “Just make me interesting.”  Baily has certainly done that.  A great biographer writing about a great writer.  You can pre-order your copy now.  And if you haven’t read Roth this might be the time to start.  My go-to title is AMERICAN PASTORAL. 

Happy Reading!

Xx

~ Store Co-founder, Judy Blume

Keep up with news about the store, including what we’re reading, new events, sales, and an occasional update from Judy Blume. Subscribe to our email newsletter.

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Dear Friends,

Who knew, a year ago, what was coming?  Who knew George and I would have to stop working at the store on March 14 and wouldn’t be able to get back for almost 12 months?  We’ve missed being there so much. Yesterday we got our 2^nd doses of the vaccine and in three weeks we plan to be working at the store again. It’s been a long year for all of us and we hope you’re safe and well.

So – February! The month of love – with Valentine’s Day coming up. Get your honey a book this year. Maybe love poems, maybe not. Maybe a great novel. I just read the latest from Vendela Vida, We Run the Tides, in our store now. I read it after hearing George chuckling while listening to the audio book. “Oh, you’re going to love this book!” he kept saying. And he was right. From the first paragraph I was hooked. The voice – that ephemeral quality we talk about when we talk about fresh, original, unforgettable – in this case the voice is 14 year old Eulabie’s. Her neighborhood is in the Sea Cliff area of San Francisco. The adults are equally well drawn, and the situations –  you want to stop her and shake her and say, Don’t! Funny, honest, heartbreaking, yet satisfying.

And how about a Valentine treat for the little ones in your life?  If you can’t come in to browse, tell us the age and interest and we’ll find a picture book for you. Or a middle grade story. For older teens, Jennifer Niven’s latest YA, Breathless. She says it’s her ode to Forever but I like it better. Sexy and romantic. You don’t have to be a teen to enjoy this book. But you may wish you’d had a first love like this one.

Then there are the two authors I’ll be talking to in the next month. First, Lily King, whose latest novel, Writers and Lovers, a book I liked so much I read it twice in a row, is now out in paperback. I’ll be talking to Lily on a Zoom as part of the Friends of the Library series on Feb 15.

And on March 2 I’ll be chatting with Susan Conley in a virtual event for Books & Books – about her new book, Landslide, another novel I devoured and highly recommend to all. Susan and Lily are friends, they live in Maine, the setting for Susan’s book. A stormy story in many ways, a marriage that may or may not survive, parenting teen boys, work, and a nor’easter that sets it all in motion. You’ll be thinking about these characters long after you read the last page.

Our bookstore will celebrate its 5^th birthday on Saturday, Feb 13. With a drive by, walk by, bike by party. Can you believe it’s been five years?  We can’t. We’ll be there in our mini with the top down for masked and socially distanced greetings. Hope you can stop by.  And maybe even buy a book.

We have to thank our loyal and hard-working staff for keeping the store going this year. Emily, Gianelle, Lori, Robin. You are the best!  And big thanks to you, our loyal customers for doing your part. A special shoutout to Meg Cabot, who told her readers to order her books from our store. We love you, Meg!

Let’s hope it won’t be long until we can meet in person for store events. For now, we’re open and ready to help in any way we can.

Stay well.

For Black History Month this year our focus is on fiction.

The theme for Black History Month this year is “Our Fiction, Our Truth,” and is celebrating the great stories told by Black writers, from Toni Morrison and James Baldwin to exciting new writers.

We have plenty of nonfiction on display dealing with race and Black history and lives, but we want to highlight the range of fiction showcasing the breadth and depth of Black experiences.

We’ve chosen a stunning debut novel, The Prophets by Robert Jones, Jr. as our new Virtual Book Club selection.

Isaiah and Samuel are teenagers, lovers and slaves. The tenderness of their love affair is contrasted by the physical, emotional and sexual abuse perpetrated against people who were not viewed as human but as property.

“A hard read, but very rewarding,” says bookseller Lori.

Our virtual book club gives us the chance to share a book we love with other readers far and near. Share your thoughts and photos with our virtual book club on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram by using the hashtag: #bbkwbookclub.

BIRTHDAY PARADE AND CELEBRATION
SATURDAY, FEB. 13th 2021
1-3pm

Books & Books at the Studios is turning 5! 

We want to celebrate with all of you, the customers that have helped us have a successful 5 years of bookselling. In person parties still aren’t a reality for us so to celebrate safely we’re inviting everyone to join us in a birthday parade.

Decorate your car, bike or scooter and come by the store to show off your work between 1pm and 3pm on Saturday, February 13th. We’ll snap a photo of your decorative mobile and put it up on our website. Online voting will determine a winner to receive a store gift certificate for $55.

We’re also handing out mini cupcakes and special edition bookmarks that day while supplies last. 

No pre-registration necessary. Just include the phrase “Happy Birthday Books & Books” in decorations to be entered to win the gift card. Voting will open at 5pm on 2/13 and run through 2/16 at 5pm on our website. Winner will be announced Wednesday, 2/17.