On My Mind: Last Visit to Strand Annex Is A Sad Affair

After bemoaning the demise of the Strand Annex, I finally made it over to Fulton Street this past weekend to officially say goodbye. Here's what I found:

First, a hysterical sign announcing their lease extension:
Ladders & empty shelves galore:
...and hundreds of books you've never heard of, five of which I rescued from the liquidator's grubby hands.

I spent a great deal of time perusing fiction, my favorite section, from A thru Z, and I left feeling pretty sad about the whole thing. No, it wasn't the half-vacated space and the pall of economic ruin. It was the realization that what remained a week before the Strand's original closing date was an unsentimental death sentence for the authors of the books that remained in inventory.

If you were an author and wanted to see if your book had any resonance or longevity in the world of readers, you could come to the Strand Annex before it closes and check the fiction shelves to see if your book(s) was still being sold for 50% off--a month after the sale began. And if it was, you would know that not only did the city's book lovers not want your book, but neither did the used book wholesalers or other book collectors with their esoteric taste in literature and worship of the NY Review of Books.

It's a sad thing, but the hundreds of books that remain are written a> by writers you've never heard of, b> by writers you'd heard of who who winced at mention of said failed book c> by people you've heard of like Pam Anderson or Joe Esterhaus (no joke), whose talents are best served outside long form literature or d> by writers you would like to read...one day..when you get done reading all the stuff you really want to read.

Whatever the case, let's say a little prayer for the thousands of hours of effort, anguish, hopes and dashed dreams that produced these books and for the closing of one of the only places in the city, possibly the world, where these books might have had a chance of connecting with a reader.

Home Sweet Favorites: NYC Bookstores

So I was away last weekend...if you must know, I was in California (*gasp*). Yes, my former home, whose Redwood mountains and breezy beaches still tug at my soft little heart. But this time, having only gone for three days, my return to the city was not so difficult. Funny enough, the weather is actually much nicer here than it was in northern CA, where if not for my wool sweater and Wolford tights, I would have frozen my fanny in that 50-degree early morning/nighttime weather.

But I digress. What I really want to write about is bookstores in NYC. One thing you gotta love about this city is how literate people are. People miss their subway stops, they're so engrossed in their reading. They stand in lines that snake around the block to get some indie writer to scribble his/her name in their books . Proust and Joyce and their ilk outnumber bodice rippers and thrillers in the used book bins lining Washington Square. In a country where reading is on the decline, it's easy to believe the written word still matters when you live in NYC.

Still, I'm concerned. Next week, one of my favorite neighborhood bookstores, the Strand Annex on Fulton, is closing. Now, the only bookstore I have in walking distance is a Borders on Broadway and Wall. It's a fine bookstore, but the selection is not as deep and varied as I would like it to be. Last year, the Barnes & Noble on Astor Place closed. No more creaking around their fiction stacks on hardwood floors. The gigantic B&N in Chelsea--also closed.

Our beloved bookstores are being priced out. The rents are high, and too many people are "Amazoning" - myself included. It's like global warming - I know I'm contributing to the problem, but sometimes, it's hard to make the responsible choices.

But if you are going to wean yourself off Amazon, here are some bookstores we should fight to keep around. Maybe the way to think of it is, you end up paying a few dollars more for a book, but you're paying for the privilege of walking into a bookstore, smelling the fresh paper and ink, sitting in the corner and reading the first chapter of a new book, knowing that a dozen or more people are sharing that space with you, reading some words on a page and letting their minds be carried away for one quiet, perfect moment. Bookstores are like zen spaces. I hope we keep them around.

"Home"-girl's favorite bookstores:

• The Strand - I can never walk out of this store without wanting to buy an armload of books
• McNally Jackson (former McNally Robinson)--the perfect place to go when you're sick of reading the same 10 authors over and over
• St. Marks Bookshop--remember how smart you were when you were in college? feel that way again with books on feminist theory and philosophy
• Left Bank Books -- a recent find, but what a gem. THE place to get first editions of your favorite novels.
• Kitchen Arts & Letters -- if you love cooking, this UES bookstore has nothing but cookbooks. Tell them what you feel like cooking. They'll have a recommendation.
• Barnes & Noble Union Square --it's a monolith, but that cafe area is a lodestone for the community. I can't tell you how many times I've met friends in that cafe. Or how much time I've killed before a movie browsing its four floors.
  

That's my short list, but if you need more, Books in New York is even more book-obsessed than I am. They've got an entire blog devoted to this topic.