Party for pageturners: indie bookstores celebrating; you’re invited

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This article was published 28/04/2023 (1250 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

CANADIAN independent bookstores are throwing themselves a party, and everyone’s invited.

On Saturday, the third Canadian Independent Bookstore Day (CIBD) takes place at indie shops across the country, celebrating the continued success — against all odds — of booksellers small and large(r).

The party is the brainchild of the Canadian Independent Booksellers Association, a nationwide network of stores working together to foster awareness about independent shops of all shapes and sizes. Established in 2020, the association threw the first Canadian Independent Bookstore Day in 2021, with an emphasis on virtual readings and other events in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The association, currently helmed by McNally Robinson Booksellers co-owner Chris Hall, took inspiration from its American counterparts’ Independent Bookstore Day.

“It’s really just to raise the profile of booksellers,” Hall says. “When the association came along, it became a real national party — online, mostly — for us to connect with each other, bookstore to bookstore, but also how our customers are connected with each other.”

The association launched with just over 80 booksellers, and now boasts more than 120 member shops including both local McNally Robinson locations, Whodunit? Mystery Bookstore on Lilac Street and Willow Press, a relatively new queer/author-owned shop at 214 Osborne St. which works to highlight marginalized voices.

Participating shops are hoping bookworms take part by visiting stores, picking up books and posting about their purchases and experiences online using the hashtag #CIBD2023.

“They can share and see what everybody else is doing — not just in Winnipeg, but across the country,” says Hall.

McNally Robinson has plenty in store for CIBD, with some help from other arts and culture organizations in the community.

“We’ve got prizes and giveaways throughout the day in the store — we used to tie it all to purchases, but we’re not anymore,” says Angela Torgerson, general manager of McNally Robinson’s Grant Park location. “There’ll be baskets of books and gift cards and lots of swag, lots of giveaways, that sort of thing.”

While CIBD doesn’t yet have the means to roll out special-edition books the way bands, labels and shops do for Record Store Day, there’s a hope the event will snowball into something bigger, with plenty of hype and the occasional special release.

“(British mystery author) Ann Cleeves has an independent-bookseller-day exclusive (the novella Too Good to Be True) that’s being released on Canadian Independent Bookstore Day, with bookplate-signed copies,” says Torgerson.

“Publishers are getting more and more co-ordinated,” adds Hall. “It takes months to pull something off. Now they’re getting to know what to expect.”

CIBD celebrations give bookstores the chance to showcase how they’re different from big-box shops, online retail giants and other places to get books.

“It’s exciting to be able to highlight the differences in what independent booksellers can provide,” says Torgerson. “You look at the national bestseller list versus ours, and we’re often selling completely different books. It’s a great day to highlight that, and highlight books we’re excited about.”

Hall and Torgerson are as eager to celebrate the store as they are their customers.

“The first year, some of our regulars knew about it. By last year, people were really, really engaging online,” says Torgerson. “You could sort of feel a buzz in the store, which we hadn’t felt since (before the pandemic). People were talking about it, they were aware of what was going on online, there were folks posting about it.

“It continues to grow… we’re really excited.”

ben.sigurdson@winnipegfreepress.com

Twitter: @bensigurdson