Celebrating Independent Bookstore Day (with special guests Cathy Jesson & MLA Christine Boyle)
It's Independent Bookstore Day, and to celebrate, Friendless is doing a double feature — two short conversations recorded at the Bookshelf, both circling the same question: what do bookstores actually do for us that nothing else can?
First up is MLA Christine Boyle, BC's Minister of Housing and Municipal Affairs — and a lifelong library and bookstore nerd. We talk about the physical, relational experience you can't get from an online cart, why her 11-year-old plays her like a fiddle every time they walk past a bookshop, and the climate novel her book club still hasn't forgiven her for.
Then I sit down with Cathy Jesson, the owner of Black Bond Books. Cathy started in her mother's store in Brandon, Manitoba in the sixties, moved to the coast, built the business into a three-generation family operation, and in 2012 stepped in on a five-day turnaround to save Book Warehouse from closing. She talks about running a bookstore as a business (not a pipe dream), why the magic only happens on the floor and not in the office, and what she wants customers to feel walking out on Independent Bookstore Day.
Both conversations are short, warm, and — if you're anything like me — going to send you straight to your nearest independent.
Mentioned in this episode:
- Black Bond Books, Book Warehouse, Hager Books - https://www.blackbondbooks.com/
- Ministry for the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson
- Fire Weather by John Vaillant
- A Truce That Is Not Peace by Miriam Toews
- The Women by Kristin Hannah
- Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir
- Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert Heinlein
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Fun and safety, Sweet Peas.
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