Bellingham, WA
This cheerful, multi-level shop in the Fairhaven neighborhood gets top marks for innovative marketing and outreach. New, used and sale books are shelved side-by-side. Authors can sell their books on consignment. Readers are urged to take the “One Book Pledge” – promising to buy one book from an independent store that they might otherwise buy online or from a chain. The shop hosts 250 events annually, and its five reading/discussion groups include those for Engaged Citizens and Environmental Conservation. Village Books also has an Espresso Book Machine – one of about 30 in the entire country – that allows patrons to produce their own work in a matter of minutes or to print obscure titles that are in the public domain.
Outside Village Books with “Dirty Dan” Harris, the founder of Fairhaven.
