The Bookshop

An Evening with Evan Friss and Joe Fassler

 
 

Thursday, October 10th | 6pm

Bookstores have always been unlike any other kind of store, shaping readers and writers, and influencing our tastes, thoughts, and politics. They nurture local communities while creating new ones of their own. Bookshops are powerful spaces, but they are also endangered ones. In The Bookshop, we see the stakes: what has been, and what might be lost.

In The Bookshop, Evan Friss draws on oral histories, archival collections, municipal records, diaries, letters, and interviews with leading booksellers to offer a fascinating look at this institution beloved by so many. A love letter to bookstores, the result is a charming chronicle for anyone who cherishes these sanctuaries of literature, and essential reading to understand how these vital institutions have shaped American life—and why we still need them.

Event Details:

  • This event is free and open to the public. Registration is not required, but we’d appreciate an RSVP over on Facebook!

  • All book festival events, unless otherwise noted, will take place at the Midtown Scholar Bookstore’s main stage.

  • Seating is general admission; first come, first served.

  • A public book signing will immediately follow the discussion. Purchasing an author’s new or previously published book from the Midtown Scholar Bookstore is required for entry to the signing line. (Additional copies of a book may also be signed if time permits).

About the Speaker:

Evan Friss is a professor of history at James Madison University and the author of two other books: The Cycling City: Bicycles and Urban America in the 1890s and On Bicycles: A 200-Year History of Cycling in New York City. He lives with his wife (a bookseller) and two children (occasional booksellers) in Harrisonburg, Virginia.\

Joe Fassler is a writer and editor based in Denver, Colorado. He is an MFA graduate of the  Iowa Writers’ Workshop, and his fiction has appeared in The Boston Review and Electric Literature. In 2013, Fassler started The Atlantic’s “By Heart” series, in which he interviewed authors—including Stephen King, Elizabeth Gilbert, Amy Tan, Khaled Hosseini, Carmen Maria Machado, Viet Thanh Nguyen, and more—about the literature that shaped their lives and work. That led to editing Light the Dark, a book-length collection that included favorites from “By Heart” alongside new contributions. Fassler’s nonfiction has appeared in The New York Times, Bloomberg Businessweek, The Guardian, Longreads, and The Best American Food Writing. Fassler currently teaches writing at Vermont’s Sterling College. The Sky Was Ours is his first novel.