Nonprofit Bookstore Opens in Bend and New Missoula Lit Mag Launches

By Jenny Shank, 7-09-08

Idealistic optimism in the book world is not dead: David Jasper of the Bend Bulletin reported that Kilns Bookstore, a nonprofit enterprise, opened in Bend over the holiday weekend.  (Via Shelf Awareness.) Jasper writes, “The opening comes just more than a month after The Book Barn, a 35-year-old shop in nearby downtown, closed due to declining sales and stiff competition from online retailers such as Amazon.”

Owners Kim Hunt and Ken Wytsma will staff the bookstore with volunteers, and channel profits to several charities.  They plan to sell books at a discount, “mostly historical, philosophical and human rights tomes, along with some poetry and classic fiction chosen at its founders’ discretion.”

Rick Bass recently reviewed Stephen Trimble‘s new book, Bargaining for Eden: The Fight for the Last Open Spaces in America for the Boston Globe.  Bass concludes:

“Whether buttressed by the description of Holding’s development of an entire valley high in the snowy mountains of Utah or of Trimble’s own modest home, Bargaining for Eden convincingly asserts that the protection of the wildest country on our public lands is necessary to preserve that quality of America so famously described by the great Wallace Stegner as ‘the geography of hope.’ The case Trimble makes is well illustrated, and also troubling testimony to the speed with which a birthright is now slipping away.”

Watch for David Frey’s review of Trimble’s book on New West soon.

Denise Hill at the NewPages blog noted the arrival of the premier issue of a new literary magazine called The Oval, published by University of Montana undergraduates.  The first issue features the work of students at the U of M exclusively, and subsequent issues will be open to contributors from colleges and universities across the country.

Speaking of literary magazines, the Wyoming Arts blog noted that the prestigious Virginia Quarterly Review has published Casper-based writer Nina McConigley’s story “Cowboys and East Indians” in its new issue.  (An excerpt is available here.) McConigley is working on her first novel and is on the planning committee for the upcoming Equality State Book Festival.

The Colorado Book Award finalists were recently announced, and among the finalists are a bunch of books that we’ve reviewed here over the past year.  In the Anthology/Collection category, we reviewed two of the three finalists, Home Land: Ranching and a West That Works, and Pulse of the River: Colorado Writers Speak for the Endangered Cache La Poudre (Laura Pritchett had a hand in both those books).  In the Creative Nonfiction category, Jim Sheeler’s Obit is a finalist.  In Fiction, Migration Patterns by Gary Schanbacher is in the running.  And in General Nonfiction, one of my favorite books of last year, Cruisin’ the Fossil Freeway by Kirk Johnson and Ray Troll, is a finalist.  Winners will be announced on October 8.

Finally, Denver writer and media personality David Sirota, author of The Uprising (which Robert Struckman recently reviewed for New West) will be presenting his book this week at The Readers Cove in Ft. Collins (July 14, 6:30 p.m.), the Boulder Bookstore (July 15, 7 p.m.), and the Tattered Cover (Colfax location, July 16, 7:30 p.m.).

Have some regional literary news or events to share?  If so,