Buying it here

Northwest Michigan has Lake Michigan, lighthouses, Earl Young’s mushroom houses, lots of trees,  lots of nice people and lots of good restaurants, all of which I have been enjoying this week, but mostly I have been appreciating its surprisingly active and arty downtowns and the independent bookstores located in those downtowns.

I’m from Ohio, where most people ignore their downtowns and shop at Walmart. If they buy books, they get them at Barnes and Noble or from Amazon. Independent bookstores? What are they? I think there’s a Barnes and Noble in Traverse City, but I’ve never seen it in three trips to this area. But I know the city has Brilliant Books on Front Street, which is where I stopped again yesterday.

Smaller towns in the area each has its own bookstore, and each seemed to have a steady stream of customers when I was there this week. Charlevoix has Round Lake Books, Harbor Springs has Between the Covers and Petoskey has McLean & Eakin, not just the best bookstore in the area but one of the best you’ll find anywhere. At least author Ann Patchett thinks so, and she has her own bookstore in Nashville (which is good, but not this good).

McLean & Eakin is a deep, narrow, beautifully designed bookshop that has everything, or so it would appear. I saw books there I’ve seen nowhere else, and I bought some of them. Here and at least one other bookstore in the area I saw a sign that read, “Find it here. Buy it here. Keep us here.” That alludes to the curse of independent bookstores: people find it there, then buy it cheaper somewhere else. I like book bargains as much anyone else, but I decided to follow the spirit of that slogan on this trip in hopes all four stores will still be here on my next trip north.

At McLean & Eakin I purchased Miss Kopp Just Won’t Quit by Amy Stewart, I Shot the Buddha by Colin Cotterill, Rise & Shine, Benedict Stone by Phaedra Patrick and The Care and Feeding of an Independent Bookstore by Ann Patchett. Three of the four I haven’t seen, or even seen mentioned, anywhere else.

During my stop in Harbor Springs, a charming town I hadn’t visited before, I found So Much Life Left Over by Louis de Bernieres. In Charlevoix I bought The First Love Story: Adam, Eve and Us by Bruce Feiler. Then yesterday at Brilliant Books I came away with Nicholas Nickleby by Charles Dickens. I paid full price for all but the Feiler book, which was on the half-price table.

Do I feel guilty for spending so much money? Yes, I do, but not nearly as guilty as I would if I had found the books here then bought them from Amazon.