The estimable Harvard/MIT/Yale representative, Patricia Nelson, writes this week:

What’s a day without a bookstore? We cherish you all as wonderful retreats, browsing heavens, the perfect place to meet, the perfect date, the perfect outing with children, a wonderful daily oasis, a welcoming place of solitude, a magic theater of words, a generous place of discussion and shared passions, a constantly surprising calendar of authors and ideas, a communitarian center, a place of democracy in action.

The Guardian UK has been posting favorite bookstores for years, may I echo the sentiments of the Guardian’s  Jeremy Mercer saying:

“Bookstores are sanctuaries. Places to lose yourself, escape the harsh demands of daily life, find new ways to dream and new sources of inspiration. I love all booksellers; anybody who helps spread the word is doing noble work. But my favourite bookstores are the small eccentric independents run by passionate and usually slightly mad book lovers.”

We are often told by customers that they love our bookstore.  We do, too. It is a wonderful place full of interesting books and people.  We sit around the Great Table in the tranquil back room and hear proud authors tell us what they have learned. We talk to customers at the front desk.  We read some of the books we sell, and we are better for that.

Yet, we suffer, as so many other book places have, decline. When Cody’s went down a few years ago, The Express wrote that it had died the “death of a thousand cuts.”  We know some of those cuts and these are difficult times for bookstores, but we also know there is much to keep us going, including the great publishers we represent, the many hundreds of local authors we want to support, and the pleasures of being in Berkeley and next door to our sister business, the Musical Offering & Cafe.

We ask you to Become a Friend of UPB.

UPB Conversation with Phyllis Faber and Elisabeth Ptak of Marin Agricultural Land Trust and Marty Knapp, Pt. Reyes photographer, on HOW ART HELPS TO PRESERVE & PROTECT THE LANDSCAPE FOR FUTURE GENERATIONS