Bindlestiff Books plays a starring role in a short film promoting the debut novel by Philadelphian Elizabeth Green, Confessions of a Curious Bookseller. The book is set in a used bookstore in the “heart of West Philadelphia,” steps from Clark Park. In the film our store plays the part of the used bookstore (though of course we have never sold used books), and the author plays the part of the proprietor of said store. The novel itself is epistolary, told through email messages, journal entries and tweets that chronicle her battles to keep the store open and reboot her life. We have the book in stock, you can find the film here.
Holiday Hours
3 DecWe are closed Dec. 25.
Saturday, Dec. 26: We will be open Noon – 7
Sunday, Dec. 27: Noon – 5
Closed Monday and Tuesday
Wednesday, Dec. 30: Noon – 7
Thursday, Dec. 31: Noon – 3:30 (and possibly later)
Friday, Jan. 1: Closed
Upcoming event celebrates Philly authors; notable books of 2020
22 NovWords of Revolution; Words of Solace Join Blue Stoop, a home for Philly writers, on Saturday, December 5 at 7pm for a very exciting event! Purchase your tax-deductible sliding scale ticket here.
Words of Revolution; Words of Solace, is a fully captioned innovative video program produced by award-winning Philadelphia cinematographer Aly Spengler and featuring readings from ten of the most exciting voices writing in and around Philadelphia today: Brittney Cooper, Myriam Gurba, Anne Ishii, Airea Matthews, Trapeta Mayson, Kiley Reid, Nikil Saval, Eric Smith, Amber Sparks, and Elissa Washuta. Featured writers will perform words written by their heroes relevant to the ideas of revolution and of solace. Sit back and settle in!
The National Book Foundation has announced its 2020 awards in fiction, non-fiction, poetry, translated literature and young people’s literature: https://www.nationalbook.org/awards-prizes/national-book-awards-2020/
The New York Times’ 100 Notable Books of 2020 can be found here: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/books/notable-books.html
2021 Calendars
13 OctWe presently have in Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Nikki McClure calendars, along with Slingshot and We’Moon organizers. The Solidarity Forever labor history calendar will be here by the end of October
Bindlestiff Bestsellers
19 SepThese are our best-selling titles for the last month, in descending order of sales:
Ibram Kendi, How to Be an Antiracist
Zadie Smith, Intimations: Six Essays
Isabel Wilkerson, Caste: The Origins of our Discontents
Brit Bennett, The Vanishing Half: A Novel
bell hooks, All About Love: New Visions
Mikki Kendall, Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women That a Movement Forgot
Richard Rothstein, The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America
Robin Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants
Bettina Love, We Want to Do More Than Survive: Abolitionist Teaching and the Pursuit of Educational Freedom
Ibram Kendi, Antiracist Baby
Zetta Elliott, A Place Inside of Me: A Poem to Heal the Heart (picture book)
NK Jemisin, The City We Became
Aminatou Sow and Ann Friedman, Big Friendship: How We Keep Each Other Close
Ta-Nehisi Coates, Between the World and Me
Richard Powers, The Overstory: A Novel
Resmaa Menakem, My Grandmother’s Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies
Octavia Butler, Parable of the Sower
Mary Trump, Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man
Making Worlds reopens
19 SepWest Philly’s newest bookstore/community space, Making Worlds, is reopening Thursday, Sept. 24. They are at 210 S 45th Street, and are reopening on a limited basis from 3 to 7 pm, Thursday through Sunday.
Bindlestiff Bestsellers
15 AugThese are our best-selling titles for the last month, in descending order of sales:
Jason Reynolds and Ibram Kendi, Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You
Colson Whitehead, The Nickel Boys
Ibram Kendi, How to Be an Antiracist
Resmaa Menakem, My Grandmother’s Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies
Richard Rothstein, The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America
Zadie Smith, Intimations: Six Essays
Brit Bennett, The Vanishing Half: A Novel
Ijeoma Oluo, So You Want to Talk About Race
Kelly Starling Lyons, Going Down Home with Daddy (picture book)
Mikki Kendall, Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women That a Movement Forgot
Ibram Kendi, Antiracist Baby
Richard Powers, The Overstory: A Novel
Robin Diangelo, White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism
bell hooks, All About Love: New Visions
Neil Gaiman, ed., Unnatural Creatures: Short Stories Selected by Neil Gaiman
Mary Trump, Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man
Robert MacFarlane, The Lost Words (picture book)
Zetta Elliott, A Place Inside of Me: A Poem to Heal the Heart (picture book)
NK Jemisin, The City We Became
Jenny Odell, How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy
Duncan Tonatiuh, Separate Is Never Equal: Sylvia Mendez and Her Family’s Fight for Desegregation (picture book)
Janet Hardy, The Ethical Slut, Third Edition: A Practical Guide to Polyamory, Open Relationships, and Other Freedoms in Sex and Love
Robin Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants
Andrea D’Aquino, A Life Made by Hand: The Story of Ruth Asawa (picture book)
N.K. Jemisin, How Long ’til Black Future Month?: Stories
Bindlestiff Bestsellers
11 JulThese are our best-selling titles for the last month, in descending order of sales:
Marianne Celano, Marietta Collins and Ann Hazzard, Something Happened in Our Town: A Child’s Story About Racial Injustice
Marc Martin, A River (picture book)
Kimberly Ridley, The Secret Bay (picture book)
Ibram Kendi, How to Be an Antiracist
NK Jemisin, The City We Became
Jason Reynolds and Ibram Kendi, Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You
Michelle Alexander, The New Jim Crow
Brit Bennett, The Vanishing Half: A Novel
Robin Diangelo, White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism
Angela Davis, Freedom Is a Constant Struggle: Ferguson, Palestine, and the Foundations of a Movement
Resmaa Menakem, My Grandmother’s Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies
Ta-Nehisi Coates, Between the World and Me
Richard Rothstein, The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America
Madeline Miller, Circe
Zora Hurston, Barracoon: The Story of the Last “Black Cargo”
Robin Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants
Ijeoma Oluo, So You Want to Talk About Race
James Baldwin, The Fire Next Time
Gaia Cornwall, Jabari Jumps (picture book)
Samuel Otter, Philadelphia Stories: America’s Literature of Race and Freedom
Tami Charles, Freedom Soup (picture book)
Octavia Butler, Lilith’s Brood
Mikki Kendall, Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women That a Movement Forgot
Adreienne Maree Brown, Pleasure Activism: The Politics of Feeling Good
Saidiya Hartman, Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments: Intimate Histories of Riotous Black Girls, Troublesome Women, and Queer Radicals
Closed July 4
2 JulBindlestiff Books will be closed Saturday, July 4. We will be open Sunday, July 5, for curbside orders/pickup only.
My Indoor Adventures children’s writing contest
14 JunThe deadline for the My Indoor Adventures submissions has been extended to July 1. details at: https://abookaday.edublogs.org/our-community/
Here’s a link to a short video about the project: https://drive.google.com/file/d/15xO-ppRywmL-D1HFgm3Pp-VBvqHdeKlt/view?usp=sharing