Thursday, January 24, 2008

The Washington Post Chimes in on Karibu Books Closing

The comments on the article are, of course, filled with the usual confused folk. Some are sad, some don't give a damn, and a few racists get to gloat over the dying body. Fun. Sometimes I can't stand this country.

Having personally gone through a store closing, I can attest that the next few months will be pure hell for the owners. Watching the vulture customers that had refused to patronize my business before, pick my shelves clean for bargains was like having little nails hammered into my heart. It took me years to get over the closing of my store.

A bookstore is not like any other business, it's a community. It's a place where our deepest wounds are shared, where we try to find the answers. Big business will never understand that; small-minded customers never will either. But for those that do feel the loss, God bless you. It was the emails and good-bye visits from them that helped me make it through some of the darkest days of my life. Please do the same for the owners of Karibu.

From The Washington Post by Lonnae O'Neal Parker and Hamil R. Harris:
"Black Readers Are Jolted by a Chain's Demise" —

Christopher Chambers, a Silver Spring author and Georgetown University professor who has done readings and moderated panels at Karibu, which is pronounced ka-ree-boo and means "welcome" in Swahili, said he had received more than a dozen e-mails about Karibu by yesterday morning, including one from bestselling author Walter Mosley. By the afternoon, he had 20. Chambers said the reaction to the news of the closings was "shock."

1 comments:

Anonymous said...

dropping by...nice blog and good info...take care

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