A while back we announced a contest whereby bookstores could create a display inspired by the now-much-lauded A New Literary of America, and we'd pick the winner and showcase it on the blog. Realizing that a coveted mention on the university press blog to end all university press blogs might not be enough to entice everyone, we decided to offer as a prize the world's most versatile gift -- US dollars, five hundred of them. The winner also gets a framed, limited-edition color silkscreen of Chuck Sperry’s cover for the Twentieth Anniversary Edition of Marcus’ Lipstick Traces: A Secret History of the Twentieth Century, signed by the artist. Two runners-up get copies of the poster as well. And now, the results are in.
WINNER:
57th Street Books in Chicago assembled a menagerie of tomes from NLHA contributors paired with the works they discussed in the book, complimented by a visual theme incorporating maps of the US and the pastel color scheme utilized in the book's cover design. Behold:
RUNNER-UP:
Skylight Books in Los Angeles, California, who made explicit the lines of connection between the NHLA and the works it addresses -- with ribbon! Witness:
RUNNER-UP:
Village Books of Bellingham, Washington built on the theme of building -- a country whose idea of itself was built as we went along, and a display whose architectural merits, complete with stacked cubes and hanging transparencies, stand unparalleled. Consider:
Many congratulations to our winners and many thanks to all those who submitted, an illustrious list that includes the Harvard Book Store of Cambridge, Massachusetts, Sam Weller's Bookstore of Salt Lake City, Utah, Books and Company of Oconomowoc, Wisconsin, Vroman's Bookstore of Pasadena, California, Chaucer's Books of Santa Barbara, California, Penn Book Center of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, University Press Books of Berkeley, California, and The Booksmith of San Francisco, California. Those of you lucky enough to have an independent store in your area know that it's more than a place to buy and sell hunks of wood pulp -- as Clay Shirky explained in a recent article, bookstores, in their guise as social hubs, provide a whole range of services for their communities for which they are rarely remunerated, and without which those communities become poorer, barer places. Think of them as oases for the thoughtful, and keep them in mind this holiday season.
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