Candice Huber, Tubby & Coo's Mid-City Bookshop, New Orleans, LA

We all know that book bans and challenges aren’t new. Many of us have been fighting this fight for a long time. Recently, here in Louisiana, as in many other places, we’ve had an onslaught of book challenges. There is a very organized group going around the state and challenging the same books in each place, trying to get them removed from public libraries, or at least cordoned off into a “special” section. In February, this group decided to hit my local library in Jefferson Parish. Through a coordinated grassroots effort, we were able to stop them. Here’s how we did it!

First, it’s important to establish relationships with your local librarians. Because I am friends with mine, they came to me almost immediately to let me know that a book challenge was happening and to ask for my help. This book banning group had challenged twelve books in the library, and due to the current process, the books had been removed from the shelves and placed in the Library Director’s office “pending review.”

Since this book banning conglomerate had already struck in Lafayette, Livingston, and St. Tammany, I was aware of several groups that had already been through this, as well as a state level anti-censorship group. I got in touch with those groups, and they were more than willing to share information with me on who these people were, their tactics, and what had already worked and not worked for them in fighting against censorship. I spent some time gathering information, talking to these other groups and the librarians, contacting ABFE, looking at the Unite Against Book Bans website to get talking points, and researching our hyper-local government.

One of the major differences between Jefferson Parish and other parishes is that our library board is an advisory board only and not a control board, meaning they have no power over the book challenge process at the library. In our parish, the Parish Council, particularly the Parish President, is the final authority. Since I knew this, the first thing I did was create a Facebook group and an email address to find like-minded citizens who are concerned about book banning. The state level anti-censorship group and the other parish groups were extremely helpful in getting the word out about our group, and as folks joined, they invited other people, and our group quickly grew. 

Once the group was created, I posted all the resources, talking points, and some email and phone call scripts I wrote and asked folks to call and email their Parish Council representatives to ask for the books to be added back to the shelves and also to show up to the next scheduled meetings of the library advisory board and the Parish Council. Through our grassroots efforts, we had more people at the next three meetings than anyone from the opposing side.

I also personally emailed my local government official who presides over the library (here, they’re called Chief Administrative Assistants) to let them know that I was concerned and angry about my First Amendment rights being violated and asking that they put the challenged books back on the shelves until the review process was complete. Due to both the group and my personal pressure on our local government, the decision was made to put all the challenged books back onto the shelves while the review was still in process.

We continued to advocate to the library board and to our Parish Council members. When the review process was complete, the committee found that the challenges were unfounded and that the books would remain in the library where they were currently shelved. At the most recent council meeting, our Parish President really stood up for our libraries and librarians and made a solid stance against censorship. Through having solid relationships with local librarians, research, knowing our opposition, creating a grassroots movement and coordinated strategy for contacting our council people, working with other groups across the state, and knowing our local government systems and people, we were able to put a stop to this particular book ban! 

The fight against censorship is ongoing, though, and we’re hoping our efforts and strategies are effective in the state legislature as well. Our group is currently helping to fight censorship at the state level by sending representatives to speak against censorship bills in state senate committee meetings and by creating scripts and asking our group members to continue to email and call their state representatives to voice their opposition to these bills. We also know that this book banning group isn’t finished, and we’re prepared to help other areas they target. Now that we have a solid group, good knowledge of our local government, and are continuing to build relationships and fight censorship locally across the state, we have a much stronger position to fight censorship at the state level, and we hope to stop it there as well. 

Books targeted by the book ban:

• This Book is Gay by Juno Dawson
  
• Sex is a Funny Word by Cory Silverberg and Fiona Smyth
  
• Empire of Storms by Sarah J Maas
  
• Confess by Colleen Hoover
  
• Breathless by Jennifer Niven
  
• All Boys Aren’t Blue by George M. Johnson
  
• Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe
  
• Tricks by Ellen Hopkins
  
• My Princess Boy by Cheryl Kilodavis
  
• Flamer by Mike Curato
  
• Being You: A First Conversation About Gender by Megan Madison and Jessica Ralli
  
• A Court of Frost and Starlight by Sarah J. Maas

SIBA has been encouraging booksellers to look forward to the return of SIBA's in person annual conference at New Voices New Rooms in Arlington, Virginia in August. Registration is open, and financial assistance is available.

But don't lose sight of the fact that NVNR is a year-round event platform that brings together booksellers from SIBA and NAIBA, its sister organization to the north. There are a number of NVNR virtual events on the horizon which can be invaluable to SIBA bookstores.

SIBA is committed to making it as easy as possible for every bookseller to attend NVNR23. A number of scholarships and grants are available to bookstores to help defray travel and show expenses.

NVNR OWNERS RETREAT | Register
5/22 at 7:00 PM ET

The second of its now quarterly Owners Retreats. The first, held in January, proved to be so productive that SIBA and NAIBA store owners asked it to become a regular event throughout the year. The May retreat will be virtual, there will be an in-person retreat at NVNR23 in August, and then another virtual retreat for the fall in October. Your best support and resource are your fellow store owners.

NVNR PUBLICITY SPEED DATING
6/14-6/15 Cost is $35
Event Details | Register

Pitch your store to publishers and publicists. This is your chance to speak directly to publishers about your store's strengths and audience, and get on their radar for future author events and support. This event is especially important for new bookstores open 18 months or less, and for any bookstore that will not be attending NVNR23 in Arlington.

The Book Industry Charitable (Binc) Foundation launched its annual spring fundraising drive on April 18th this year. The goal of the Do Good All Year campaign is to encourage at least 180 book and comic lovers from across the country to join Binc’s current monthly sustaining donors.

SIBA booksellers are familiar with the important role Binc has played in times of crisis. Right now Binc receives over 20 calls a week from bookstore and comic shop employees and owners who need vital financial and mental health assistance. Binc has never refused to help.

The regional independent bookseller associations (NEIBA, NAIBA, SIBA, MPIBA, CALIBA, PNBA, MIBA, and GLIBA) are all getting involved in the Spring campaign as well. Binc is offering a celebratory ice cream social to the region which has the highest number of new monthly donors who sign up, and anyone can participate and donate. Even those that don’t work in bookstores can be part of the fun. Existing monthly donors can increase their monthly donations to help a region win the ice cream party, too.

An ice cream social would be a nice thing for SIBA booksellers at the upcoming annual conference in August. Arlington and Washington DC can be pretty warm that time of year! But even more importantly, your donations directly help your colleagues when they need it the most. Click here to become a regular donor.

SIBA’s annual conference returns in August and we want to see you there!

For the last three years, in response to Covid restrictions on in-person gatherings, SIBA held our annual conference virtually. We partnered with NAIBA as “New Voices New Rooms (NVNR),” a virtual event platform that, in addition to our conferences, hosts education, bookseller retreats, and publicity speed dating. Our teams really enjoy working together, publishers have been very supportive of our innovative approaches to programming, and our regions’ booksellers have developed relationships and idea-sharing to much mutual benefit. Engagement has been through the roof during a very challenging time. Building on our successful partnership, we’re combining our strengths and talents once again with a joint in-person conference August 7-10 in Arlington, VA.  For SIBA members, this conference replaces the former SIBA Discovery Show.

We’ve changed up the timing from September to August to avoid, fingers crossed, the worst of peak hurricane season. We’re also respecting that many booksellers prefer to be at their stores during the beginnings of football, school book fair, and holiday seasons. We know the timing is a big change, but we hope you can align your summer plans with ours, as our event is not to be missed.

New Voices New Rooms is, above all,  a networking conference. Each day of our conference supports different areas of networking: bookseller-to-bookseller, industry-to-bookseller, and author-to-bookseller. We’ve created space in our schedule to bring these groups together for brainstorming, innovation, title discovery, and personal connection. We’re offering new twists on the familiar conference environment to let the magic of title discovery and personal connection happen organically.  And we’ve kept the evenings clear for those life highlights: the publisher dinners. 

We invite you to be part of the conference. Being back together, enjoying company, learning and laughing, is what it’s all about. From sharing stories on the bookstore tour bus, meeting your beloved rep on the exhibit floor, discovering your next favorite read at an editor buzz session, or making a personal connection with an author you have long adored, these all contribute to the success of your store, and your own happiness and hopefulness around the dream that first brought you into this bookselling world. Need more nudging?Find out more here and please contact me if you have any questions, need guidance, or just want to chat about it. See you in August!

Indie Bookstore Day marks its 10th Anniversary on Saturday, April 29th, 2023. Over 150 SIBA bookstores are participating in this year's event, each with their own unique collection of special events, sales, and creative, fun ideas. In some areas bookstores have come together to celebrate together. "Bookstore Crawls" are being held in Charlotte, Atlanta, New Orleans, Lakeland, Florida and in Little Rock, Arkansas.

Bookstores that sell audiobooks via Libro.fm have been having fun with Libro's "Golden Ticket" promotion, which entitles the finder to 12 audiobook credits. The Book and Cover in Chattanooga, TN is holding an early morning audiobook walk that looks like so much fun:

Other things stores are doing: A Short Story Pizza Party, Make Fairy Crowns and Wizard Hats, Dress up as your favorite book character, Store Gift Cards, Food Trucks

Next month is a busy one for SIBA, and filled with opportunities for SIBA booksellers. Here is a heads up on what to expect, so mark your calendars accordingly!

On May 1 the new batch of Read This Next! books are posted. Booksellers can see a sneak peak below, along with links to the May Edelweiss collection, flyer, and graphics, as well as brief comments from your fellow booksellers. Pay attention to these titles, each of them have multiple positive reviews from your colleagues, in some cases nearly a dozen enthusiastic reviews.

Booksellers who ordered the Summer Catalog should see your orders drop the week of May 8. If you haven't done so yet, visit the RAMP website for free marketing materials: shelf-talkers, social media and email graphics, bookmarks and lots of other fun things to help stores get the most out of their catalog. While you are there, you can also order your fall holiday catalogs , which needs to be done by June 1.

On May 11 SIBA booksellers can check in with their board members at the virtual SIBA Board Office Hours. Ask questions, voice your concerns, hear what the board is working on. Since nominations are currently open for new board members so this would also be a good time for booksellers interested in running to talk to the current board about their experience serving.

May 15th is the deadline to nominate someone for the Katie Trocheck Abel Award. This award honors the daughter of the beloved author Mary Kay Andrews, and seeks to celebrate the often unheralded acts of kindness that take place all the time in our bookselling world. You know someone who deserves that kind of recognition, so take a moment to give it to them.

On May 18, SIBA is hosting a virtual event "Supporting Trans/Nonbinary Staff & Community." The event is bookseller-focused, but all members of the book industry are invited to attend. This is an important topic that may be affecting your colleagues and staff, and is almost certainly affecting your customers. Make time to attend. You can also submit questions ahead of time anonymously.

May 22nd NVNR hosts the second of its now quarterly Owners Retreats. The first, held in January, proved to be so productive that SIBA and NAIBA store owners asked it to become a regular event throughout the year. The May retreat will be virtual, there will be an in-person retreat at NVNR23 in August, and then another virtual retreat for the fall in October. Your best support and resource are your fellow store owners.

Hi SIBA Friends!

As your Member Relations Coordinator, I’m excited to start this monthly newsletter column to check in with you regarding the projects I’m working on and to tell you about all the great member benefits SIBA offers! One of my biggest goals is to ensure you know about the wonderful programs SIBA has and that you take advantage of all the opportunities you’re given. This column will also offer resources and call out educational opportunities. I hope to be informative and entertaining!

The first thing I would love you to know is that we want to feature you, our bookstore members, in this newsletter! We want to hear all about the cool things your store is doing, so please fill out the Bookstore Profile Questionnaire and tell us about your store, and we’ll use the information to feature you. 

Next, my current big project is reaching out to all of our members to check in, so if you see an email from me, please respond! I’m gathering information on what questions you have, how SIBA can best advocate for you and support you, and what you need in order to take advantage of the programs and opportunities SIBA offers. 

Finally, please welcome our newest members! These stores joined SIBA during the first quarter of 2023:

• Book Ferret, Winston-Salem, NC
• Broadway Books, Ashland, KY
• The Copper Acorn Books & Gifts, Marion, VA
• GG’s Library, Prosperity, SC
• Ghostlight Books, Springhill, TN
• Greene Books, Athens, AL
• Paper Hearts Bookstore, Little Rock, AR
• Treat Yo Shelf Books, Mountain Home, AR

We have new members in seven of the eleven states in our territory! I’m so excited to welcome all of you!

And of course, if you have any questions about your membership and benefits or if you just want to say hello, you can contact me any time at candice@sibaweb.com.

Orders for the Summer Catalog are at the press and expected to land at stores in a few weeks. Time stops for no one, however, so yes, it is now time to order your Holiday Catalogs!

Don't miss out on this major SIBA benefit and key tool in making your 4th quarter a success. SIBA booksellers receive up to 14 boxes (7000 catalogs) for free, direct and saturation mail to your customers and potential customers, as well as newspaper insertions are available.

The deadline for saturation mail orders is June 1, and for all other orders is June 15th. But don't wait, Catalog Ordering is open now!

RAMP has designed a streamlined ordering page to make the process easy-peasy. If you have ordered any RAMP products since 2020, your store account is already active. If not, creating an account takes just a few minutes.

Stores who ordered catalogs in the past three years: Click here
Stores who need to create an account: Click here

Visit RAMP for more detailed information, to download the marketing kit.

Big changes come from small steps and mistakes

In a recent interview with Workshop, Amrita Aggarwal of Bakau Consulting outlines some of the steps small businesses can take, and the pitfalls they face, in transforming their companies into ethical, anti-racist organizations. Pointing out that businesses which don't actively cultivate diversity risk failure because they do not reflect the communities they serve, and that will be noticed.

"It is a collective responsibility for us to give back and make sure we do better for the communities we’re serving." -Amrita Aggarwal

Aggarwal offers a number of ways small businesses can integrate anti-racist practices into their regular operations--from re-evaluating the company's mission and purpose, to changing some of the company messaging on social media, or making a donation to indigenous communities whose land they are on.

But most importantly, she encourages business owners not to stop with the creation of a diversity statement, but to follow through with real, substantive action. She also advises not to let the fear of making a mistake hamper real action. We learn from mistakes, they are signs that we are committed to change:

"The thing is, you are going to make mistakes. And that is okay. What is more important is the accountability that you take after you’ve made that mistake. Maybe, now that you evaluate your business, you find that this thing you did might have been racist. The first step is awareness and an acknowledgment that something has happened. Then you go and be accountable: what are some reparations that you can make for the harm that has been caused?" -Amrita Aggarwal

At the end of the interview Aggarwal offers an exceptionally thorough resource kit used by Bakau Consulting for helping businesses to strategize their diversity and inclusion goals which not only includes a collection of links and resources they find useful, but also specific strategies on topics such as "Inclusive Language," "Interrupting Unconscious Bias," and "LGBTQIA2S Inclusion."

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 27, 2023

The Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance opposes efforts to ban books and censor events at independent bookstores.

(Asheville, NC) During the last year, SIBA bookstores have reported widespread efforts to ban books. They have witnessed this in their community libraries and schools and have experienced extraordinary pressure, including protests, to limit choices in their inventory, especially when books reflect the stories of those who are LGBTQ+ and/or people of color. Bookstores hosting drag storytime events have been threatened with physical violence and faced armed protests and vandalism. Authors who identify as non-binary and/or transgender have expressed concern for personal safety when visiting stores in states now contemplating or passing anti-trans legislation. Black authors have had school visits canceled and their books removed from school and public library shelves because of the perception of Critical Race Theory within the content.

The Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance strongly condemns these acts of censorship and intimidation, and supports the ALA’s Freedom to Read Statement, written in 1953 and still true today. We cite this passage:

“We believe that free communication is essential to the preservation of a free society and a creative culture. We believe that these pressures toward conformity present the danger of limiting the range and variety of inquiry and expression on which our democracy and our culture depend. We believe that every American community must jealously guard the freedom to publish and to circulate, in order to preserve its own freedom to read. . .The freedom to read is guaranteed by the Constitution.”

Independent bookstores, because they are privately owned and able to curate their inventory, are uniquely positioned to safeguard the freedom to read for readers of all ages. We stand with stores carrying books under community threat of censorship and hosting events that spark protest by those who would ban book content or authors.

The mission of independent bookstores to serve their community of readers and defend free speech and access to literature and discussion of controversial ideas has never been more important during this wave of banning, intimidation, and regressive legislation. As one SIBA children’s store owner stated,  "We may become the only places left where kids see themselves in the books they read."

Linda-Marie Barrett, Executive Director
Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance
51 Pleasant Ridge Drive, Asheville, NC 28805
803.994.9530
www.sibaweb.com