500 Days of Summer and Metropolis Books

I must admit I loved that movie, and well the product placement of our sign in one of the sequences. Hmmm, I think I was suppose to take our sign in while the film shoot was going on, I sort of forgot.

Downtown LA's Dynamic Decade

We are lucky enough to be part of it!! Reprint from the Downtown News, written by Jon Regardie


Detailing the most Important Projects of the last decade.

When Tom Gilmore announced plans to turn a trio of buildings not far from Skid Row into market-rate apartments, many were skeptical. “To those who say it is not a great neighborhood,” said Gilmore at the time, “we just bought the neighborhood.” The 70-unit San Fernando Building came online in fall 2000, followed the next year by the 104-apartment Hellman Building and the 56-residence Continental Building. The corner of Fourth and Main streets has since become the epicenter of street life in the district, as businesses including Pete’s Café, Metropolis Books, Banquette, the OBD Market and Old Bank DVD have followed.Impact: At $33 million and 230 units, the Old Bank District was smaller in scale and budget than many later projects in Downtown. Yet none was more influential or precedent setting. Gilmore was the first developer to test the city’s new Adaptive Reuse Ordinance, which made it easier and less expensive to turn dead office structures into housing. He somehow secured the money, and as construction crews worked, other developers waited to see if the buildings could be transformed and if people would move in; many feared it would be an expensive flop. Instead, Gilmore found a sizeable market of people ready to embrace urban living, and in the wake of his success, developers flocked to the area, buying up nearly every old building available (and crazily ratcheting up the price of once un-sellable structures) and turning them into housing. The Old Bank District may have lacked the gloss of Disney Hall and the glitz of L.A. Live, but it opened doors no other project in Downtown did — without the Old Bank District, Downtown would not have seen the residential revolution of the past decade.

Thursday Dec. 10th. Art Walk Night-7:00 pm

Art Walk Night!!!
Hannah Dennison & Susan Kandel

Hannah Dennsion continues the Vicky Hill mystery series with Expose'! Vicky is an ambitious trainee newspaper reporter who dreams of becoming a famous investigative journalist but finds herself stuck writing obituaries for the Gipping Gazette. Vicky's also the daughter of legendary criminal, The Fog-a fact she must keep secret.

Mystery author Susan Kandel returns with a new installment in her Cece Caruso series - Dial H for Hitchcock! Cece is a clothes obsessed, divorced ex-beauty queen who lives in Ventura - and solves crimes. Her other novels include I Dreamed I Married Perry Mason, Not a Girl Detective, Shamus in the Green Room, and Christietown.

Saturday The Good Men Project-5:00 pm

Don't miss The Good Men Project this Saturday December 5th. at 5:00 pm

The Good Men Project: Real Stories from the Front Lines of Modern Manhood (Edited by James Houghton, Larry Bean, & Tom Matlack) is an anthology of stories by men-rich, poor, black, white, gay, straight, urban, rural, famous, ordinary--all first-person narratives about a moment of insight in their lives. Collectively, their experiences help define what it means to be a man in America today. The Good Men Project includes the book, a documentary film, live events and an online discussion. All proceeds go to The Good Men Foundation, which supports at-risk boys.

December 1st. our third anniversary!!!

December 1st. is our third anniversary of opening the bookstore. Save 10% off your entire purchase the month of December.

Now open Mondays until the end of the year

We are now open Mondays from 11-5 thru the holiday season. We will extend our store hours the last two weeks before Christmas.

Coming December 5th. 4:00 pm. The Good Men Project

The Good Men Project: Real Stories from the Front Lines of Modern Manhood (Edited by James Houghton, Larry Bean, & Tom Matlack) is an anthology of stories by men-rich, poor, black, white, gay, straight, urban, rural, famous, ordinary--all first-person narratives about a moment of insight in their lives. Collectively, their experiences help define what it means to be a man in America today. The Good Men Project includes the book, a documentary film, live events and an online discussion. All proceeds go to The Good Men Foundation, which supports at-risk boys.

Jeffrey K. Wallace lives in Orange County, California. When he's not reading, writing, parenting, or teaching (at Chapman University), he's busy enjoying his family. Wallace's essays have appeared in the Los Angeles Times, Family Circle Magazine, the Orange County Register, Toastmaster International, and the anthology I Wanna Be Sedated: 30 Writers on Parenting Teachers.

Kent George is an actor, writer, and filmmaker living with his wife and two children in Los Angeles. As an actor he has appeared in numerous theater, television, and film projects over the past twenty years. He is a longtime company member of Circus Theatricals in Los Angeles, and he has presented two original plays at the Powerhouse Theater in Santa Monica. In 2006, George wrote and produced the semiautobiographical feature film Puff, Puff, Pass. He currently is editing a feature-length documentary titled Inside the Box, which is about Circus Theatricals and the lives of theater actors in Los Angeles .

Publisher's Weekly covers National Bookstore Day

Here is a reprint of Wendy Werris article in Publisher's Weekly.

Among the many events held November 7 to mark the first National Bookstore Day was a program put together by Skylight Books in Los Angeles which held a wine and cheese reception for local booksellers--old, new and former--who came to celebrate the continuing relevance of independents across the country.Skylight’s owner Kerry Slattery introduced each bookseller to the gathering of customers and writers and had them say a few words about their store and its context in the Southern California book community.

Most of the speakers acknowledged the “interconnectedness” among booksellers and the allegiance toward one another that outweighs the idea of being competitors. Tyson Cornell, director of marketing for Book Soup, described an event at his store that had to be canceled due to a power outage. “Skylight saved the day for us, though,” Cornell said. “When I phoned Kerry at the last minute she told me to move the event over to her store, which we did, and then she insisted that Book Soup keep the profits from that night’s signing.” That kind of generosity of spirit also brought new customers to Skylight and an awareness of the choices available to the book-buying public in Los Angeles.Claudia Colodro, owner of Stories Books and Café in Echo Park and a former staffer at Dutton’s in North Hollywood described her store’s policy of selling both used and new books and holding events twice a week. Portrait of a Bookstore in Studio City was represented by gift buyer B.J. Hegedus. “We’re now discounting all hardcovers 20% - all the time,” Hegedus told the group, articulating a possible sales strategy for the other booksellers. Every store at Skylight’s celebration is struggling with ways to bring in new customers as they try to compete with the price wars between Amazon and Wal-Mart.

Portrait’s book buyer Lucia Silva is a regular book commentator and reviewer on NPR. Also on hand was Julie Swayze, co-owner of Metropolis Books in the historic core of downtown Los Angeles. The store, surrounded by artist’s lofts, participates in the monthly Art Walk by having a signing, poetry reading or art-related event. Metropolis has a page on Goodreads.com as well as Facebook.Slattery, who opened Skylight 13 years ago, made nametags for the guests based on the paintings of their stores found in The Art of the Bookstore: The Bookstore Paintings of Gibbs M. Smith (Gibbs Smith). “If your local independent bookstore is out of a title you want, there’s no need to order it from Amazon,” she told the customers. “All of us have web sites with ordering capability, and we can also download and sell you the e-books you’re interested in.”

Adele Wallace opened Sisterhood Bookstore in Westwood in 1972. “We did wonder at the time if there were even enough books by and about women to stock our shelves!” Wallace mused. “But Alice Walker was coming into the mainstream then, and Gloria Steinem and Betty Friedan. Eventually we began running out of room for all the books on women’s studies.” Sisterhood, one of the first feminist bookstores in the country, was in business for 28 years before a Borders store opened across the street and forced them to close in 1999. “The great irony is that the very same Borders closed a year ago.” Now a librarian, Wallace remains a staunch supporter of indie bookstores.Doug Dutton, whose eponymous bookstore in Brentwood closed in 2007 after a 20-year run, seemed bemused by his current status of eminence as one of the legends of Los Angeles bookselling. “Perhaps it’s my gray hair that’s granted it to me,” he joked. Reflecting on the staying power of indie bookstores he said, “We share insights and common ground, and in spite of all rational thinking I’m considering getting back into it.” Dutton mentioned, too, that the book he’s reading – Atmospheric Disturbances, by Rivka Galchen (FSG, 2008) – came to his attention by listening to a review of it by Portrait of a Bookstore’s Silva on NPR.In other parts of California, the three-store Diesel Books chain co-owner John Evans said that all of his locations participated in the event, with staff at the Malibu store serving hot apple cider and pastries to customers who also enjoyed a special visit of support by Mayor Andy Stern. In Brentwood, customers who bought over $100 worth of books received free Diesel Books t-shirts to commemorate the day, and a quiz was held in the Oakland store with winners presented with $25 gift certificates. “We designed the questions to reward our regular customers,” Evans said. “We asked things like, ‘which staff member has been listed in a bestselling memoir (Evans, in Norman Ollestad’s Crazy for the Storm)?’ and ‘name three books published by Diesel staff members in the last five years.’ “We had a very positive response to National Bookstore Day. Several ex-employees stopped by, and customers were glad the event was happening,” Evans continued. “Everyone liked the concept of it. For us it was National Reader Appreciation Day as well.”