Bookselling & Political Action: Event Video
Last night we held a fascinating discussion between booksellers and writers, Danny Caine (How To Resist Amazon and Why) and Josh Cook (The Least We Can Do)! The event was coordinated with The Raven Bookstore. Afterward, there was an audience Q&A and a chance to win copies of both books!
If you didn’t catch the event live, no worries! You can still watch it below:
ABOUT THE LEAST WE CAN DO
In celebration of Independent Bookstore Day 2021, we’re proud to present Josh Cook’s The Least We Can Do!
Like most of our cultural institutions, bookshops and the booksellers who run them have worked hard the last few years to respond to political and social issues in our society. They’ve formed committees and hosted panels, held training sessions and had difficult conversations in both their private and professional lives. Yet books by White supremacists, fascists, misogynists, and other dangerous ideologues are bought and sold in independent bookshops across North America every day. What are the economic, social, and moral consequences of stocking and selling these titles? In The Least We Can Do, Josh Cook, bookseller at Porter Square Books in Cambridge, Massachusetts, takes up these questions and more, embarking on an urgent and insightful reckoning with critical issues around freedom of expression, public discourse, industry ethics, and moral culpability.
The first in a new series of pamphlets to be published by booksellers, for booksellers and those invested in bookstores and book culture, The Least We Can Do is a call to action and the beginning of an essential conversation.
ABOUT JOSH COOK
Josh Cook is a bookseller at Porter Square Books in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he has worked since 2004. He is also author of the critically acclaimed postmodern detective novel An Exaggerated Murder and his fiction, criticism, and poetry have appeared in numerous leading literary publications. He grew up in Lewiston, Maine and lives in Somerville, Massachusetts.
ABOUT HOW TO RESIST AMAZON AND WHY
When a company’s workers are literally dying on the job, when their business model relies on preying on local businesses and even their own companies, when their CEO is literally the richest person in the world while their workers make minimum wage with impossible quotas … wouldn’t you want to resist? Danny Caine, owner of Raven Book Store in Lawrence, Kansas compiled this zine about his commitment to fighting the seemingly impossible giant in the bookselling world: Amazon. This zine includes the open letter he wrote to Jeff Bezos, examples of successful social media activism that produced waves of successful economic solidarity for local bookstores, links to other resources, and some sobering words about boycotting. Let this zine inspire you to support independents and stand up to the biggest threats facing our society!
ABOUT DANNY CAINE
Danny Caine is the author of the poetry collections Continental Breakfast, El Dorado Freddy’s, and Flavortown, as well as the book How to Resist Amazon and Why. His poetry has appeared in LitHub, DIAGRAM, Hobart, and Barrelhouse, and his prose has appeared in LitHub and Publishers Weekly. The Midwest Independent Booksellers Association awarded him the 2019 Midwest Bookseller of the Year award. He lives in Lawrence, Kansas where he owns Raven Book Store.
Order The Least We Can Do from Biblioasis here!
Order How to Resist Amazon and Why from The Raven Bookstore here!
