Description: Can bookstores save the world? As bastions of culture, anchors of local retail districts, community gathering places, and sources of new ideas, inspiration, and delight, maybe they can. But only if we protect them and the critical roles they fill in our communities.

Verdict: Danny Caine, author of the bestselling sensation How to Resist Amazon and Why and co-owner of the Raven Book Store in Lawrence, Kansas, makes a compelling case for the power of small, local businesses in this thoughtful examination of the dynamic world of bookstores.

At once an urgent call to action and a celebration of everything bookstores can do, Caine’s new book features case-study profiles of a dozen of the most interesting and innovative bookstores of today, from Minneapolis to Paris.

Through a well-informed analysis of these case studies, Caine offers actionable strategies to promote a sustainable future for bookselling, including policy suggestions, ideas for community-based action, and tips on what consumers can do to help.

Prospering the question of why bookstores even need to be protected, author Danny Caine admits he can easily imagine some bookstore owners or workers saying no. After all, a bookstore, a for-profit business, doesn’t need protection in the same way that, say, civil rights do. A business must figure out how to make money to stay open, so if a bookstore fails, that seems like a business problem, not a social, political, or cultural problem.

Within this preponderance, we are obviously talking stores, not museums. Right? On top of that, lots of bookstores aren’t failing at all. By many indicators, the number of bookstores in America is increasing. Some people have even suggested that America is increasing. Some people have even suggested that America is in the midst of an indie bookstore renaissance. If that’s the case, why worry about protecting bookstores?

Hence the reason for this book, for this delightful book sets out to answer, but to do this, Caine states that he needs to first break it down into two separate questions: Why are bookstores worth protecting? And why do bookstores need protecting?

Amongst the points of argument are how a bookstore’s value resides in the benefits it provides to its community, economically and connectivity wise. And in addition to connecting readers with new or groundbreaking books, bookstores can also introduce members of their communities to social movements.

This book, which is veritably rich in its impassioned prose, is a most captivating read for any lover of books, patron of bookstores, or champion of the survival of these vital institutions. Ergo, How to Protect Bookstores and Why makes the strongest possible argument for the importance of a resilient, inclusive, and progressive bookstore landscape that you have quite possibly heard in a long, long time.

Official Book Purchase Link