When Jack founded The Portobello Bookshop in July last year, never could he have imagined that he’d be celebrating Portobello’s one-year anniversary in the midst of a global pandemic!
While the physical shop might be currently closed, Jack is determined to keep the activity going (safely!) and keep bringing books to his wonderful customers.
After weeks of hard work and planning, the bookshop set up a new online order system, and they will soon be launching a click-and-collect service.
In spite of the current challenges, Jack and his team are remaining hopeful and creative, and are still planning to celebrate Independent Book Week, in whatever form might be safe to do so.
Their current plans involve a virtual event with children’s author Emily MacKenzie, whose latest book Beware! Ralfy Rabbit and the Secret Book Biter (Bloomsbury) is published this month.
Emily will also be curating a stunning shop window for Portobello.
Jack said: “For the time being we don’t plan to open as a physical shop, but instead to run a click and collect service, as we keep an eye on things and open at a time when we feel it is ok to do so.
We’re going to make sure our shop is as safe as possible. This will include distancing signs around the interior of the shop, a shield for our till area, and of course hand sanitiser always available.
“The interior of our shop was always designed for easy access and navigation and the flow of it from left to right will allow us to hopefully ensure people can move around safely and browse easily.”
Jack talked about their plans for Independent Bookshop Week: “IBW is a wonderful thing and we’re pleased that it will be possible for us to do something for it with the lockdown having been lifted a little.
“We’ve got local author and illustrator Emily MacKenzie popping in to the shop to do an inspiring window featuring characters from her latest book Beware Ralfy Rabbit and the Secret Book Biter, a book all about books, reading and the love of literature.
“She’ll also be doing an online event, most likely streamed via our Instagram, which both children and adults are welcome to join!”
From online events with bestselling authors, to a picture book celebrating key workers, to virtual bookshop crawls, Independent Bookshop Week 2020 will go ahead this year, taking place 20-27 June as planned.
Organised by the Booksellers Association (BA) and sponsored by Hachette, the annual celebration of independent bookshops across the UK and Ireland this year has adapted to include online events to give book lovers across the country access to authors and books during lockdown.
The week will celebrate the role indie booksellers have continued to play in building a sense of community during the pandemic, as well as encouraging customers to support their local highstreet by shopping local at what is a particularly challenging time for small retailers.
VIRTUAL EVENTS
Confirmed events taking place during IBW include:
- Meg Rosoff, bestselling author of How I Live Now, will be joining the series of virtual events “At Home with 4 Indies”, created by booksellers from Book-ish (Crickhowell), Linghams (Wirral), Forum Books (Corbridge) and Booka Bookshop (Shropshire). The series, which since the lockdown began has included guests such as Joe Wicks, Robert Webb, David Baldacci, and Marian Keyes offers all book-lovers a new, special kind of author event. The event with Meg Rosoff will be live on the At Home with 4 Indies Facebook page on Tuesday 23rd June at 8pm.
- Maggie O’Farrell, bestselling author of the Women Prize nominated novel Hamnet, will join At Home with 4 Indies on Friday 26th June at 8pm.
- Cressida Cowell, Waterstones Children’s Laureate will be a holding a virtual bookshop tour on her social channels, featuring each of the following indies on a different day for the duration of IBW. Bookshops confirmed so far are Mainstreet Trading (Melrose), Little Ripon (North Yorkshire) and Silverwood Events (Kirkham, Preston).
- Steve Chambers, co-author of Resist: Stories of Uprising, a collection of stories and essays exploring two millennia of British protest, will be doing a virtual event with Bookmarks Bookshop (London) on Friday 26th June.
- Julia Bell, novelist, essayist, poet, creative writing course director and author of Radical Attention will be taking over the social channels of Newham Bookshop (London) and sharing her bookshop picks during the week.
- Tim Burgess will be curating a special book-inspired playlist, released on his Twitter channel at 3pm on Sunday 21st June.
- To celebrate National Reading Group Day, which coincides with the first day of IBW, The Reading Agency will be encouraging reading groups across the UK to read The Beekeeper of Aleppo by Christy Lefteri. There will be a discussion with the author on Facebook on Saturday 20th June.
INDIE BOOKSHOPS AND PUBLISHERS PAIR UP
To underline the many ways in which small businesses are supporting each other at this difficult time, IBW wills see independent bookshops across the UK and Ireland being “twinned” with indie publishers, in a series of special events and exclusives.
Confirmed twinned bookshops and publishers include:
- Saraband Books (Glasgow and Manchester), indie publisher of fiction, nature writing, and environmental reads will be twinned with Sam Read Bookseller (Grasmere, Lake District).
- Publishers of “the best of Chinese literature”, Alain Charles Asia (West Sussex) will be promoting 11 indie bookshops from Sussex throughout the week via its social channels.
- Indie publisher Wrecking Ball Press (Hull) will be partnering with The Rabbit Hole (Brigg) and will be hosting virtual events with a selection of their authors, providing signed titles and more.
EXCLUSIVES
An early release of Meg Rosoff’s new children’s book, The Great Godden will be available exclusively in indie bookshops during Independent Bookshop Week, with signed copies and tote bags available for customers, before its general release in July.
Thank You, Heroes, a new picture book celebrating key workers by Patricia Hegarty and Michael Emmerson will be release exclusively in indies from 20th June, ahead of wider publication in July. Little Tiger will be donating all publisher profits on UK sales to NHS Charities.
INDIE BOOK AWARDS
The shortlist for the Indie Book Awards 2020, this year in their fourteen edition, has been revealed, as voted for by independent booksellers across the UK and Ireland.
Spanning four categories – Fiction, Children’s Fiction, Picture Book and a new Non-Fiction prize – the awards celebrate the paperback books of the year, as chosen by independent bookshops, and are part of Independent Bookshop Week (20 – 27 June 2020), the annual celebration of indie bookshops organised by the Booksellers Association.
Included in this year’s shortlist are Booker Prize winner Bernardine Evaristo (Girl, Woman, Other), international best-selling author Elif Shafak (10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World), Baillie Gifford Prize winner Hallie Rubenhold (The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper), former Children’s Laureate Julia Donaldson (Animalphabet) and Irish Children’s laureate Sarah Crossan (Toffee).
Chosen by a judging panel of independent booksellers, authors and industry influencers, the Indie Book Awards winners will be announced on Friday 26 June 2020, the penultimate day of Independent Bookshop Week.
The full Indie Book Awards 2020 shortlist:
FICTION SHORTLIST
The Offing by Benjamin Myers (Bloomsbury)
10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World by Elif Shafak (Penguin)
You Will Be Safe Here by Damian Barr (Bloomsbury)
Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi (Picador)
Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens (Corsair)
Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo (Penguin)
NON-FICTION SHORTLIST
Lady in Waiting by Anne Glenconner (Hodder & Stoughton)
War Doctor by David Nott (Picador)
The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper by Hallie Rubenhold (Black Swan)
Extraordinary Insects: Weird. Wonderful. Indispensable. The Ones Who Run Our World by Anne Sverdrup-Thygeson (Mudlark)
Mudlarking by Lara Maiklem (Bloomsbury)
No Win Race by Derek A Bardowell (Mudlark)
CHILDREN’S FICTION SHORTLIST
Toffee by Sarah Crossan (Bloomsbury)
Deeplight by Frances Hardinge (Macmillan Children’s Books)
Chinglish: An Almost Entirely True Story by Sue Cheung (Andersen Press)
The Star Outside my Window by Onjali Q. Rauf (Orion Children’s Books)
The Somerset Tsunami by Emma Carroll (Faber & Faber)
The Girl Who Speaks Bear by Sophie Anderson (Usborne)
PICTURE BOOK SHORTLIST
Animalphabet by Julia Donaldson & Sharon King-Chai (Two Hoots)
Greta and the Giants by Zoe Tucker & Zoe Persico (Frances Lincoln Children’s Books)
Don’t Worry Little Crab by Chris Haughton (Walker Books)
Alfie on Holiday by Shirley Hughes (Puffin Books)
I’m Sticking With You by Smriti Halls and Steve Small (Simon & Schuster)
Franklin and Luna Go To The Moon by Jen Campbell, illustrated by Katie Harnett (Thames & Hudson)
The final winners of the Adult categories will be chosen by a panel chaired by bookseller Matt Taylor (Chepstow Books & Gifts) and including Elizabeth Perry (Daunt Books), Zool Verjee (Head of Marketing and Publicity at Blackwells), Sarah Shaffi, (freelance journalist and #BAMEinPublishing co-founder) and Hachette author William Shaw.
The judging panel of the Children’s categories will be chaired by bookseller Vanessa Lewis (The Book Nook) and includes Layla Hudson (Round Table Books), Jessica Paul (Max Minerva’s Marvellous Books & More), Jonathan Douglas (CEO of National Literacy Trust) and Hachette author Piers Torday.
For updates and to join the conversation on social media, follow @booksaremybag and #IndieBookshopWeek.
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