Community Corner

In today’s newsletter:

• We Asked & You Answered... thank you ✨

• Bookworm Is Entering Its CERTIFIED FRESH Era Thanks to Natalie Lagnese 🔥🔥

• Brick & Mortar 4Ever: NYC bb🗽📚

• What’s on your TBR list this Autumn? 🍁🍂

We Asked & You Answered. Thank You ✨

Wormies, you've got us floating on cloud nine! ☁️Thanks for all the wonderful things you had to say about Bookworm. We’re glad you love this little corner of the internet as much as we do.

Still, we’re new. We’re fresh. We’ve just got little baby wormy legs. And there’s a lot of room to grow. Y’all shared some great ideas about how we can continue to evolve, and all of these are on our to-do list:

• A user-friendly "how-to" or FAQ 🤓

• Amping up the title search 🔍

• Author content*

• Yearly challenge to compliment our monthly ones 📅

• Recommendations based on reads ("If you adored Winnie the Pooh, get ready for..." 🐻🍯)

If you missed the form last time, don’t fret. We really want to hear what you’ve got to say. Click right here:

*Be sure to tune into our next Community Corner. I’ve interviewed someone v special.

Bookworm Is Entering Its CERTIFIED FRESH Era Thanks to Natalie Lagnese 🔥🔥

Can we take a moment to say hello and hell yeah to Natalie Lagnese (@wormalie_wormnese).

Natalie worked day and night and day again to help with Bookworm’s new lewk. And lewk good it does, right?

She nailed it.

A little more about her? Natalie admits that choosing favorites isn't her forte, but some standout reads from the last few years include This is How You Lose the Time War, Circe, and Piranesi. She’s also a huge fan of Jhumpa Lahiri (me too!). 📚 Outside of reading, she’s into board games, video games, and needle felting. Oh, and she’s on a 151-day (and counting!) streak on the NYT crossword puzzle app. 🤓

Here she is lounging in love and laughter with her biological son, Dean. 😍😍He’s always wanted to be in a newsletter, so this is really a dream come true for him.

Brick & Mortar 4Ever: NYC bb🗽📚

I enlisted the help of fellow wormies and real, live NYC residents (and friends) to help me write this list. Let’s give a big thank you to J.Dawg (@j_du) and Naina (@the_naina) 👏.

Here’s what they’ve got to say:

1. Bluestockings: I* first fell in love with this bookstore when I lived in a commune in 2011, and we navigated where to put our limited purchasing power. This store held resources and space for us. It’s since grown into a new rad location where I first found out about Bookworm! They often host community groups and overall offer a safe space.
   
   *The “I” in this blurb is J.Dawg.

2. Book Club Bar: A bar. With books. A fun atmosphere to have a drink. Everyone’s enjoying an espresso martini while chatting about books. An easy place to mingle or score some alone time to chill and read.

3. Yu and Me Books: A cozy spot where a powerhouse team curates brilliant stories and hosts fun author events, often spilling out into the Chinatown sidewalk. In their words, it’s “a bookstore / café / bar that focuses on the strong, diverse voices of our community, with a focus on immigrant stories.” It’s the first Asian American woman-owned bookstore in the city.
   
   Their store burned down on July 4 and the community raised over $360,000, and they just opened a temporary spot in Essex Market! The beautiful power of books and community! (If you’d like to support the shop, donate here or buy a book through their shop!)

4. Book Culture: Collegiate nostalgia and full of little treasures that aren’t books. My friend says she often leaves with a candle and a stuffed animal. The Long Island City location shines with a great children’s section, complete with games, and storytime events for young readers.

5. Kitchen Arts and Letters: The most fun cookbook store. The staff are knowledgeable and can direct you to any recipe, cuisine, technique, or food memoir. It’s niche and perfect.

6. Books Are Magic: Rock star events that often sell out nearby libraries and event spaces. It’s a well-curated spot with little nooks that invite you right on in. Plus their IG is 🔥🔥
   

7. Westsider Rare and Used Books: A used bookstore full of magic and a cat (who is probably also magic).
   

8. Three Lives and Co.: Zadie Smith was just there to promote her latest. Cute West Village vibes with a charming NYC section of local authors.

9. Honorable Mention: The absolute nostalgia of the Union Square Barnes and Noble and because they have a bathroom.

Been to these stores? Chime in with your thoughts! 🎙️

Got a hometown bookstore that we need to know about? 🌟 Hit reply and spill the beans. Your city might be next in our Brick & Mortar 4Ever spotlight.

What’s on your TBR list this Autumn? 🍁🍂

Fall for me? It's all about a certain book vibe. Sure, of course, spooky season is important. Right now, I have spines cracked on The Ex Hex by Erin Sterling and Weyward by Emilia Hart.

But I’m looking for something beyond sinister and spider-webby. I’m looking for a story that builds. That has to do with campus life-- in a big city or small town. That circles around family or found family or both or neither.

I don’t know what it is, but there’s something so good about a campus novel, something about the growing up and falling down during back to school that really gets me excited. Books like If We Were Villians by M.L. Rio and The Secret History by Donna Tartt. And The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri. I know none of these are new, recent releases. The Namesake came out in 2003, for Pete’s sake. A good one I read recently that fits this category is I Have Some Questions for You by Rebecca Makkai.

What do you like to read in the fall? Is there a book that really gets you excited about pumpkins and leaves and crisp air and cozy sweaters?

Yours in dirt,

Ali (@codeblue)