When I wrote about the closing of a Barnes & Noble bookstore in San Jose, I didn’t realize how many other people were feeling a sense of loss. But I heard from several readers who were very sad to see the store shut its doors Jan. 19.
“I can’t imagine how to exist without my Almaden Barnes & Noble store,” Barbara Carmichael wrote. “True book lovers know you don’t just order a title — you need to pick it up, turn it over, read a page or two and then decide. I’m grieving a huge loss here.”
Mary Stradner wrote a letter to the corporation, expressing her disappointment in losing the only large, fully-stocked bookstore in South San Jose. “It is sad to see yet another bookstore closure, especially one in such an accessible location,” she said in an email to me. “I did not get a very hopeful answer regarding a new location.”
Margaret Hengel, who serves with me on the Silicon Valley Reads community advisory board, said the store was one of her treasures, too. “I went in yesterday and left with tears running down my face.”
Then the other shoe dropped when Books Inc. announced its bankruptcy a few days later. (It’s the “we’re trying to survive” kind of bankruptcy at least, though the Berkeley store will be closing). Fortunately, as Carol Zink reminded me, there are still Books Inc. locations in Campbell, Mountain View and Palo Alto.
And while I listed some of the brick-and-mortar bookstores valley residents can still patronize, I didn’t get them all. Joyce Gross reminded me about a local treasure in Saratoga: Book Go Round, which has been around since 1983 and sells books, records, CDs and DVDs. Even better, the volunteer-run nonprofit store on Oak Street supports the Saratoga Library (which is a good reminder to patronize those, too.)
And bookstores aren’t all created equal, as Bruce Tritch pointed out. His SpaceCat comic book store shared a wall with the Barnes & Noble at Westgate Mall until the big store’s corporate suits made it clear they didn’t like having a “rival” as a neighbor. “Maybe, in the long run, the lack of a huge corporate entity will be good for small business bookstores in San Jose,” Tritch said.
We can all hope that’s true.
ON THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL: The race is on to become the new representative for San Jose’s District 3 on the city council, which covers downtown and areas around it, with seven candidates qualified for the April 8 election.
With barely more than two months until then, getting to know the candidates is more important than ever, which is why three big San Jose organizations — the Chamber of Commerce, the San Jose Downtown Association and the Rotary Club of San Jose — have teamed up to hold a candidate forum Feb. 12.
Six of the candidates — Gabby Chavez-Lopez, Adam Duran, Phil Dolan, Matthew Quevedo, Irene Smith and Anthony Tordillos — are expected to participate in the forum, which starts at 4:30 p.m. at the Rotary Summit Center on the seventh floor of the Fourth Street Parking Garage downtown. You can register to attend at www.sjdowntown.com/d3.
GOOD DEED DEPT.: Good Samaritan Hospital’s good fortune turned into a great donation for West Valley Community Services, which received a $10,000 donation from the medical center to support its mobile food pantry, Park-It Market. Good Samaritan Hospital CEO Patrick Rohan said the San Jose hospital was honored to help with the Cupertino-based agency’s mission of ensuring no one in the community goes hungry.
So, how did this generosity come about? Good Samaritan finished first in HCA Healthcare’s annual Canned Food Drive Sculpture Competition for the second year in the row, which let them direct $10,000 to a local nonprofit. Their winning entry, the Good Sam Can Van, was inspired by the Park-It Market and was created with more than 1,500 cans of food that also will be donated.
WVCS Executive Director Sujatha Venkatraman said the donation will make a big difference for families facing food insecurity. “It helps us bring fresh, healthy food directly to those who need it most, eliminating barriers and strengthening our community,” she said.
MUSIC TO OUR EARS: The Mission Chamber Orchestra will perform Feb. 2 at the Italian American Heritage Foundation’s cultural center on North Fourth Street in San Jose. And you can bet the program, “Sounds of the Motherland,” will lean more Italian than the Tower of Pisa. The composers featured include Gioachino Rossini, Alessandro Marchello and Jeremy Cavaterra — along with one name that will get most of you humming right away, Vince Guaraldi.
Longtime IAHF member Ken Borelli notes that not only was Guaraldi an Italian American, he was a native of San Francisco’s North Beach neighborhood and this year is the 60th anniversary of what probably are his best-known pieces, made famous in “A Charlie Brown Christmas.” Sadly, the great jazz pianist died way too young, suffering a fatal heart attack at age 47 in 1976 after playing a set at Butterfield’s, a nightclub in Menlo Park.
Tickets to the 3:30 p.m. concert are available at www.missionchamber.org.
AUTHOR! AUTHOR!: Since we started with books, let’s wrap up that way, too, with Ladies of Charity’s “Meet the Author” event on Feb. 3. The featured writer is Sam Carlino, the owners of Sam’s Bar-B-Que on Bascom Avenue, who wrote about his grandfather’s infamous history with organized crime in “Colorado’s Carlino Brothers: A Bootlegging Empire.” I was lucky enough to hear these stories from Sam a few years ago when he was working on the book, and it’s an amazing well told tale.
The 9:30 a.m. event is at St. Thomas of Cantebury Church, 1522 McCoy Ave. in San Jose, and tickets are $40 each (with proceeds going to scholarships for middle schoolers attending Sacred Heart Nativity and Our Lady of Grace schools). Go to www.ladiesofcharitysanjose.org for more information.