There is only one place I enjoy visiting more than a library, and that’s a bookstore. It’s all part of my enjoyment of reading, something I hope all my grandchildren and great grandchildren develop, if they haven’t already.
One of my favorite places to bring my grandchildren to is a bookstore, where I give them the opportunity to browse and find a book they like, which I will buy, as long as they can read a page or two out loud before we purchase it.
I’ve been blessed on my youth to have visited several wonderful bookstores in the Chicago area where I grew up. Going to Kroch’s and Brentano’s in downtown Chicago was the ultimate treat. Throughout my life I’ve enjoyed bookstores wherever I’ve traveled, including, most recently, Powell’s in downtown Portland, Oregon.
It’s no wonder, then, that I have been enjoying a recently published book entitled “The Bookshop: A History of the American Bookstore” by Evan Friss. I purchased this, appropriately, in Los Banos’ legendary independent bookstore, Phoenix Books.
The owner of Phoenix Books, Joanne Hoefer, is something of a legend herself and thoroughly independent. She has kept her store at 936 Sixth Street alive and well for 47 years at a time when hundreds of independent bookstores across America, as Friss points out, have shut down.
Bookstore survival, especially in small towns, is as rare in the 21st century as the survival of small-town newspapers, another reason I respect Joanne.
My connection with her goes back to the 1980s when my wife Susan belonged to a small book club in town which ordered books for the club’s members from her store.
Later I came to know Joanne better when I connected with the Friends of the Los Banos Library. She, along with Colleen Menefee, kept the Los Banos Branch of the Merced County Library open at a time in the early 1990s when the county was in a budget crisis and county supervisors felt they had to close it.
That’s when Joanne and Colleen started the Friends of the Los Banos Library and collected enough donations to pay a library clerk to keep it open each day, at least for a few hours.
I’ve been in Joanne’s bookstore often during the past four decades, finding it a place where I can find current best sellers as well as a very wide assortment of used books — shelved and piled in no apparent order, although I believe Joanne knows exactly where each book is.
“Books are the quietest and most constant of friends,” Charles Eliot wrote. I think Joanne feels each of the books in her store is a friend.
Looking for a used book in Joanne’s store is a little like a scavenger hunt. Joanne tells me that many of her customers like “the hunt” in search of treasures, as they discover books they weren’t consciously searching for, but find delight in serendipitously finding.
A visit to Phoenix Books is in some ways like a visit to a book museum, with Joanne as the docent. Customers appreciate her knowledge of books of all kinds, from history to mystery to cooking.
This is how Joanne has kept in business all these years, as well as doing online sales of rare or unusual books. Like many other independent booksellers whom Friss mentions in his book, she has had to use her knowledge, wits and imagination, as well as personal customer service to keep it going.
Like the time she did a book signing for local author Vincent Hillyer’s book “Vampires,” published in 1988, when Vincent came to the store in a coffin dressed as a vampire.
Most recently, Joanne has been the coordinator of another local writer’s book signing, organizing Julian Zabalbeasoa’s discussion and signing of his new novel “What We Tried to Bury Grows Here” on Friday, Dec. 20 at Wool Growers from 5 to 7 p.m.
Joanne has definitely been swimming against the tide of bookstore closures. While she has been in business, as Friss points out in “The Bookshop,” the chains of Borders and Barnes and Noble ate into independent bookstore sales. Then came Amazon, selling books at prices lower than independent bookstores could. Then came COVID, during which, Friss writes, an average of one independent bookstore closed each week in America.
Joanne has somehow survived the storm of closures. Part of her success, I think, has been her determined and persistent independence, a trait that many bookstore owners share, as Friss notes, going back to Ben Franklin.
In Los Banos Joanne is a “one of a kind.” She is, for example, a person who speaks her mind without hesitation. When many people meet her for the first time, they find themselves taking a step back, sensing a force of nature. But soon they come to know that Joanne is a caring and kind person.
When the jewelry store two doors down from the Phoenix Bookstore was robbed a few months ago, Joanne was among the first on the scene to help and support Sherry Pearson and her staff as the police conducted their investigation, one of many examples of Joanne going out of her way to help people.
I’m sure when Joanne reads this column, she’ll email me and write “Why did you write this column about me? You know I don’t like to be in the spotlight.”
Well, Joanne, tough luck. What I have written deserves to have been written. Against the odds you have survived. And on behalf of all of us who appreciate books and bookstores, thank you.
Finally, I hope some folks reading this column, when they’re wondering what to give as Christmas gifts, wander into and through Joanne’s bookstore–either selecting a book or buying a gift certificate for a family member or friend. And while wandering through the store, maybe they’ll discover a treasure or two for themselves.
On another note, my thanks to Los Banos resident Marian Cotta who pointed out a typographical error of mine in a previous column. I meant to say Dr. John Mevi recently turned 90, but I typed 99 instead. Bad typing on my part, excellent proofreading by Ms. Cotta.
A final update: The total number of soups to be served at the Empty Bowls meal on Dec. 5 is now 15. The event will be held at the Los Banos Arts Center from 5 to 7:30 p.m. Tickets can be purchased at the door.
John Spevak’s email is john.spevak@gmail.com.
