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Posted by: David Bunch

USA Today had an interesting story on Friday about an independent bookstore in Denver that is relocating (by now the move is probably complete). What is so fascinating is how Tattered Cover Book Store planned to move a hefty volume of books in the shortest amount of time possible.

After more than three decades, the landmark is moving out of the city's priciest retail zone, Cherry Creek. The flagship store, beloved locally and admired nationally as a haven for book hounds, will transfer all 125,000 volumes to a new home in time to reopen Monday morning.

No book will be boxed until after 6 p.m. Saturday, lest a customer need to thumb through it, curl up with it in one of the store's trademark easy chairs — or even buy it. "The books stay on the shelves until Saturday night. It's all about the books," Meskis says.

A side issue of independent bookstores' struggle for survival is also explored in Friday's article.

Teicher of the booksellers group acknowledges "significant decline" for independents from the early 1990s until about two years ago. The association once had 4,500 merchants with 7,000 locations. Today: 1,800 with 2,500 stores. He says a modest recovery is underway, though store closings still outnumber openings.

Local bookselling remains a challenge. Last week, San Francisco's landmark A Clean Well-Lighted Place for Books announced it will close. Across the San Francisco Bay, Cody's Books, a Berkeley institution for 50 years, will shut its original Telegraph Avenue location, though it has two other successful branches.

Check author Paul Collins' blog, Weekend Stubble, for information about two more Bay Area bookstores' closings.