Copyright startribune
Much of what I have here, you can’t find on Amazon. Most horror sections in other stores are only one or two shelves, and mostly in the Ks: [Dean] Koontz and [Stephen] King. I have only four shelves of science fiction fantasy; the rest is all supernatural horror fiction, and most of it is older editions. The tactility of a hand-drawn cover, an older book, there’s not an alternative for that today. Now, everything is mass produced and designed to look like the same genre. It’s weird. Nothing screams that it’s a horror book. You need something that has a tactility to it, a nostalgia to it. There’s a human need for this type of content that is presented this way. In the case of rare books, which is mostly what I have, it’s important to put those in someone’s hand and to trust them, tell them, “No, this is meant to be read.” You can’t limit what people want to read by how expensive it is. You can justify the price by telling them what matters about it, why it’s so hotly desired and why it’s so limited in quantity. There’s a niche element in finding something new. That’s how we compete. There is no place in the world like the Twin Cities when it comes to our used bookstores, and it’s not close. We are so lucky with what we have here. We work together in a non-competitive way, where we’re really open with each other. There are multiple stores that deal in this material. If I don’t have something, I’ll tell people to check out a place like DreamHaven Books. I’ll send people their way just because it connects them with a larger network that, as a kid, I needed to build the collection that ended up starting this store. I love helping them out. It’s just a great experience. The same goes for the people at Midway Used & Rare Books, the people at Uncle Hugo’s Science Fiction Bookstore. There’s a really tight-knit community here where it encourages people to become booksellers, to get good at their craft and to work with each other.
