A really lovely shout-out for several Iowa City bookshops appears among the Literary Boroughs series in Ploughshares:

Literary Boroughs 21: Iowa City 

This is the back of a book. The book is a fairly obscure retelling of Robin Hood. 

The text of this sticker needs to be artistically rendered in bronze and set in an arch over the front door of this bookshop.

Unfortunately that won't the first on the list of store improvements for this winter, but someday. Someday.

Folks with families, we love it when you come to visit, but we don't love it when we discover that tags have been ripped or cloth torn during play. _We must ask you to pay for any toys damaged during your visit._

It's not just that we shouldn't have to throw things away.* It's that everyone should help everyone remember to show good manners.

*We take a lot of pride in selling only well-tested, non-toxic toys. Torn tags or mended pieces can void the product warranty, which puts us in an awkward position, because we can't sell what we can't prove is safe. Help us be good to your kids: help us keep the toys clean with proof of manufacturing quality intact.

Hey, it's moving weekend and you all have a lot to think about, but could you do us a favor?

When you're emptying out the cabinets and finding those still good and still sealed, but too bulky to move, non-perishable food items, could you swing by the Johnson County Crisis Center to drop them off? Or drop them off here and we'll take them.

Thanks.

$1.00 for hardcovers, 50c for paperbacks in our Benefit Sale Room! Hundreds of mystery and science fiction novels have been donated in the last couple of weeks to our ongoing Benefit Sale (and lots of other things too, like cookbooks, bestsellers, kids' books, and more). Find some in-the-shade, by-the-fan, and next-to-the-vent reading to take your mind off the heat!

*ALL that money goes to Local Foods Connection. We don't do that "proceeds of" stuff.

A/C, cats, and kids reading books. What's better on a summer day? There's also a "Waldo" hidden among the stacks; you can ask for more information at the desk.

The first edition of the Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant (1885/6): now available at the Haunted. 
Happy July 4.

Nialle on missing Hogwarts Day: "I'm not observant. I only bother with Hallowe'en. Mostly because J is exactly as alive as Harry Potter's parents are dead."