Fourth-graders at C. M. Macdonell Elementary School in Laredo who wrote letters trying to persuade their bookstore, the only one in town, not to close.
Mary Benavides steps from behind the cash register several times a day to embrace the mourners. For more than 30 years, she has managed the mall's B. Dalton outlet -- the only bookstore in Laredo. It will close next month.
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All B. Daltons nationwide are closing, as corporate parent Barnes & Noble shutters the chain. In this era of mega-bookstores with cafes and cozy couches and 150,000 titles -- and with more than a million books available online -- B. Dalton's cramped outlets no longer make economic sense.
Xavier Garcia and Joe Garcia IV read at the B. Dalton bookstore in Laredo, Texas.
The city council is expected to pass a resolution Monday proclaiming that Laredo needs a bookstore. State lawmakers have promised to write letters. A "Save Laredo's Bookstore" page on Facebook has 530 members and a city committee is circulating petitions. The theme of their campaign: Laredo Reads.
Now (Monday, 1.15pm) up to 6
Jose Angel, 10, stands in front of two boards with English and Spanish words in his bilingual class.
Author Sonia Nazario saw that first-hand when the bookstore manager and several high-school teachers invited her this fall to discuss her book "Enrique's Journey." Over two days, Ms. Nazario spoke to 4,000 people, and some waited hours for her autograph. "It was like the hottest rock star had shown up in town," she said. "I've never had such a reception in my life."
Nearly 2,000 copies of her book sold in Laredo, and there was a waiting list for all 75 copies at the public library.
"Books created a communal bond in what was, to me, an unlikely place," Ms. Nazario said. "The beating heart of that was the bookstore."
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