LIVINGSTON, MT — Wheatgrass Books is happy to announce our participation in the 11th Anniversary of Independent Bookstore Day!
Join us in celebrating Indie Bookstore Day with Missoula author Malcolm Brooks. Malcolm will be signing books from 11 am - 2 pm. At 2 pm we’ll move upstairs for a reading and reception.
Malcolm Brooks is the national bestselling author of Painted Horses and the more recent, Cloudmaker. With Cloudmaker, Malcolm Brooks returns with a soaring, spirited novel set during the summer of Amelia Earhart’s final flight—a tale of American ingenuity and optimism set against the backdrop of a deepening Great Depression. The summer of 1937 will be a turning point for fourteen-year-old Houston “Huck” Finn. When he and a friend find a dead body in a local creek, a rare Lindbergh flight watch on its wrist, it seems like a sign. Huck is building his own airplane, a fact he has concealed from his mother. That summer also marks the arrival of his cousin Annelise, sent to live with the family under mysterious circumstances. As it turns out, she has had flying lessons—another sign. As Huck’s airplane takes shape, so does his burgeoning understanding of the world, including the battle over worldliness vs. godliness that has split Annelise from her family, and, in a quieter way, divides Huck’s family too. And meanwhile, there’s the matter of the watch, which it turns out the dead man’s cohort of bank robbers would very much like back.
In Brooks’ trademark “lush, breathtaking prose” (San Francisco Chronicle on Painted Horses) and with a winking nod to the Sam Clemens who inspired its hero’s nickname, Cloudmaker is a boisterous, heartfelt novel that brings to life the idealism, inventiveness, traditionalism, and deep contradictions of the American spirit.
Malcolm Brooks was raised in the rural foothills of the California Sierras and grew up around Gold Rush and Native American artifacts. A carpenter by trade, he has lived in Montana for most of two decades. His writing has appeared in Grays Sporting Journal, Outside, Sports Afield and Montana Quarterly, among others.
In addition to the Malcolm Brooks reading and book signing, local teen group, Queer Quills will host a children’s story hour from 11 am – noon. Children accompanied by their parents are welcome!
Independent Bookstore Day (Indie Bookstore Day) was established in 2013 to promote, celebrate, and highlight the value of the independent bookstore community. The day has been observed on the last Saturday of April every year since 2013. This year there are over 900 stores participating across the country.
Independent Bookstore Day is organized by the American Booksellers Association, a national not-for-profit trade organization, that works with booksellers and industry partners to ensure the success and profitability of independently owned book retailers, and to assist in expanding the community of the book.
Lisa Snow, owner of Wheatgrass says, "Independent Bookstore Day is one of our favorite days. It both celebrates the bookseller and the book buyer. We are so excited to have participated in past years and look forward to many more."