Tag Archives: sidelines

Gifts Galore at Malvern Books

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The festive season is well and truly upon us, my dears—and if you’ve left your shopping till the last minute, fear not, as all your essential Yuletide gifts can be found here at Malvern Books! We’re open every day until the 25th (with a slightly early closing time of 6pm on Christmas Eve), and to make your present-purchasing a little easier, we’re also offering a stupendously generous Holiday Gift Card Offer—for every $40 you spend, you’ll receive a $10 gift card. (Please note, the gift card can not be used on the day of purchase.)

As for what to buy… well, there are plenty of handsome new arrivals featured on our home page, but here are a few more top picks for the beloved bookworms in your life:

Hit ParadeBrooklyn’s Ugly Duckling Presse recently released Hit Parade, a bilingual Russian-English collection of poems by Semyon Khanin, Vladimir Svetlov, Sergej Timofejev, and Artur Punte, the four most acclaimed members of the Orbita creative collective, based in Riga, Latvia. Lyn Hejinian called Hit Parade “one of the best collections of poetry I’ve ever encountered,” so it’s a pretty safe bet that your favorite poetry lover is going to appreciate these greatest hits.

Last week we eagerly unpacked a new order from Chax, a Texan indie press founded in 1984 and dedicated to “increasing the impact of new writing in our culture.” We received a host of awesome titles, including Reason and Other Women by Alice Notley, The Complete Light Poems by Jackson Mac Low, Andalusia by Susan Thackrey, and Linh Dinh’s Some Kind of Cheese Orgy, which might just be the most enticing book title ever.

chax press

And don’t forget our lovely sidelines! We have holiday cards, t-shirts, mugs, bookmarks, and beautiful Leuchtturm notebooks in a wide range of colors.

Sidelines

Let There Be Leuchtturm

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Today’s the first day of our Grand Opening extravaganza (you might have heard about it?), which means you’re almost certainly going to be stopping by Malvern at 6.30pm for nibbles and drinks and readings, right? Excellent. Now, we also recommend you allow yourself a little extra time for loitering near the cash register, because… sidelines! We got ’em!

Sideline items (hark at our bookstore lingo!) are those tempting little doodads that lurk near the checkout, calling out to you, “Purchase me! On impulse! I’m cute!” And we have some very cute, very impulse-purchase-worthy sidelines at Malvern…

Cards

First up, we have greeting cards. But not lame greeting cards that say soppy things like, “Our love is like a rainbow of angel wings fluttering against a darkening sky” (barf). Our cards have food puns! Yes, that’s right, the two best things ever—FOOD and PUNS—in one sealable envelope.

Bookmarks

We also have bookmarks, because we think dog-earring books is a crime. Our bookmarks are made from genuine foreign postage stamps, because books are like stamps for the soul, transporting you to unfamiliar places. Ha! Not really! They just look cool, and they’re selling like hot cakes. (What a strange expression. I’ve never bought a hot cake, and I bet you haven’t either. Let’s say, “selling like a delicious novelty donut-croissant hybrid.”)

Mugs

T-shirts

Next up, we have two Malverny options: mugs and t-shirts. We suggest you buy both, because much like shampoo and conditioner, they are designed to be used in conjunction for maximum Malvern effect. And if you spill stuff from your Malvern mug onto your Malvern t-shirt (which we know you will), it won’t leave a stain because MAGIC. Some of the t-shirts sport a WE DON’T SELL CRAP slogan (very true), while others say A DIFFERENT KIND OF ADULT BOOKSTORE (for those of you unfamiliar with Malvern lore, the former occupant of our esteemed location sold knick-knacks of a decidedly… saucy nature).

Leuchtturm

And last but not least, we have our Leuchtturm1917 journals. They’re beautiful. You might be thinking they look just like a certain popular brand of nifty notebooks, but trust me, they’re much nicer: better quality and much more colorful. And here’s another cool thing about the lovely Leuchtturms: they’re ethically made. You see, although it might seem like we’re all pirate jokes and giddy nonsense here at Malvern, we’re actually rather serious about what we sell, and we want all our sidelines to be either locally made or fair trade, and environmentally sound. So we sent an email to a Leuchtturm representative asking for clarification on how the journals are manufactured, and were thrilled with the (prompt and lengthy) reply… to summarise, Leuchtturms are stitched together by a third-generation family-owned bindery and the company itself has been run by the same family for four generations (i.e. since 1917, hence the name). Good news for those of us who like to write our poetry in classy, kindly-crafted journals.

So, lots of lovely, lovingly made stuff to choose from at Malvern. Come for the free pizza (thanks, Conans!), and stay for the sidelines! See you tonight, my dears.