Welcome to Malvern Books!
Malvern Books is now closed. Malvern Books was a bookstore and community space in Austin, Texas. We specialized in visionary literature and poetry from independent publishers, with a focus on lesser-known and emerging voices.
An Update from the Manager of Malvern Books
Dear Friends,
We’ve had a wonderful time sharing our favorite books with you over the past nine years, and it’s been an honor to celebrate the work of so many brilliant writers through our readings and events.
Malvern Books is the realization of Joe Bratcher’s vision—Joe dreamt of a bookstore that would carry the books he loved, mostly poetry and fiction from small, independent presses. He wanted to promote writers and translators of books from other countries, while also championing the work of local writers.
When Joe first talked to me about opening Malvern Books, I must admit I was skeptical. I didn’t think we’d find an audience. It was 2012 and everyone was saying that bookstores were dead, Kindle and online shopping were the future. I anticipated many quiet sales days, with Joe and I just sitting there, looking at each other. He told me if that’s how it ended up, well, at least we’d have a chance to chat—and since we always seemed to laugh a lot when we talked, it sounded like a good way to spend some time. And so from then on, whenever we’d have a really slow sales day, with just a few people coming in, we’d look at each other and say, “We’re living the dream!” and we’d laugh.
But back to opening… in early 2013, with the help of our amazing architect, contractor, and interior designer, we created the space that Joe had in mind. We started posting on social media thanks to Tracey, our wonderful digital media manager and first Malvern hire. And we were so grateful to the many enthusiastic writers and readers who expressed their excitement at the imminent arrival of Malvern Books. From the very beginning it felt like we were building a community.
We opened our doors in October 2013, and we were shocked by how many people came by. You showed up and you loved what we had to offer! You constantly surprised and humbled us with your kind words and helpful suggestions. People from out of town would visit the store because a local friend had told them they had to come by, and we received much appreciated shout-outs from the Austin Chronicle and numerous other newspapers and journals.
And then 2020 hit—but even with the pandemic, we had loyal customers who came by for curbside pick ups, signed up for individual shopping appointments, and participated in our Zoom book clubs and events. If we didn’t say it enough, THANK YOU!
All along the way, we were lucky enough to have truly wonderful staff members who loved the books we carried and who helped us build the store we have now. Their work has been invaluable and we could not have done this without them.
On July 28th of this year, we lost Joe. I can’t tell you how hard it has been to try and carry on in this space without him. Our little Malvern world has not been the same since, and, as much as we love this store and our amazing customers, Malvern Books simply cannot continue without our Joe.
Malvern Books will be closing on December 31st, 2022. It has been a wonderful nine years and we thank each and every one of our cherished customers, friends, staff, and suppliers for helping us along the way.
As we move forward, we’ll be sharing our plans with you for sales and specials. For now, we just wanted to let you know this was coming. We hope you all continue to seek out works in translation and books published by small presses—there is so much great stuff out there—and that you continue to support our local independent bookstores, like our dear friends at BookWoman, among others. But, most importantly, we hope to see you in the store sometime soon, to say goodbye and to thank you, both for being the readers that you are and because you have come with us on this incredibly fulfilling journey in Joe’s world.
With heartfelt thanks and wishing you all the best,
Becky Garcia,
Manager, Malvern Books
The inaugural event in our Everything is Bigger monthly reading series, hosted by Tyler Gobble. To kick things off, we have readings from Dean Young, Blake Lee Pate, and Vincent Scarpa.
Dean Young is the author of more than ten collections of poetry, including most recently, Fall Higher and Bender: New and Selected Poems, as well as a book of prose on poetry, The Art of Recklessness. He is currently the William Livingston Chair of Poetry at the University of Texas at Austin. Additionally, he is this year’s Texas State Poet Laureate.
Blake Lee Pate is co-editor of Smoking Glue Gun Magazine and an MFA candidate in poetry in the New Writers Project at the University of Texas, Austin. She is currently the marketing director for Bat City Review. Her work can be found in Forklift, Ohio; elimae; and decomP, among other places.
Vincent Scarpa is a first-year fiction writer at UT’s Michener Center for Writers. He is a two-time Pushcart Prize nominee and the recipient of the 2012 Norman Mailer College Fiction Prize.
Introducing W. Joe’s Poetry Corner! For the inaugural event in this reading series, we have an evening with poet and visual artist David Thornberry. The event will kick off with our host, W. Joe, interviewing David. Next up, David will give a reading, followed by an audience Q&A. David’s artwork will also be on display in the store.
In association with the New Writers Project at the University of Texas, we’re proud to present a reading with poet Michael Teig. Michael is a founding editor of jubilat, and author of the collections Big Back Yard (2003; selected by Stephen Dobyns as winner of the inaugural A. Poulin, Jr. Poetry Prize) and There’s a Box in the Garage You Can Beat with a Stick (2013).
“… Michael Teig maps the mercurial terrain of the imagination with such equipoise you may forget you’re dreaming just as these pages are so soaked with the miraculous everyday, you may forget you’re awake. Imagine getting a letter from a zinnia. Deft as an owl landing in a blossoming cherry tree, these are gorgeously uncanny and regal poems.”—Dean Young, in praise of There’s a Box in the Garage You Can Beat with a Stick
So nice, we’re doing it twice! (And also: many more times!) This month’s reading will be hosted by the inimitable Tyler Gobble and will feature Claudia Smith, Dan Boehl, and Laurel Hunt.
Claudia Smith grew up in Houston, Texas. Her fiction has appeared in several journals and anthologies over the years, including Nortons’ The New Sudden Fiction: Short Short Stories From America And Beyond and Cinco Puntos/Akashic’s Lone Star Noir. Her collections of short-shorts The Sky is A Well and Put Your Head In My Lap are available from Rose Metal Press and Future Tense Books, respectively; her chapbook The Sky Is Well‘s first printing sold out, but was reprinted in the collection A Peculiar Feeling of Restlessness. Her debut collection of short stories, Quarry Light, is now available from Magic Helicopter Press.
Dan Boehl is a founding editor of Birds, LLC, an independent poetry publisher, which put out his book The Kings of the F**king Sea. He helps run the Austin reading series Fun Party.
Laurel Hunt is an MFA candidate at the Michener Center for Writers at UT-Austin. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Smoking Glue Gun; Forklift, Ohio; and Whiskey Island, among other places.
If you’re the cautious type who would like to check out last month’s Bigger fun before you commit, please visit our YouTube channel for footage.
P.S. RAFFLE PRIZES! OH BOY!
For the second installment of W. Joe’s Poetry Corner, we’re delighted to present an evening with Austin poet Cindy St. John. The event will kick off with our host, W. Joe, interviewing Cindy. Next up, Cindy will give a reading from her new chapbook, I Wrote This Poem (forthcoming from Salt Hill), followed by an audience Q&A session.
Cindy St. John holds an MFA from Western Michigan University. She is the author of four chapbooks, including Be The Heat, and her poems have appeared in numerous journals, including H_NGM_N, No Tell Motel, and the Southern Review. She teaches Language Arts at Austin’s Fulmore Middle School and is one of the co-hosts of the Fun Party reading series. In 2013, she was a Millay artist-in-residence.
A reading with poets Peter Streckfus (author of The Cuckoo and Errings) and Rob MacDonald (editor of Sixth Finch).
Peter Streckfus’ debut collection, The Cuckoo, was selected by Louise Glück for the Yale Series of Younger Poets. Additional honors include fellowships from the Peter S. Reed Foundation and the Breadloaf Writer’s Conference, and two Pushcart Prize nominations. In 2013 he was a Rome Prize Fellow in Literature. His work has been anthologized in numerous collections, including Under the Rock Umbrella: Contemporary American Poets from 1951 to 1977 (2006).
In association with the New Writers Project at the University of Texas, we’re proud to present a reading with poet Noelle Kocot.
Noelle is the author of six poetry collections, including Soul in Space (2013) and The Bigger World (2011), and a book of translations of some of the poems of Tristan Corbière, Poet by Default (2011). Her poems have also been anthologized in numerous editions of The Best American Poetry. She is the recipient of awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Academy of American Poets, and the American Poetry Review, among others, and some of her work recently went to Mars on the spaceship MAVEN. She was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, and currently lives in New Jersey.