Author Gail Farrelly's Christmas list includes an unusual plea to St. Nick. With the help of the National Security Agency, we intercepted her message, and share it with you:
Dear Santa, all during 2009 I've been nice (okay, okay, I was a little naughty, but only once or twice!), and now I have a very special request. Can you figure out a way to save independent bookstores? More and more of them are closing, and it's very scary.
Do you have a favorite indie at the North Pole, Santa? I hope you do, because a bookstore like that is a fabulous place to be -- surrounded by books and book lovers -- on a cold, snowy day.
I recently had a wonderful evening at a book signing in New York City at Partners & Crime Mystery Booksellers in Greenwich Village. Great book, terrific food supplied by the author, an interesting blend of people. Civilization at its best. And Santa, since you travel around the world, you may want to come to New York and attend one of the live, old-time mystery radio plays at Partners & Crime. You will love the plots, actors, organist and sound effects. Admission to the plays is reasonable, and they transport you back to another time and place. Finding a parking place for a car is hard in the Village. But for a sleigh and reindeer, any rooftop should do it.
But you know, Santa, with the growth of e-books and increased competition from chain bookstores and chain superstores, how many of the indies will be able to survive? It's something we should all be thinking about. We are letting a good part of our book culture go down the drain. Are we nuts?
Maybe you could help develop better marketing plans and strategies for the indies. Or how about a more direct approach. Santa, you could label as "naughty" any reader who buys a lot of books, but never from the indies. Maybe a big lump of coal in their Christmas stockings would convince them of the error of their ways.
I'm asking a lot. Saving the indies is a big challenge, I know. But Santa, for someone like you who is able to circle the globe in one night to bring gifts to all the good little boys and girls in the world, this should be a piece of cake. We look to you for a miracle. A lot of us are no longer little, but we are good and deserve a gift: the indies 4EVA!
Get to work on it, please. Pronto. Oh and yes, Merry Christmas!