The wide range of final sessions at this year’s Winter Institute, which wrapped up on Thursday, perfectly encapsulated what it means to be a bookseller today.
In a session called "Bookstores in the Time of Fascism," a panel of four booksellers discussed how to successfully operate their businesses amid the current sociopolitical moment, sharing practical tips as well as their general philosophies.
"Start small, start locally, and make it sustainable," said Keaun Michael Brown of Ujamaa Community Bookstore in Indianapolis. "Small actions count," added Jackie Davison of the Lynx in Gainesville, Fla. "You can't do everything and shouldn't do everything."
Brown emphasized that whatever one does while operating a store during these unsettling times, "you should be happy while you're doing it." Suggesting such programming ideas as "chess nights," Brown emphasized the importance of "spreading joy," telling fellow booksellers to "get the whole nimbus out of your head that advocacy has to look a certain way."
Aimee Nezhukumatathil (Night Owl) and Isaac Fitzgerald (American Rambler) celebrated representation, poetry, nature, and the beauty of the night in the WI2026 closing keynote, “This, Too, Can Be a Place of Transformation: Finding Wonder in the Unexpected.”
Nezhukumatathil started by reading what she called "a love letter to booksellers," which also happened to be a love letter to poetry. "Booksellers, poetry survives because you put it into people's hands," she said. "When you sell a poetry collection, you're not just selling a book—you are selling a space where attention still matters."
In her youth, Nezhukumatathil said, she loved to read about the outdoors, “but I didn't see anybody who looked like me in the stories of the outdoors. Where are the brown people to be outdoors?”
Noting that the Asian characters in books available to her always “were Ninjas,” Nezhukumatathil said that she was inspired to write because she “wanted to insert myself there,” and wanted BIPOC readers to realize “that you can have brown skin, have crushes and like roller skating and be a total nerd and love the outdoors. You can love makeup and love the outdoors. You do not have to be one thing.”
As WI2026 wound down, attendees gave the event high marks its emphasis on booksellers' collective power—as well as the connections between indie booksellers and indie publishers.
Cheers and tears
While several booksellers expressed their appreciation for WI2026, some said they also want it to evolve further to better serve its various constituencies.
First-timer Baker Rodgers, the owner of Queer Haven in Columbia, S.C., said that they would want more support for LGBTQ authors and books. “You had to hunt for” LGBTQ authors and books at WI2026, they said, “and there might have been things going on concerning queer authors—I don’t know.” They expressed interest, for instance, in a dinner specifically for queer authors and booksellers.
There were 72 authors signing at the Wednesday evening reception, they noted, but “there was no way to know” which authors and books would be appropriate for their bookstore, Rodgers said. “I do want to support queer authors and their books—maybe there should be a rainbow sticker on signage at the receptions.”
David Landry, the co-owner of Class Bookstore in Houston, Tex., agreed. Ignite, the pre-con for BIPOC booksellers that he was instrumental in conceptualizing last year, is “bound to grow,” he said. “What I hope will happen is that other groups will form their own Ignite. That was the intent—to spark the flame. The hope is that other groups will be empowered to create their own pre-cons. And Winter Institute would be all those groups then coming together.”
As Nezhukumatathil and Fitzgerald exited the stage after their conversation, ABA CEO Allison Hill bounded up to announce that WI2026 had officially ended. “It’s all just a bunch of budgets and spreadsheets and maps until you show up and create magic,” she said.
Then it was time to announce next year’s Winter Institute venue, before which Hill emphasized that ABA selects venues for its institutes several years in advance. When she then said that WI2027 would take place in Minneapolis February 10–14, the news was greeted with applause and even tears from several booksellers.
“I’m not a religious person, but sometimes the moon and stars do align,” Jessica Devin of Brewster Books in Brewster, Mass. remarked to Victoria Ford of Comma Bookshop in Minneapolis as they departed the David L. Lawrence Convention Center for the last time.
