What is FABfest?

FABfest is a new kind of street fair in Fort Greene, hosted by our new BID, the FAB (Fulton Area Business) Alliance!

Fulton Street from Fowler Square to South Oxford will be closed to traffic each Sunday in June, as we celebrate local Brooklyn businesses, arts groups and cultural organizations with music, food, games, dance parties, environmental demonstrations, crafts and activities for children, and more. Each day kicks off with a salsa dance party at 12 noon and the fun continues until 6:00pm, rain or shine!

Greenlight is delighted to be involved in FABfest, with events on the street and in the store each Sunday in June. Click any of the links below to go to our Facebook event page for more information about Greenlight's FABfest programming, or stop by the store to pick up a flyer about FABfest. (There will be more authors and activities added, so check back on Facebook for updates.) And visit FAB Fulton on Facebook for more about all the great stuff going on at FABfest. See you out in the street!

June 6:
All day:StoryCorps listening station, activities and giveaways, and streetside Mad Libs
3:00 PM: Listening session with StoryCorps staff

June 13:
All day:Six-Word Memoir Writing, activities and giveaways, and streetside Mad Libs
3:00 PM: White whiskey (moonshine) reading and tasting, co-hosted by The Greene Grape

June 20:
All day:Activities and giveaways, streetside Mad Libs, and information from New York Writers Coalition
2:00 - 6:00: Main Stage performances by Steamboat, Urban Word, Toure, Nelson George, and others
4:00 PM Free all-ages writing workshop from NYWC

June 27:
All day:Literary trivia contest, streetside Mad Libs, activities and giveaways, and literary magazine giveaways
5:00 PM: Literary magazine celebration with A Public Space, Armchair/Shotgun, BOMB, and Electric Literature

Today in Fort Greene: Totally Independent Book Fair!

It seems there's something about the corner of Fulton and South Portland that attracts the literary types. On the very stretch of Fort Greene street where Greenlight Bookstore will open this fall, a different kind of literary marketplace is in effect today, June 13: the Totally Independent Book Fair!


You can read more about the TIBF on the New York Times' Local blog. The fair is the brainchild of Nehprii Amenii, a children’s author and illustrator, and aims to give self-published and independently published authors a chance to pool their resources and interact directly with readers and book buyers. Authors bring their own table to set up on the sidewalk (no permit required to sell books on the street in NYC!), and the fair is in effect. It's kind of like when everyone on the block has their stoop sale on the same day -- the excitement generated is more than if any one person had done it on their own, and that means more publicity (and hopefully more sales) for everyone.

Participating authors include Ms. Amenii, erotica author Monica Martinez, poets KL Belvin and Janice Brabaw and graphic novelist Jemir Johnson, as well as MAS Media Studios, Street Fiction writer David L. and Marvelous Harrison. I haven't read or seen any of their work -- but I'm always a fan of independent literary ventures. So take a stroll over to Fulton and South Portland today between 10 and 5, and support another great DIY bookish experience in the neighborhood.

The Big Announcement: Greenlight Is Go!

It's the moment we've all been waiting for: the lease is finalized, the contractors are on their way, and we've got an opening date target for Fort Greene's own independent bookstore! At last we can reveal the mystery location:

On June 1, Greenlight Bookstore became the official tenant of 686 Fulton Street, at the corner of South Portland -- right in the heart of Fort Greene.


If you're not already familiar with this corner, we recommend checking it out in Street View on Google Maps to get a sense of the bookstore space in context (it's the former Nationwide Insurance space.) Across the intersection is Habana Outpost, one of the most exciting restaurants in Fort Greene and a neighborhood staple. Around the corner on South Portland is the C train, Lafayette Avenue stop, making us accessible from anywhere in the 5 boroughs. The G train is two blocks northwest on Fulton, and if you continue strolling in that direction for a few blocks more, you'll find yourself at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, one of Brooklyn's finest cultural institutions.

And just look at those beautiful windows!!

The space is about 2000 square feet -- just right for stocking a wide variety of books in many categories, and for hosting great author readings and other events, while still feeling cozy. The funky layout has both wide open spaces and nooks and crannies, perfect for a quiet browse, for reading a picture book with a child, or for chatting with friends and neighbors over a cup of coffee from Marquet, right next door.

We have great landlords who have been invested in the neighborhood for a long time: Samy and Hesky Brahimy of IBEC Building Corporation. We're also working with a local Brooklyn architect team, Jarrett Pelletier and Frederick Tang of deFT Projects, on a plan to make this a beautiful, welcoming space that incorporates the best traditions of bookstores and Brooklyn style, as well as the new energy and ideas that define our borough, and that we hope to bring to bookselling.

If all goes smoothly (and with construction projects being what they are, that's a fairly big if), we hope to be open in September. When we get a little bit closer, we'll start planing a grand opening party that will top even our amazing launch party last September at BAM. In the meantime, we'll be posting regular updates on the store's progress on our blog and Facebook page, and you can feel free to email us with your thoughts and comments.

Thank you for walking with us as we move toward our bookstore dream. We're looking forward to continuing to share this journey with you, and welcoming you into Greenlight Bookstore this fall.


P.S.: The Financials
Among our good news is the fact that we've just been approved for a business loan from the World Trade Center Small Business Recovery Fund, which means that we will definitely have the funding to make Greenlight Bookstore a reality. However, we're still accepting community lenders, since as we've been told by our mentors in bookselling, everything always costs more than you think it will. The additional funds we're able to collect, in increments of $1000 or more, will help to ensure that Greenlight Bookstore is able to stock a wide range of books, sustain a fully functional e-commerce website, and pay a living wage to its bookstore staff. And as a community lender, you'll be entitled to special discounts until your loan is paid off, and lender privileges throughout the life of the store. Details about becoming a community lender can be found here on our website, or you can feel free to email us with any questions. Thanks so much to the many lenders who have gotten on board already -- you are helping to make this happen!

Fort Greene Open Book

It's a new project (something we tend to sympathize with): Open Book TV.

Here's the official description:

"Open Book is a new half-hour weekly television program about books and writers focusing on the contemporary and historical literary production in a different spot on the planet each week."

But the really important thing about Open Book?

The first show focuses on that most literary of all spots: Fort Greene, Brooklyn.

Not only does the show spotlight the neighborhood's literary history with readings of Walt Whitman, Richard Wright, and Henry Miller, but it features the current resident literary and creative lights: Jennifer Egan, Jeffrey Wright, Carl Hancock Rux, Moustafa Bayoumi, Ishmael Beah, Bill Lee, Darryl Blaine, and Suheir Hammad.

Also featured: Madiba (best South African restaurant I know), M & H deli(Halal), the Walt Whitman Houses, the Navy Yards, Spike Lee's dad's house, and what I'm pretty sure is the inside of the Methodist church on Hanson Place.

Authors I was looking forward to: Egan and Rux (and they didn't disappoint).

Authors whose descriptions and evocations of Brooklyn and Fort Greene unexpectedly choked me up: Bayoumi on a rich and open-eyed multiculturalism, Hammad on a particularly local youth and pride, Wright on an almost mystical but humorous continuity across the centuries.

All of them made me love this neighborhood even more.

Oh come on, just watch it, and relish the literary joy available in our local "spot on the planet"!

Greenlight in the NYT Local Blog!

It's nice to be one of the (unpaid) guest bloggers on the New York Times' Local blog for Fort Greene -- especially because Greenlight Bookstore is local news. Today's post "Lit Life: A Bookstore Becoming" fills in the blog readers about our new space and our community lender program.

Looking forward to the reader feedback, and to expanding our community!

New Lit Life in the NYT

My profile on Emily Takoudes, a lovely member of the Fort Greene literati, went up on the New York Times' Local blog yesterday. Check it out!

I met Emily back at our bookstore party in September, and it was great to reconnect. I'm grateful to her for connecting me with lots of the other bookish folks in the neighborhood -- and for her enthusiasm about books, food, and Brooklyn.

If you're a Facebooker, you can also check out the group Emily created for Fort Greene / Clinton Hill Publishing. And don't forget to become a fan of Greenlight Bookstore on our page while you're there!

Author Nelson George on his own Fort Greene

Nelson George, author of the forthcoming memoir City Kid: A Writer’s Memoir of Ghetto Life and Post-Soul Success, has an interesting meditation in today's New York Times on the changing face of Fort Greene.

George moved to the neighborhood in 1985 and views the area as a "crucial black artistic enclave." Like many New Yorkers, he's regretful to see his neighborhood change from the way it was when he first encountered it, and wonders about the changing race and class dynamics of the neighborhood. It's a valuable piece for the portrait of one writer's history in Brooklyn, and as a starting point for thinking about Fort Greene's identity. A conversation about the article and related issues is already underway on Brownstoner; feel free to wade in with your opinions.

I'm following this discussion closely, hoping for additional insights into what I've observed and learned about the neighborhood. To me, Fort Greene seems like a wonderful example of racial co-habitation and community -- it's one of the reasons I love it. But it always hurts when things change around you, and I know that racial tension is probably always a presence in Brooklyn to some degree. I'm curious what Fort Greene's current crop of writers, readers, and artists think.

New Roots

"Put a bookstore in a neighborhood, and you really feel the roots of a community growing," said Lois Harvey, owner of West Side Books.

That's from a Saturday article in the Denver Post about the community bookstores in that great bookish town.

I thought it was a perfect expression of not only why Rebecca and I want to start our bookstore in Fort Greene, but why the neighborhood wants one.

A bookstore isn't just a place to get books; there are lots of those. It's a place to spend your leisure time, to meet your neighbors, to talk to folks with shared interests, to hear new authors read, to learn about issues or what's coming up. It's what's often called a Third Place, like a pub or a social club: not home, not work, but the place in between, where the life of the neighborhood really is. It's where our shared history gets made.

Fort Greene has strong roots already, and it's also got lots of newer residents who have been attracted to that history and identity. When the Fort Greene Association's Retail Survey revealed that residents of all backgrounds and races were hoping for a bookstore, that revealed something: that the neighborhood wants to strengthen and grow those roots.

We hope Greenlight Bookstore is going to be a place that together the different threads of the neighborhood, where all our roots can grow together.

Today's the day!

... and I'm just trying to keep my head from exploding from anxiety, trying to remember everything, and complete and total joy.

Tonight's bookstore kickoff party at the BAM Harvey is going to be so off the hook (if I'm allowed to use that phrase as a card-carrying nerd). Food. Booze. Raw, sexy space. Colson Whitehead. Jennifer Egan. Kate Christensen. (Maybe) Jhumpa Lahiri. Fort Greeners. Book industry bigwigs. Friends. Loved ones. Supporters. Surveys to find out what YOU want from your bookstore.

And mad, mad media coverage. We've got Brooklyn 12, the Daily News, the Observer, New York Press, and yes, the New York Times herself coming to take photos and get the scoop. I am sure that I will look totally goofy; I hope they just listen to my words instead.

AND -- tonight is the night for a big announcement that will push the bookstore forward by a giant leap. I've hinted about it to some of you -- some of you know the secret -- and the rest of you will find out. This something (or someone?) is stone cold kick ass, and you're going to love love love.

Okay, I have to get back to work for a couple more hours before I start getting too excited and using more inappropriately street phrases. Can't wait to see you all tonight!