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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Children’s Corner Reluctantly Moving From Skywalk Home

What with all the changes to the Skywalk section of River Park Square, you might not have heard that The Children’s Corner Bookshop is moving.

Now situated at 814 W. Main, the city’s only just-for-kids bookstore is in the process of relocating one block east to 714 W. Main, which will place it between The Bon and Nordstrom in the spot formerly held by Women’s World.

The move is scheduled for July 15, but co-owner Susan Durrie describes that date as tentative. “Certainly by the end of July,” she says.

Durrie and co-owner Judy Hamel are busy dealing with architects, contractors and the required building permits. “You know how building is, it’s very inconcise,” she says. “We’re tying to get over there as quickly as possible.”

Moving, obviously, was not something that the partners had planned on doing. They’d recently expanded their River Park Square location, which has been the store’s home since 1978, making the 22-year-old business one of the biggest children’s bookstores in the Northwest.

But, Durrie says, “We’re hoping that when the dust finally settles, everything will be OK.”

And, she adds, customers can expect only a short disruption in service.

“We’re still open,” she says. “We’re not going to be closed hardly at all. We’re going to close only as long as it takes to move this stuff over there and put it up on the shelves. … And we’re trying to re-create the same feeling, the same colors, the same style in the new space that we have in the present space.”

The store’s phone number will remain the same: 624-4820.

Mutant message

It’s one of those stories you hear about a self-published phenomenon. It involves a woman who traveled to Australia, tagged along with a band of aborigines on a four-month walkabout and lived to write about it.

But after Marlo Morgan paid $1,000 to have her tale printed, the resulting book “Mutant Message Down Under” went on to sell some 300,000 copies.

Now HarperCollins, which bought rights to the book for a reported $1.7 million, has sold an additional half-million or so. And now that the book has been released in a flashy new edition (187 pages, $10 paperback), it’s likely to sell even more.

You should know that the book is listed as fiction. The reason for this, Morgan writes, is “to protect the small tribe of aborigines from legal involvement.”

The Australian government claims it’s because she made the whole thing up.

Help is at hand

If you’ve written something - say, a novel - but aren’t sure whether it is publishable, you might want to seek some professional help.

Willow Springs’ Editorial Service is set to service your needs. The same editors who choose the work that shows up in the Eastern Washington University literary journal will comment, for a fee, on your scribblings.

Willow Springs is even offering a special “book evaluation service,” which it calls The Book Doctors.

For no fee, the staff will provide clients with its evaluation of some 100 literary journals. For a free brochure, write to: Willow Springs Editorial Service, 526 Fifth St., MS-1 EWU, Cheney, WA 99004.

A hot topic

On the tail of last week’s appearance in Moscow of Mike Thoele, author of “Fire Line: Summer Battles of the West,” comes another wildfire-themed book.

“Smokejumpers ‘49: Brothers in the Sky” by Starr Jenkins (Merritt Starr Books, 219 pages, $23.95) is a self-published memoir by an ex-U.S. Forest Service smokejumper. It includes several photos by former Life magazine photographer Bob Stackpole, including several of the infamous 1949 Mann Gulch fire that killed 13 firefighters, and a letter by the only living survivor of that tragedy, Spokane resident Robert Sallee.

For ordering information, call the San Luis Obispo, Calif.-based publisher at (805) 544-6214.

The reader board

David James Duncan, author of “The River Why” and “The Brothers K,” will read from his new book, “River Teeth,” at 7:30 p.m. Monday at Auntie’s Bookstore, Main and Washington.

Sam Halpert, author of “Raymond Carver: An Oral Biography,” will read from his book at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday at Auntie’s Bookstore.

Philip Margolin, author of “After Dark,” will read from his suspense novel at 7:30 p.m. Thursday at Auntie’s Bookstore.

, DataTimes