Pleasant Land provides escape for book, coffee lovers

RATHDRUM – The one rule posted in Rathdrum’s new downtown coffee shop isn’t a hard one to stomach. Just ask the group of Saturday morning regulars, whose numbers have grown from two to 20 strong by a brew of comfort, coffee and chitchat.

The above-the-counter sign in Pleasant Land Books, more coffeehouse character than commandment, reads: Sit long, talk much, laugh often. Since the October opening of the ground floor, 1,000-square-foot shop, which features new, used and rare books, owners Jan and Sam Conner, 53 and 63, respectively, haven’t had much of a problem keeping their customers planted in their seats, especially during those weekend get-togethers.

“Books and coffee are kind of my passion, and they just seem to go well together,” Jan Conner said about their coffee bar/bookstore amalgamation. The Pleasant Land name was derived from the couple’s hometown of Athol.

That blend has drawn in dedicated locals from around the prairie, such as Marsha and Jim Zehrung and Teddy Schultz, who can be found there throughout the week. And they’re not alone, especially on weekends, when they’re joined by other retirees from the Golden Spike Estates near the edge of town.

“I like it because it’s close and it’s local,” Schultz said. The owners, she added, are “not only friendly, they are more than proprietors; they take care of us.”

For the owners, the idea to start the business came about with their impending retirement. With their remaining work years – and Jan Conner’s experience from running her own online bookstore – “we just decided we’d try a business of our own,” she said.

After a short site search that narrowed the field to the prairie area, the Conner family, including son Matt, discovered the recently built offices of the Palidash Building, which they found to be in keeping with Rathdrum’s downtown revitalization project and designed to capture the spirit of the historic city center.

“We liked the small-town atmosphere. The main street was just exactly what I was looking for,” Jan Conner said. The open-room shop takes inspiration from old-fashioned bookstores, with a full-service coffee bar lining the northeastern wall, several rows of bookcases in the back, and cozy furniture overlooking the mountain view near the entrance. Once winter thaws, the owners plan on adding outside tables along the sidewalk.

With their laid-back atmosphere, “you can just kind of step back in time and forget the busy-ness of life for a little bit,” she said. And escapism is encouraged, since, according to their Web site, “Pleasant Land Books was formed out of a love for the written word and the cherished, old books that allow us to escape to almost any place we might want to travel.”

However, leaving modern-day devices behind is entirely optional, as Pleasant Land Books offers free wireless Internet. As for the bookstore’s collection, which was gathered from used-book stores and secondhand shops, there are a variety of Christian-themed books, as well as works by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Leo Tolstoy, Ernest Hemingway, Lewis Carroll, and Jan Conner’s own childhood favorite, “Beautiful Joe,” by Marshall Saunders. Customers can also special-order books.

“We wanted to keep all the modern conveniences with the old-fashioned atmosphere,” she said. As the only place of its kind on the northern edge of the prairie, she added “we’re unique to Rathdrum right now.”

Since opening their doors last fall, the Conner family has acquired much more than their unique collection of printed pages.

“It’s been good. It’s been better than expected. … The community has been great. We’ve had nothing but positive comments and support from people,” Jan Conner said. “We really like it. We’ve made a lot of new friends.”

Fitting in with the aforementioned house rule, the three retired friends seated around the couch said they look forward to their time in the coffee shop, especially the weekly, lingering coffee sessions and the onset of spring.

“We’re not about to go,” Marsha Zehrung said.