In my email today:

Dear Loyal Customers,

Sometime in the near future the Duluth News Tribune will be running a story about Northern Lights Books & Gifts being for sale. It is true. Since August I have been contacting our top customers and local book colleagues to let them know I was looking for a buyer. Our lease will be up the end of February and I do not plan to renew.

I have decided to scale back my professional responsibilities so I can be available to travel in order to care for elderly parents in northern Illinois. Over the past year I have been gone nine weeks. I am very grateful to my staff for their professionalism and for their loyal efforts on behalf of the bookstore.

There have also been significant changes in traditional bookselling. I believe we are at a “Guttenberg” moment in publishing with the impact of electronic media. A new fresh approach is required for continued success in bookselling at the brick and mortar level. My heart and head are distracted with other priorities and I do not have the energy to figure out what comes next for profitible bookselling.

It has truly been an honor and a dream come true to serve the community of book lovers who have shopped with us for the past seventeen years. In the meantime we are operating full steam ahead through the holiday season.

Gratefully,
Anita Zager
Northern Lights Books & Gifts

I noticed it’s been a year since the Honking Tree incident when perusing the Two Harbors paper. They are looking for words-art-whatever to publish next week on the anniversary. They also welcomed stories, made up, I suppose, chronicling what you think might have happened. Email the News-Chronicle at [email protected]