About Us

CHRISTIN EVANS & PRAVEEN MADAN

Christin and Praveen are the new face of the Booksmith. They bought the bookstore from founder Gary Frank in 2007. Refugees from the Land of Corporations, they have many exciting plans for The Booksmith. Their big, hairy, audacious goal - Create the Independent Bookstore for the 21st Century.

Christin and Praveen also recently started LitMinds.org along with Christin's sister Carrie. LitMinds is a community where readers, authors, and independent booksellers can share their unique reading interests, make new friends, and enjoy stimulating conversations. LitMinds aspires to be a place for celebration and a catalyst for change. LitMinds is a free service.

RACHEL MEIER

Rachel is a New Yorker living in exile. She like San Francisco but doesn't understand why the subways are above ground or why there isn't a decent pizza pie to be found. She loves to read and she loves to be bossy. Check out readafuckingbook.com, where those two interests intersect.  

Red Lion Book Company, 1968 > Unicorn Book Shop 1969, first author event with Gary Snyder. Lots more, in Santa Barbara, then Berkeley. Old Mole > Cody's, at Cody's for eons. And NCIBA, ABA, and so on. Post-Cody's, Berkeley Arts & Letters, The Booksmith. Still reading, still being wowed by writers and words.

ALISA COHEN

When not working at the Booksmith, Alisa is a tireless substitute teacher. She also feels the book Everything I Need to Know I Learned from a Children's Book pretty much sums it up.

AMY ROSE

Amy is not judgmental, quiet, or graceful. This is what her best friend wrote:

"If you ask her about herself, she'll say she's boring, even though she has ridden in a hot-air balloon, lived above a funeral parlor, climbed glaciers in Alaska, once worked at a 200-year-old prison, has been on stage with Bad Religion, travelled to 46 states, braved a year living in the deep south, chose to elope with a man she met at McDonald's, often makes whole-wheat crust pizza from scratch, and can 1RM dead-lift over 200 lbs."

Amy is definitely more afraid of you than you are of her. http://burnmybiscuits.com

CAMDEN AVERY

Camden is a reader and he reads. He reads and he reads and he reads and he reads and he doesn't read much that's new. Sometimes he is reading something old and then again sometimes he is reading something very old. There is only so much time for reading and you have to draw the line somewhere, you do. When he's reading what he's reading, in his reading he likes to talk about what he is reading. His reading isn't a snobbish reading, he doesn't have a favorite reading but he does know some books are better than other ones as anyone will tell you.  

CONSTANCE SMITH

Constance runs the photography section and will smack you down if you sass her.

She takes lots of pictures, which you can see at constancesmithphoto.com

GREER GABLE

After four years in the midwest, Greer is very happy to be back in the Bay Area. She is addicted to tea, and can make rather awesome animals out of pipecleaners. In an alternate universe, her daemon is a fox. 

KIARA BRINKMAN

Kiara takes care of the poetry section and helps out in the children's section.  She will probably try to sell you a book by Anne Carson or Shaun Tan. 

Kiara also works as a writer and a teacher.  Her first novel, Up High in the Trees, made the New York Times Editor's Choice list and was a Chicago Tribune Best Book of the Year in 2007.  Currently, she's finishing her second novel and laboring away on a story collection. 

In her spare time, Kiara is learning how to play her new ukulele, which was a birthday gift from her husband. 

For more information, please visit: http://www.kiarabrinkman.com/

LAUREN GALLAGHER

Lauren is a dancer and is very helpful. She also knows a lot of stuff about things, but you have to ask.

LAUREN O'NIELL

Lauren has been an avid reader of children's books since the age of 4. She has Big Plans to whip the Booksmith's children's department into shape. When she's not searching for the perfect book for eager readers of all ages, Lauren can be found reading (on the BART, in line at the grocery store, or at home on the sunny side of the Bay), baking, and art-making. Ask her anything, we promise she won't bite.

SEAN CHIKI

"It was all Jack London's fault really. If not for that bender on the San Francisco waterfront back in 1893, I'd never have walked into that bookshop with the help wanted sign. Two bottles of whiskey later and with no memory of where I'd left my pants, I found myself alone, Jack having signed aboard the Sophie Sutherland bound for the coast of Japan. With such auspicious signs began my career as a book-slinger."

Sean has worked at the Booksmith since 1998. He occupies his free time with many questionable activities (most of them legal) that he won't go into here but if you're really curious, you might want to take a peek at www.seanchiki.com.

TODD LAVOIE

Sometimes I miss the good old days, hanging with Lou Reed and Ultraviolet and Candy Darling back at the factory. "Oh, that Todd," Andy Warhol used to joke to whoever was conscious, "He's such the Star." Then we'd trade silkscreens and off I'd go on my merry way. Those days are long behind me, though I still cry whenever I listen to Transformer.

Goodbye Andy, goodbye Studio 54, hello obscurity.

So, now I'm in SF, biding my time until I cash in on my fifteen minutes of fame. I'm working on a novel, still type-type-typing away. I surround myself with books and music. I dream of making the perfect risotto, realizing it'll never happen if I keep eating out as much as I do.

I have played one continuous game of "Let's run from one end of the apartment to the other" with my puppy since January. I scrounge along the ground for plastic bags. I get caught in thought over what I'd say to David Bowie over coffee and crepes. I go out dancing from time to time — pretend it's 1980 all over again. I sing Holy Holy to TwoBuck Chuck from Trader Joe's.

I saunter into the secondhand shops on the Haight with my Head Held High...and emerge empty-handed, hopes dashed into the urine-stinking pavement...I am the Anti-Scenester. And I wouldn't spend my days a bit differently.

I love this place.