Come enjoy our great selection of used and new books, soak in the mountain view, and brave our Real Alaskan Ugly Coffee, brewed right here in Palmer, Alaska!

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Fireside Books
720 South Alaska St.
Palmer, AK 99645
Tel: 907 745.2665
Fax: 907 745.2664
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Alaska's Quirkiest Bookstore!
Look at the walk-ability score for Downtown Palmer!

Alaskan journalist Kaylene Johnson has written the definitive biography of Governor Sarah Palin, Sarah: How a Hockey Mom Turned Alaska's Political Establishment Upside Down is Alaska's political book of the moment!






Poetry Now Smart Mob

In the past, our poetry events have always been for self-selected audiences. People come who already like poetry. The result, over time, is a smaller and smaller (but more and more passionate) audience for poetry. What I want to see happen -- and this goes for all the arts -- is to move poetry out into the real world. And i think cell phones are the medium for that. You know how wherever you are -- in the grocery store, the coffee shop, the bookstore -- you are a captive audience to whatever cell phone conversations are going on near you.

Why not use that to bring poetry to the world -- or at least the Mat-Su Valley and Anchorage. Sign Up for the Poetry Now Smart Mob Performance Thingamagig: So here’s my proposal: You, dear reader, and whoever else you can get to join in, agree to carry a poem with you everywhere you go for the month of April. You tell me how to text message you. I send you a message at least three times during the month, and when you get the message (It will say "Poetry Now") you say, "Excuse me I have to take this" and you read or recite your poem into the cell phone as if you were having a conversation. And there it is, a public display of poetry. Is anyone willing to join in? Email me at poetrynow@goodbooksbadcoffee.com

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Events at Fireside Books Read more...
Author visits! Readings! Writer's Groups! Come join us for tons of literary fun!

Title of Event: John Straley
When: Wednesday, May 14, 2008 4:00 PM
Location: Good Books Bad Coffee
Description: Come meet Alaskan mystery author John Straley. His newest book, "The Big Both Ways" is out, and he'll be here to sign copies and answer questions.


Staff Picks Read more...
Find out what our friendly but opinionated staff love to read!

How to Get Your Child to Love Reading How to Get Your Child to Love Reading
by Codell, Esme Raji
Are children reading enough? Not according to most parents and teachers, who know that reading aloud with children fosters a lifelong love of books, ensures better standardized test scores, promotes greater success in school, and helps instill the values we most want to pass on.
Esme Raji Codell--an inspiring children's literature specialist and an energetic teacher--has the solution. She's turned her years of experience with children, parents, librarians, and fellow educators into a great big indispensable volume designed to help parents get their kids excited about reading.
Here are hundreds of easy and inventive ideas, innovative projects, creative activities, and inspiring suggestions that have been shared, tried, and proven with children from birth through eighth grade.
This five-hundred-page volume is brimming with themes for superlative storytimes and book-based birthday parties, ideas for mad-scientist experiments and half-pint cooking adventures, stories for reluctant readers and book groups for boys, step-by-step instructions for book parades, book-related crafts, storytelling festivals, literature-based radio broadcasts, readers' theater, and more. There are book lists galore, with subject-driven reading recommendations for science, math, cooking, nature, adventure, music, weather, gardening, sports, mythology, poetry, history, biography, fiction, and fairy tales. Codell's creative thinking and infectious enthusiasm will empower even the busiest parents and children to include literature in their lives.
Book Sense Picks
Unique and provocative selections from a great diversity of voices...all personally recommended by the independent booksellers of America.
The Cry of the Icemark
by Hill, Stuart
Summer 2005 Children's Picks!"This Young Adult novel features Thirrin, a feisty heroine who moves from child to military commander, and then to queen when her father dies defending their homeland. As she defends her kingdom, she collects an unusual group of allies, including good witches, Amazon-like warriors, vampires, and a good friend who turns out to be a powerful wielder of magic. The cliff-hanger ending should keep readers enthralled." --Jane L. Quinn, The Corner Shelf, Culpeper, VA
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Quote of the Day
"Books were my pass to personal freedom. I learned to read at age three, and soon discovered there was a whole world to conquer that went beyond our farm in Mississippi."

- Oprah Winfrey

From The Quotable Book Lover (Lyons Press)
Feature: Children's Books
Homepage Text
Tap Dancing on the Roof: Sijo (Poems)
by Park, Linda Sue, Banyai, Istvan
Sijo is a traditional Korean form of poetry. Sijo is syllabic, like Japanese haiku, with three lines of 14 to 16 syllables each: the first two introduce the topic, the third and fourth lines develop it, and the fifth and sixth lines contain an unexpected humorous or ironic twist. This collection contains 26 sijo, half on "Inside" and half on "Outside" themes, many humorous, all appealing to a child reader. The simplicity and accessibility of these poems will encourage children to try their hand at writing sijo.
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