Adam Booth and Heather Novotny of Racine’s Vintage and Modern Books

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Photo by Jenny Maurer

Adam Booth and Heather Novotny - Vintage and Modern Books

Adam Booth (left) and Heather Novotny (right)

Historically, bookstores have been a place for showcasing new artists and organizing political movements. City Lights in San Francisco, for instance, played a big role in promoting poets of the beats and published Alan Ginsberg’s influential poetry collection Howl and Other Poems in 1956. In the Midwest, St Louis’ Left Bank Books was the first bookstore in the region to promote feminist, leftist, and other alternative literature upon its establishment in 1969.

Racine, Wisconsin too, has had a long history of independent bookstores starting in the late 1800s with Botsford and Wooster, a stationery and bookstore.  After a 16-year-gap following the closure of Martha Merril’s location in 2009, Vintage and Modern Books opened in September 2024 on Sixth Street. Run by a couple of fantasy genre fans, Adam Booth and Heather Novotny, the bookstore has made a name for itself by hosting poetry readings, local author appearances, and have even helped establish a new coffee shop soon to be next door. With Amazon’s decision to have their own book sale during the 12th annual Independent Bookstore Day, it was the perfect time for Booth and Novotny to sit down and discuss the role of independent bookstores in communities, the political context of chains vs independents, and the current state of bookstores in general.

What brought you to book collecting?

Booth: Both of us have always had a little collection of books, but I’ve moved around a lot so a lot of the times I’ve had to sell my books or give them to friends. When we moved back to the states in 2020 and cleaning out (Booth’s spouse) Heather’s parents’ garage, I found a box of old sci-fi paperbacks from the ‘60s and ‘0s.  Heather said, “If you want to sell them do,” so I set up my Etsy store at the time and that slowly evolved and got bigger. After we started a website, we established the shop.

Novotny: We got more and more books until we needed a shop!

Describe your relationship between your store and the community.

Novotny: We were attracted to coming to Racine because it has a nice downtown area and there’s a lot of opportunity for community here. At this point, we have this backroom that we’ve opened: it’s available for events so we’re trying to be more involved with the arts. I’m also on the board of directors for ArtRoot so we’re just trying to build relationships with the community and creating a place for people to find community. I think that will be increasing as we do more events like book clubs and game nights that we’re dipping our toes into right now. 

What do you think attracts artists and literature enthusiasts to the Midwest particularly?

Booth: From what I’ve seen, I think there’s a long history of bookshops here along with a need for something simple, something that brings people together and that doesn’t cost a lot of money. I would say a lot of the countryside also inspires arts and artists.

Novotny: The Midwest is an interesting place. We have a reputation for being a hard-working pragmatic people, but there’s also a lot of intellectual interest along with the big cities such as Chicago and Madison.

Has the independent bookstore scene developed over the decade or so? Has Amazon had any influence?

Booth: Definitely. I think it was previously a lot easier to open a bookstore and now people seem to be finding it more difficult. You also have to work a lot harder especially in terms of social media and advertising, you have to do so much work. A lot of people prefer the simplicity of ordering from Amazon and ordering electronic books which is definitely having an effect.

Luckily for us, we lean more into collectibles and secondhand stuff, so the profit margins are different. We also deal with a very different crowd who want to invest in something that already means a lot to them whereas with new books, people have to take a gamble with prices always going up.

Novotny: I’d add that people are aware that buying from Amazon is something that affects small business in a negative way and there’s also a couple of different platforms to help independent booksellers. We’re signed up with bookshop.org where you can buy any brand-new book, and the proceeds go to your local bookstore. We also signed up for Libro.fm which does audiobooks; people can go there and get a subscription or purchase any audiobook with the support and proceeds going to any independent bookstore. That’s helping level the playing field.

How do you see physical books continuing to be a part of our society in the next 10 or more years?

Booth: With things like e-books, it’s not that every book gets converted to an e-book. If you just want the content, e-books are fantastic. I don’t think there are many readers that are super passionate about just content and not the physical book. If you have a book that’s had a very profound effect on you, having a physical copy is a whole different thing. I think it’s similar to vinyl records; a lot of us listen to a huge amount of music we don’t own anymore, but if someone finds a first pressing of their favorite record, it’s about the object along with the content.

Novotny: People are constantly interacting with digital products so being able to pick up something like a book to get away from the digital world, I think that’s going to continue to be more and more important. We’ve seen a movement of people doing things like pottery because it’s about getting your hands dirty and getting away from screens. I think people will continue to come towards books and sometimes with younger generations too, there’s a rebellion against digital products.

What do you hope to accomplish this year?

Booth: With a lot of the work, we’re most of the way there; we’ve filled most of the store with shelving and the stuff we really want to accomplish is more behind the scenes. We want to get more events and more people using this back room. There’s also more to be done on our website (vintageandmodernbooks.com) and we’ve got a refresh to that coming soon where we’ll incorporate Libro.fm and bookshop.org. We’ve also met a local bookbinder who we’re hoping to work more closely with, and I’d personally love to be able to get some kind of one-off books made with her. Hopefully, by Christmas, we’ll be at the point where we can hire someone to help us part time. If that goes well, we may be able to take on more stuff, but right now we need to increase our footprint this year. Also hopefully, our friends down the street, Raku Roasters, will be opening. We’ll be working with them along Ezperanza Coffee to offer free coffee with every purchase on Fridays and Saturdays so then people can buy a book, get a coffee and sit in the back area with their friends.

Is there anything you’d like to add?

Booth: One thing I’ve mentioned is our use of the back room; anyone who has an idea for an writers’ group, poetry group or anything like that, feel free to get in contact with us (Vintageandmodernbooks@gmail.com).  We’re trying to keep the use of the backroom free with the idea of community more than business.