This business has been in town for 14 years without a permanent location, but now Warren residents Michael and Shannon Yahn have found a place to settle down, right in the middle of Liberty Street, heralding a resurgence of Warren, Pennsylvania's downtown retail district. It's a bookstore.
Authors Books & Music bookstore is fully stocked with quality books you won't find anywhere else. Vist this business on the web at Authors Books & Music.
Photos and article by Chris Lareau, copyright 2009
Before E-Bay and since the days when Amazon.com was just a one-inch ad in the New Yorker, Michael and Shannon Yahn have been honing their business model of literary pursuit. They still own the domain name for their first venture, Books By Bid, an online search and sell website that pre-figured E-Bay on WarrenPA.net. They helped turn the old Warren Emporium on Second Avenue into the now vibrant Allegheny Bookmart. On November 16 this year they opened Authors at 227 Liberty Street with the help of a few volunteers from GroWarren.
There wasn't much fanfare. No ribbon cutting or brass bands. But that's the style of the Yahns, a couple of book mensches who have the know-how to find any book you want. They take care of books and let the books sell themselves. Slow and steady seems to be their motto, starting off with a book signing Saturday by local writer Reg Darling. Darling is a fifth generation Warrenite (and before that an Onondogan descendant) whose cosmic writing chronicles the most unusual times of growing up here on the Allegheny High Plateau. He will be signing copies of his books, Coyote Soul, Raven Heart and his latest tome, Hartwell Road. If you thought living around here was boring, read a few pages of these books.
Opening just in time for the Holidays, Authors' contribution to the Christmas Walk on Friday night will be a live four-string quartet right inside one of their large display windows. Not much of a grand opening, yet a grand way to run a business.
If the launch of Authors is any indication, passersby on Liberty Street should start seeing more lights on through the short winter days in 2010. Window shopping may yet again become a favorite pastime for pedestrians in this Victorian city.
Indeed, a progressive architectural firm has already been hired to restore the entire block that contains the new bookstore. See related story.
As a city of not quite 10,000, Warren might start to lay claim to the same upscale development seen in some Adirondack towns. There are now four bookstores within walking distance of each other: Authors, Allegheny Bookmart (314 Second Avenue), The Book Rack (309 Hickory Street), and New Life Christian Bookstore. Authors owner and Warren Area High School alumna Shannon Yahn thinks this is terrific. If you want to buy someone a book for Christmas, Warren is the place to visit. You're sure to find exactly what you want, she says.
Keeper of the books. Authors owner Shannon Yahn inspects acquisitions at her newly opened shop on Warren's Liberty Street.
Authors Books & Music,
227 Liberty St.,
Warren, PA
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