Newham Bookshop celebrates
40 years’ trading in 2018
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Vivian Archer, manager and driving force behind Newham Bookshop for the last 31 years, has been given a special award at the Books Are My Bag Readers’ Awards, sponsored by National Book Tokens. The award, presented for the first time, was for Vivian’s Outstanding Contribution to Bookselling.
The award was presented to Vivian by Vaseem Khan, east London-based author of the Baby Ganesh Detective Agency books. June Sarpong, author of Diversify, well-known television personality and friend and supporter of Newham Bookshop, hosted the evening. The event was held at Foyles’ flagship store in Charing Cross Road on Tuesday 13 November and was attended by many authors, publishers and independent booksellers. By careful secret planning, Vivian’s husband Bob, daughter Rachel, and others involved with the Bookshop were able to see the award presented in person. “How did you find out about this?” asked a genuinely surprised and delighted Vivian Archer. All those connected with the Bookshop – together with many in the book trade – are very pleased to congratulate Vivian on this richly-deserved award.
We’re celebrating 40 years’ trading, and we’re moving Two Doors Down. So we’re having another 40% discount sale to help reduce stock (less to move), celebrate our anniversary and raise some more funds for the move. So come and visit us and buy some books to help our move. (*Everything in stock is discounted except for CGP and other revision books).
Newham Bookshop thanks all those who were at The Wanstead Tap for our Grand Auction of signed books to raise money for our move from 747 to 743 Barking Road. The auction raised around £3,000 towards our target of £25,000. Our special guest authors Vaseem Khan and Bobby Seagull both spoke up for independent bookshops and Newham Bookshop in particular. Dan Clapton, owner of The Wanstead Tap, was a superb auctioneer even though he won a couple of bids himself. Everyone enjoyed The Wanstead Tap’s wine and food from chef and baker Sophie Downer-Hill.
We have had a special donation from our friends at Penguin, a signed copy of Michelle Obama’s memoir Becoming, to be published on 13 November. (These signed copies are not available for customers to buy). The winning bid was £175 from a Canadian bidder who will receive the book soon after we get it.
Newham Bookshop has won the central London region prize in Pan Macmillan’s Independent Bookshop Innovation Award. The award is run by Pan Macmillan as part of its Macmillan 175 celebrations. Each winning bookshop will receive £1,750 to launch a new and innovative project in their bookshop. The projects focus on community outreach and supporting new readers. The winners were announced at the Booksellers Association conference in Birmingham on 10 September by Anthony Forbes-Watson, managing director of Pan Macmillan.
Our project supports Arc in the Park, a charity based in Canning Town E16, with its Arc World Book Club. The club involves children and their families who are currently not active readers, and helps to develop their interest and enthusiasm for reading and books. Newham Bookshop will provide advice and support to the club in the selection of titles, and will supply and deliver the books.
The Award judges said: “We loved the immediate results that this project will bring to a broad range of children including those with disabilities. Year one will provide book access for 50 families and year two plans to broaden the scheme to a second hub.” Vivian Archer, manager of Newham Bookshop said: “We are pleased and proud to have been given this award. We are celebrating 40 years as a community bookshop and this will really help us to promote reading with our partners in this diverse community. Thank you Macmillan for recognising this.”
Holding the Baby is a travelling exhibition sharing memories of childcare and parenting in London’s East End.
Sit down in a cozy mid-century living room, turn the dial on a 1950s radio and discover stories of worries and love, postnatal depression and family support, working mums and stay-at home-dads.
Come to the launch to preview the exhibition, hear speakers on childcare and parenting and eat delicious, free cakes and snacks. RSVP to rosa@on-the-record.org.uk or call 07583 656338.
After the launch the exhibition will tour Newham’s libraries until end of February 2019. Click here for a full list of tour dates and venues.
Thanks to the generosity of authors and publishers, we have some rare signed books and other items for you to bid for to help our Two Doors Down fundraising campaign. Click here for details.
Have a look at this post by Iron Liddy on the blog West Ham Till I Die. Thank you for a great article. Lovely comments, too. Make your pledge now.
Martin Rowson, The Guardian’s political cartoonist, has generously donated this cartoon for our Two Doors Down fundraising campaign. The winning bid was for £250.
Owing to the great demand for tickets, we’ll be welcoming Peggy Seeger and Eliza Carthy MBE to Wanstead Library on Tuesday 27 November. (The event was originally at The Wanstead Tap, but we needed a bigger venue). For full details and to buy tickets, click here.
We are building an archive of our events from 2002 onwards. This was long before we had a website, and includes the period of our first website, up to the Autumn of 2014. This is work in progress, and more details will be added over the next few months. Click here to visit the archive.
The Gentle Author visited Newham Bookshop recently and wrote a post about us in the Spitalfields Life blog, which you can also read here.
The Music and Freedom Project is a travellng multi-media exhibition about human rights, telling stories you’ve seldom heard, told by the people who made them happen – in the US civil rights movement, the UK and Newham’s struggles for social justice. The exhibition is currently at Beckton Globe Library until 30 April and there will be linked events and workshops across Newham for the next two months. For details of Journey to Justice and the exhibition please visit their website.
We loved this article in the Guardian’s Sportblog by its former chief sports writer Richard Williams: Delusions of stadium grandeur haunt West Ham and club’s owners.
Congratulations to The Wanstead Tap for winning this well-deserved award. Apart from all the author events which we are proud to support, owner Dan Clapton puts on a varied programme of music, comedy and other events, all served with excellent craft beers and a range of adult soft drinks.
We were delighted to see John Walker’s article for E7 Now & Then which tells the story of Newham Bookshop and how we have achieved our 40th anniversary. You can read the article by clicking here.
Siôn Hamilton visited Newham Bookshop in December and spoke to Vivian and CJ. Read his article here.
Our fundraising total for those affected by the Grenfell Tower fire has reached £7,000. We’d like to thank you all for your donations and auction bids. Also, thank you to the many authors and publishers who donated items to auction or for prizes.
All the funds raised are being donated to the Kensington & Chelsea Foundation, an independent charity founded in 2008, which is working with all the other charities supporting the Grenfell Tower residents.
Our fundraising efforts were reported by Newham Recorder on 29 December. As is often the case with the Recorder, Vivian Archer is said to be the owner of Newham Bookshop (as well as the manager), but – as you know – we are a community bookshop with no owner and no shareholders.
You can now buy tickets online for Newham Bookshop’s events, and for some events in partnership with other organisations. Click on the logo, and you will be taken to the secure website run for us by The Little Box Office Ltd, a British company which provides online ticketing for theatres, music and book festivals.
Newham Bookshop’s website is developed and maintained by David Ceen and Ian Thomason who continue to enjoy coding. Copyright © 2014 - 2018 Newham Bookshop.
