My Journey as a Bookseller

Week of January 28, 2023

My forty-year odyssey living the literary life as the owner of Books & Books. I will give guests an insight into the ups and downs of independent bookselling, peppered with anecdotes of the many writers I’ve had the opportunity to meet and befriend. The audience will come away knowing what it takes to open and sustain a bookstore, while hearing stories about some of the most iconic literary figures of our time, writers as diverse as Joan Didion, Tony Bourdain, Susan Sontag, Judy Blume, Allen Ginsberg, Isabel Allende, Salman Rushdie, Carl Hiaasen, Saul Bellow, Maya Angelou, and many others.

  

Mitchell Kaplan, a native of Miami Beach, opened the first Books & Books in 1982 in Coral Gables, Florida. Now with four South Florida locations, Books & Books hosts over 400 events per year. In addition, the original Coral Gables location is home to the well-established Café at Books & Books, and there are Books & Books affiliated stores at the Miami International Airport, and in Key West, where he collaborates with the noted author Judy Blume and her husband, George.  Among his honors, Mitchell served as president of the American Booksellers Association and he received the Literarian Award from the National Book Foundation. Books & Books was also Publishers Weekly’s bookstore of the year. He recently accepted an appointment to serve on the Board of the National Coalition Against Censorship. As co-founder of the Miami Book Fair in 1985, Mitchell has served as the chairperson of its Board of Directors and continues to guide the programming team at the Fair which takes place on the campus of Miami Dade College in the heart of downtown Miami. Each year the Fair presents close to 500 authors over one week in November, along with a street festival, where bookstalls line the streets adjacent to the campus. Programs take place in Creole, Spanish and English, reflecting the diversity of Miami. Mitchell, with his partner Paula Mazur, established The Mazur Kaplan Company to bring books to the screen, both film and television. His most recent release is Let Him Go starring Diane Lane and Kevin Costner. Mitchell also hosts the podcast The Literary Life with Mitchell Kaplan, broadcast from Miami, where he lives with his wife, Rachelle. They have three children, Anya, Daniel and Jonah.