Book lovers invited to participate in LA's first Indie Book Crawl

CULVER CITY, Calif. (KABC) -- Book lovers are invited to explore some of L.A.'s independent bookstores this weekend at the inaugural Los Angeles Indie Book Crawl.

The owner of Village Well Books and Coffee in Culver City came up with the idea, hoping to bring the reading community together in a fun way, encouraging people to discover new books and new spots to buy them.

"For us, it's to help our business," Jennifer Caspar said. "Have a great weekend of business and have people discover us and have new customers. And then, the experience for the participant is that they get to discover new neighborhoods and new bookstores."

A total of 13 indie bookstores are participating, from Manhattan Beach to West Hollywood, Pasadena and beyond. To participate, you spend $10 at one location, get a passport and stamp, then head to the other locations.

"As you visit other stores, you get prizes along the way. And if you reach the end, you get the grand prize and an entry into a raffle to win gift cards from all of us," Casper said.

Across town, romance novels can be found at The Ripped Bodice.

"I have been waiting for so long for something like a book crawl. I feel like the LA reading community is so tight knit. We already have a big celebration in April with the LA Times Festival of Books," said general manager Taylor Capizola, who is excited to celebrate books, bookstores and readers alike.

"I can't wait to see all the other people come in. I want to see what other bookstores they went to, the experiences that they had, it's a wonderful time to just be able to, like, talk to the reading community of LA, too," Capizola said.

The hope is that it becomes as big as book crawls in other cities, giving people a chance to connect with both books and people.

"People are lonely now. People need to get out of their houses and off of their screens and since the pandemic, we've all kind of lost our skill at that, at getting out and hanging out outside, and making friends and talking to people," Caspar said.

The book crawl is Friday through Sunday. For more information, go to [url HREF="https://www.LAindiebookcrawl.com" TARGET="_blank" REL="nofollow" ]LAindiebookcrawl.com[/url].

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