i’m still standin’

When Chris O’Harra and Shannon Ahern announced in 1993 that they had purchased the Liberty Building and planned on moving Auntie’s Bookstore into the long-standing space, Spokane book fans cheered.

After depending for decides on chain-store outlets such as Waldenbooks and B. Dalton Booksellers, or the various smallish independent and/or used-book businesses that came and went, Spokane was more than ready for a large-scale literary center that even Seattle and Portland bibliophiles would admire.

And while the years since have presented venerable Auntie’s with its share of ups and downs, the store remains Spokane’s literary jewel – one that is celebrating its 30 anniversary this weekend.

At 10 tonight, Auntie’s is holding a release party for Christopher Paolini’s novel “Brisingr,” the third in his “Inheritance” series. On Saturday, a 9 a.m. “readathon” will precede tours, a special 11 a.m. story time, clowns and balloon-animal making. Discounts on book purchases will continue through Sunday.

O’Harra, for one, had always intended Auntie’s to be, as she said in 1985, not only “the biggest and best bookstore in the area” but also “the finest in terms of selection.”

“It better be,” she told Spokesman-Review writer Tom Sowa. “All those books there,” she said, referring to the bulging shelves at the store’s former location – 313 W. Riverside Ave. – “are my life savings.”

O’Harra and her brother-in-law Ahern became booksellers in 1978 when they opened the Book & Game Co. in the Flour Mill. They moved to the Riverside Ave. site seven years later, dubbing the new space as Auntie’s Bookstore and Café.

“We wanted a name that would give it some personality,” O’Harra told SpokaneWoman magazine, “but … O’Harra and Ahern sounded like a tavern. So we called it Auntie’s – just because I was the aunt.”

It was at the Riverside Ave. location that they began holding literary readings. This was where Sherman Alexie got his start as a stand-up performer, where Seattle-based novelist Ivan Doig attracted standing-room-only crowds and where many Spokane-area book lovers were introduced to the printed word.

Even before O’Harra and Ahern shifted their business to the Liberty Building, they whetted the public’s appetite by scheduling a November, 1993, reading by Douglas Adams, author of the “Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” series. Some 400 people crowded into the building’s ground floor, which still stood empty save for 200-odd folding chairs.

In 1999, Ahern sold his interest in Auntie’s to O’Harra, though the two still share ownership of the overall building.

Over the years, readings by Alexie, Doig, Chuck Palahniuk (“Fight Club”), J.A. Jance (“Damage Control”), Jess Walter (“Citizen Vince”), Ann Rule (“The Stranger Beside Me”) and hundreds of others have filled Auntie’s various reading spaces (either the upstairs auditorium or, in recent years, the café space).

Even as other changes have occurred – blending of new and used books, growth of online sales, competition from other chain stores, re-entrenchment to the Liberty Building’s ground floor, stock-market crashes – O’Harra and her staff have plugged on. And despite the ever-evolving nature of the book business, they’ve provided the reading public a valuable service.

Contacted by phone Tuesday at the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association trade show in Portland, O’Harra was her usually bubbly self – even given the bad news breaking that day about the continuing stock-market drop.

“We’ve had our challenges,” she said, “but I cannot think of a time in the whole 30 years that’s been more difficult in terms of trying to stay atop bills, keeping the store stocked, the staff happy and customers coming in.”

But, she added, “I’m still optimistic because that’s just the way I am.”

Time to let out another cheer.