JULIE WALMSLEY

My piece on longtime Larchmont destination Chevalier's Bookstore is now up at Larchmont Ledger and needing a correction. In a conversation with his friend and fellow bookworm, Bert Deixler, Holter proposed buying the store. The two local residents approached Winthrop, and by the end of October they were the new owners of Chevalier’s. It was actually Deixler who suggested buying the store to Holter, not Holter's idea. Holter at the time said, "Yeah right!" and brushed off the suggestion. But after thinking about it and seeing the barren store again, he changed his mind. More backstory on Chevalier's, and the other two independent bookstores I wrote about, Stories on Sunset in Echo Park and Skylight Books in Los Feliz, is here .

So, the independent bookstore is not dead. At least not in Los Angeles. I visited  Skylight Books  in Los Feliz,  Stories on Sunset  in Echo Park, and  Chevalier's Books  on Larchmont for forthcoming articles for the Ledger papers, and found full stores with interesting stories and committed customers. People still use libraries too. I was at the Silver Lake Library twice last week, and parents actually go with their kids and read from printed books, not iPads and Kindles. I wasn't allowed the editorial space for all the photos and interesting bits about the stores, their ownership, and their strategy. The outtakes - A longtime neighborhood hang, Skylight Books has been open since 2006, and owned by the same LLC. Some of the individual investors have changed out, but a core group continues to shepherd the store. The resident cat, Franny, is very sweet. She just hangs out with customers all day. She is named for J.D. Salinger's Franny and Zooey...

This morning the LA Times' David Zahniser wrote about the arrival of David Ryu in Los Angeles City Council, and how he could interact with that body's president, longtime City Hall denizen Herb Wesson.  Zahniser's article primarily covered the election's outcome as a function of controversial redistricting and the resultant disgruntled voters looking to smack back at City Hall, but he also discussed Wesson's role: Wesson, who has served on the council for a decade, said he expects to get along with Ryu just fine. The job of a council president, he emphasized, is to help the 14 other members become successful. Ryu, he pointed out, had few serious policy disagreements with Ramsay. The council president has another responsibility, which wields dealmaking (or breaking) power over all legislative action: agendizing. Wesson, who supported Ryu's opponent Carolyn Ramsay, decides what goes on the agenda when, and how to break out single motions and ordinances into...