Mark Kurlansky has become a veritable regular on the Book Sense 76 List. The hardcover edition of his The Basque History of the World (Walker) appeared on the November/December list in 1999; the hardcover edition of The White Man in the Tree: And Other Stories (Washington Square Press) was on the January/February 2001 list; and The Basque History of the World paperback (Penguin) was featured on the March/April Book Sense 76 in 2001.

Ernest Hebert, novelist and Dartmouth professor of writing, has taken to the open road for a book tour with stops at about 15 Book Sense stores. His work of historical fiction, The Old American (Hardscrabble, University Press of New England), set in the New England frontier during the French and Indian Wars, is based on the true story of an English settler kidnapped by an Algonkian king, Caucus-Meteor.

This is the earliest announcement yet of the Book Sense 76, in order to give you as much lead time as possible to check initials or on-hand.

The March/April 76 with bookseller quotes will run here next week, as we know many of you like to see the quotes early, and to cut and paste them for newsletters, Web sites, and shelf-talkers.

Any on-sale dates that we have for February and March are noted; otherwise, assume January or fall '01 publication, with a few earlier, which is neat.

The Book Sense Gift Certificate program continues to grow and gain national acceptance. Indeed, more gift certificates were sold on BookSense.com Web sites in December thancolo in the previous 11 months combined.

"Like son, like father," Alabama Booksmith owner Jake Reiss III describes his foray into bookselling to BTW. His son Jake IV sold books door-to-door; son Frank became manager of Acorn Books in San Francisco then moved to Atlanta and opened the still thriving A Capella Books in the late '80s. Jake's brother Norman also sold books, at Malone's Bookstore in Tuscaloosa.

Readers of USA Today this morning got a Book Sense-specific "USA Today Snapshot," when the newspaper's Life section featured five "top teen books" taken from the recent Book Sense Teen 76 Top Ten. The featured spot -- on the first page of the Life section -- also noted that the complete list and recommendations were available on BookSense.com. (The full list can be found here, and it will also be mailed to Book Sense stores in the February white box.)

This month, reporting to the Book Sense Bestseller List has gotten a lot easier. Booksellers in the Book Sense program have begun reporting their store sales by uploading a file from their POS systems directly into the ABA system and by using an improved online Bestseller data entry form. [For an earlier BTW story about new reporting options, click here].

Here's news of the next 76 Top Ten -- a Teen 76 Top Ten. It will be mailed to you in the February white box, for store display in March.

Teen/young adult books will still be included in the full Children's 76s, but, just as you've moved and increased your teen sections in your stores, we want this group of readers to have their own distinct place.

1. Send in your Book Sense Book of the Year ballot, Round One, by February 11. Ballots sent by mail must be postmarked by February 4. (Click here for an online form.)
2. Nominate poetry and SF/fantasy books by February 8.
   

Cheryl and Raymond Zadd, co-owners of Mail Hub Plus Books, have long been on the lookout for niches to fill in their community of Brecksville, Ohio. Midway between Akron and Cleveland, with a population of 13,000, Brecksville is a little too small to be courted by any of the big chain stores. And that's just fine with the Zadds. "There are no malls in Brecksville," Ray Zadd told BTW emphatically.