When Robert Sindelar of Third Place Books tried to buy gift cards via the websites of several major indie bookstores in another city, he was very surprised by what he found.

Booksellers and former booksellers let off some steam this week, sharing their odd, aggravating, and all-too-common bookstore moments.

IndieBound has now expanded to the Southern Hemisphere. The Australian Booksellers Association (OzBA) is launching an Oz-based IndieBound this July.

Kate DiCamillo, winner of the 2010 Indies Choice Book Award for "Most Engaging Author," offers a message to booksellers from her acceptance speech at ABA's Celebration of Bookselling Luncheon at BEA. "Booksellers Make the Difference" is presented here and as a downloadable two-page PDF.

This year's Indies Choice Book Award winners explain how independent bookstores have helped shape their careers while providing some memorable experiences along the way.

Lars Townsend, who oversaw the launch of the Politics & Prose website on ABA IndieCommerce's Drupal platform, recently shared some thoughts on the benefits of having an e-commerce site in general and the advantages of the new Drupal platform specifically.

By William Petrocelli of Book Passage in San Francisco and Corte Madera, California

What looks like a simple price war between Amazon, Target, and Wal-Mart over a handful of bestsellers is symptomatic of a much deeper problem in the book business. The larger fight is really over what you get to read.

By Barbara Theroux of Fact & Fiction in Missoula, Montana