LAREDO, Texas — The final chapter has been written for the lone bookstore on the streets of Laredo.
With a population of nearly a quarter-million people, this city could soon be the largest in the nation without a single bookseller.
The situation is so grim that schoolchildren have pleaded for a reprieve from next month’s planned shutdown of the B. Dalton bookstore. After that, the nearest store will be 150 miles away in San Antonio.
The B. Dalton store was never a community destination with comfy couches and an espresso bar, but its closing will create a literary void in a city with a high illiteracy rate. Industry analysts and book associations could not name a larger American city without a single bookseller.
“Corporate America considers Laredo kind of the backwater,” said the city’s most prolific author, Jerry Thompson, a professor at Texas A&M University International who has written more than 20 books.
Since the closing was announced, book lovers in Laredo have flocked to the small store located between City Trendz (“Laredo’s No. 1 Underground Hip Hop Shop”) and a store that offers $4 indoor go-kart rides to stock up on their favorite titles.
Schoolchildren even wrote letters to the parent company, Barnes &Noble, begging for the store to stay open.
“Without that store, my life would be so sad and boring,” wrote a fifth-grader named Bryanna Salinas, who signed her name with a heart.
The Laredo store is among 49 remaining B. Daltons nationwide that Barnes &Noble will close by next year.
The company believes a bookstore is viable in Laredo and has identified a location for a large-format Barnes &Noble, but the space will not be available for at least 18 months, said David Deason, Barnes &Noble vice president of development.
In the meantime, without a single independent bookseller, Laredo may be in a league of its own among big cities.
Nearly half of the population of Webb County, which includes Laredo, lacks basic literacy skills, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.
Fewer than 1 in 5 city residents has a college degree.
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