Spotlight: Susie’s Stories Bookstore
Susie and Doug Rich are helping to change narratives through storytelling.
The couple own and operate Susie’s Stories Bookstore, located at 51 Bearskin Neck, Rockport. They are our Branch’s Preferred Book Vendor for the 2024 Branch Book Series, a series of six discussions scheduled throughout 2024 for members and non-members to engage in meaningful, intimate dialogue around issues relevant to the NAACP and around the work done by our Branch Committees. You can see the Branch Proclamation here.
Susie Rich is a Children’s Author. When her own kids were growing up and doing activities like dance and football, she would write stories that centered on those adventures. When her children got older she started publishing her stories. And those stories weaved in both her incredible creativity and gift for storytelling with her own personal experiences as mother and once herself, a child.
One story, entitled, “Hopscotch” is a story taken in part from her own childhood, when she played a lot of hopscotch herself. Another story is about a girl who got her clothes dirty. Susie recalls, “my own mom used to say ‘ I don’t care as long as it’s clean’, because we didn’t have a lot of money and there were five kids and she’d say “I don’t care what you wear as long as it’s clean.” In the story, as a cute surprise, it turns out that the main character’s mirror was dirty, not the clothes. Another story is about an animal that lives in Boston and went to the Berkshires and got to meet a whole cast of different animals. And in another story, about friendship, a whale helps a duck leave its pond to get to the ocean.
In 2019, Susie and her husband Doug, opened the bookstore. The store hosts a rich collection of literature including both fiction and nonfiction books for children and adults. Susie’s children book series is also for sale in the shop. The idea for the bookstore began in 2018 when Susie and Doug were enjoying a walk on Bearskin Neck and spotted a ‘for rent’ sign in the window of a small and adorable building on the pedestrianized road - if you’ve not visited this gorgeous New England Seaside town, it’s worth putting on your list. Susie wondered how much rent was for the space and called the number to enquire. She asked whether a bookstore might be a good fit for the community and the owner encouraged her.
Susie had already been familiar with SCORE, a business mentoring program, and so leaned into them for support to put together a business plan for the bookstore. Her husband Doug was and is very supportive of the idea. Before they knew it, Susie’s Stories was open for business. But, shortly after opening to a warm reception, the COVID pandemic hit and introduced challenges to the new shop.
“The community was so excited and supportive”, Susie said. to respond to the challenge of selling books in pandemic isolaiton, they pivoted to offer online purchase and delivery and drive-up delivery, and it “worked out”, according to Doug.
Recently, our Branch voted to partner with Susies Stories for the 2024 Book Series. As a Black-owned business in the nOrth Shore and the only Black-owned bookstore, Susie and Doug provide the opportunity for our community to invest in a local business that provides and supports diversity and intellectual, literary discussion in the community. Susie and Doug also do a great job stocking books that help the community stay abreast of the same issues that the Branch champions, and their stock illuminates the rich and varied Black American experience.
For so long, the North Shore has existed with a few missing voices at the storytelling table. It’s refreshing and inspiring to have Susie’s Stories here with us to help refocus this lens.
We hope you will partake in the 2024 Book series and purchase your books from Susie’s Stories. Enjoy their 5% discount for our Branch Members.
Get your books for the 2024 Book Series Schedule:
January 22 His Name Is George Floyd, by Robert Samuels and Toluse Olorunnipa, hosted by Sylvia Sellers Garcia, Branch Member and Director of the 2024 Lowell Humanities Series
April 23 How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America, by Clint Smith, hosted by Lauren McCormack, Branch History Committee Chair
May 2 Never Caught by Erica Armstrong, Hosted by Mercy Njuguna, ,Branch Secretary and Healthcare Committee Chair
August 12 We Want to do More than Survive by Bettina L. Love, hosted by Heather Maes and Dan Anderson, Co-Chiars, Education Committee
September 23 Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson, hosted by Michelle Sands, Branch Communications Committee
November 25 You Are Your Best Thing: Vulnerability, Shame Resilience, and the Black Experience by Tarana Burke, Brené Brown, hosted by Branch Communications Committee Member Heidi Wakeman