Members of the Midwest Independent Booksellers and Great Lakes Independent Booksellers Associations gathered for their annual joint trade show, Heartland Fall Forum, October 14-16. This year, it was GLIBA's turn to host, and more than 300 booksellers (about half of them first-timers) convened in Indianapolis, chosen because of the "explosion" of new bookstores opening there in the last couple of years, GLIBA executive director Larry Law told PW.

As one bookseller reported in a text to PW, the show had "really good energy, with lots of praise for [MIBA's new executive director] Grace Hagen; people are very happy with the venue," the Indianapolis Marriott Hotel in the downtown area that accommodated the conference's 545 total attendees. While PW was unable to obtain photos taken at the opening night reception at the Kurt Vonnegut Museum which, according to reports, was a raucous affair that broke up around midnight, there was plenty of photographic evidence of a close-knit community of booksellers celebrating their resilience amid the uncertainties of these tumultuous times.


Heartland kicked off on Tuesday with the traditional awards ceremony, where the year's best books as voted on by MIBA and GLIBA booksellers were spotlighted, as well as their authors, along with the 2025 Great Lakes Bookseller of the Year (Wild Geese in Franklin, Ind.) and the 2025 Voice of the Heartland (Ross Gay). Pictured (from l.) are Heartland Award winners Anton Treuer (Where Wolves Don't Die; young adult/middle grade), Travis Zimmerman (How the Birds Got Their Songs, illustrated by Sam Zimmerman; picture book) and Marcie Rendon (Anishinaabe Songs for a New Millennium; poetry), and Ross Gay.


A group of booksellers pose for a photo with an author during the tour of the Indy Reads literacy center and used bookstore on Tuesday. Pictured (from l.) are Shannon Krug and Kaci Friss, Serendipity Books, Chelsea, Mich.; Mary Webber O'Malley, Skylark Books, Columbia, Mo., who also works for Binc; Erin Potter, Watermark Books, Wichita, Kans.; Megan Cassada, Dockside Books, Charlevoix, Mich.; Allison Horner, an author from St. Paul, Minn.; and Maxwell Gregory, Madison Street Books, Chicago.


A group of Iowa booksellers who don't often have an opportunity to see each other face-to-face in the largely rural state in which they do business pose during Heartland for a group photo. Pictured (from front to back, l. to r.) are Linda Crookham-Hansen, Terri LeBlanc, Sarah Bergan, Darci Tracie, Lori Holliday, Kathy Magruder, Melissa McAllister, CoriAnn Theroux, Rachel Trainum, Sarah Krammen, Rob McAllister, Mariah McGuire, and Luis Lujan. Thanks to Magruder, the owner of Pageturners Books in Indianola, Ia., for the identifications.


Olivia Hansen, a rep with Andrews McMeel Universal in Kansas City staffed the AMU booth during the Heartland trade show.


Columbia University Press rep Kevin Kurtz (l.) talks with Javier Ramirez (c.), the co-owner of Exile in Bookville in Chicago and Shane Mullen (r.), the events coordinator at Left Bank Books in St. Louis during the Heartland trade show.


Cadwell Turnbull (A Ruin, Great and Free) was one of more than 60 authors who signed copies of their latest books for booksellers.


MIBA board president Melissa McAllister (l.) of Dungeon's Gate in Ankeny, Ia., with GLIBA board president Alyson Jones Turner of Source Booksellers in Detroit, PW's 2025 Bookstore of the Year.


While many booksellers browsed the displays in the exhibit area Thursday morning, others were placing their bids on the auction sponsored by Binc to raise funds to assist booksellers in need. Many of the auction items were the entire contents of Heartland booths at the end of the show, donated by exhibitors who would rather not pack up their booths. Binc raised approximately $8,300 at Heartland.

There was an error regarding the name of the bookstore, as well as an award it received during Heartland. That error has been corrected.