About the Bookseller

“Why is this so hard?”

I’m Nikki Auberkett: independent author, former(ish) book editor, and someone who’s asked this question a thousand times when it comes to not only self-publishing novels, but getting them into brick-and-mortar bookstores.

It’s also the same question I kept asking when I started looking into opening a bookstore for independent authors. Not because I’m not tech-savvy or new to retail (20+ years’ experience!). But because there are giant walls made of stigma standing between self-published works and in-store retail.

Here’s the thing: 2020 changed a lot in the world of publishing. Mainly through technological features and software innovation, but ultimately the massive shift to working from home as authors, editors, and designers who want to take more ownership and creative control.

Unfortunately, it’s been a snail’s pace crawl to get booksellers on board with carrying independent works. Prior to 2019-2020, “self-published” typically meant “low quality” (although there are are few bestselling exceptions, such as The Martian, Eragon, and Fifty Shades of Grey!).
In the world of retail, especially small business retail, it’s a risky gamble to carry products that might never sell due to the compromised quality. It’s even worse when the stigma and bad past experiences turns into a lack of transparency, education, and/or readily-available information in general.

This is where BumbleBooks comes in.

I’m not just a pro at retail—I’m an award-winning indie author/former book editor and a passionate bookworm who has been there, done that, and have the accolades (and stress!) to show for it.
With BumbleBooks, we’re not only taking the steps to help promote indie authors within our online catalog—and in our brick-and-mortar location—we’re pushing to have this serve as a prime example and case study of how readers can and will genuinely enjoy buying indie works from places other than Amazon.

And with this, we’re hoping the environmental impact of Print On Demand publishing will be significant enough to help save our planet’s wild bees.

Every time you buy a book listed on this site, you’re not only supporting an independent author and independent bookstore, you’re also helping the book publishing world evolve—and do better for our planet as much as the people on it.

For that, we thank you!