On Saturday May 22, Steve, the creator of DDMAU was here at the store teaching people all about his game. Fast-paced, quick thinking and characters are just a few points that make up this new and rad card game. Steve says, "it's like UNO on steriods!"

The workshop was set up for four hours, and during that time he gave away a ton of DDMAU stuff and taught and played his game with people! This event was a lot of fun. Steve is a former Army soldier, and devolped DDMAU here in Tucson. (Yay local!) Thanks to everyone who came out and played with us. You can follow this link to see the pics from the event!

For the last two days, several members of the Bookmans staff and myself have been setting up our booth at the 2010 Phoenix Comicon at the Phoenix Convention Center. A lot of time and love has gone into the decision making that it required to come up with the really cool items that we will have available for the convention attendees.

This year everyone will be spinning our prize wheel, hoping to win one of our exclusive Bookmans Phoenix Comicon t-shirts. My favorite part? It's always free to win Bookmans schwag! What I am really looking forward to over the weekend is to see months of planning come together for the First Annual Kids Need to Read Geek Prom that Bookmans is sponsoring.

I know, I know. Book reviews are supposed to be about new books, books that are in the news, or even better, books that haven't even had time to be in the news yet. They aren't meant to be about books published in 1996, books whose film adaptations are already more than five years old.

I'm sorry. Sue me if you want to.

I've found myself lately, miraculously, possessed of time to read books I always wanted to read but never got around to.

It's amazing.

It's like being handed a do-over pass.

The Konamis is a webcomic by Jack Crawford and Bookmans own Tavis Maiden (@tavismaiden). Updated each Monday, Wednesday and Friday, follow the adventures of The Konamis, a real comic tale about the real comic adventure of The Konamis (meaning "little waves"), the little ol' rock band that makes a big splash!

Kurtz

The only thing that makes living in Arizona tolerable is the handful of used bookstores scattered amongst the multitude of meth labs and Sonoran hot dog/ammunition stands that litter the landscape like so many would-be-immigrant bones in the Nogales Desert.

I don’t know how they survive in the state ranked 49th in the union for education and whose border militia dwarfs the Democrat population 6 to 1, but thank Rao that they do, ‘cause I don’t think I could make it through the week without them.

My absolute-hands-down-favorite of the lot is the Bookmans Entertainment Exchange stores, because entering one of their locations is like stepping through a stargate into a parallel world, wherein the concept of pawn shops was pioneered by a gang of good looking hipsters.

We had a blast this weekend at Bookmans on Ina... literally. Hard-core gamers came out of the safety of their own recliners to face-off in a one-on-one deathmatch, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 style. We fired up the XBox 360 and let our customers go at it for some cool prizes, like $100 trade credit and the much coveted 1st place trophy.

The Konamis is a webcomic by Jack Crawford and Bookmans own Tavis Maiden (@tavismaiden). Updated each Monday, Wednesday and Friday, follow the adventures of The Konamis, a real comic tale about the real comic adventure of The Konamis (meaning "little waves"), the little ol' rock band that makes a big splash!

The Super NES

The Konamis is a webcomic by Jack Crawford and Bookmans own Tavis Maiden (@tavismaiden). Updated each Monday, Wednesday and Friday, follow the adventures of The Konamis, a real comic tale about the real comic adventure of The Konamis (meaning "little waves"), the little ol' rock band that makes a big splash!

The NES

I'm guessing he got some gnarly diseases that I could never name. But as I was laying in bed last week, sniffling amongst a pile of wadded up tissues and red-dye-No. 3-stained Popsicle sticks, I thought about Shakespeare and wondered what he might think of modern-day culture; The financial crisis, bipartisanship, and Tori & Dean on Bravo.

The second day of my strep affliction I clicked through the channels past Maury Povich, an infomercial for some awful workout routine promising a six-pack in 90 days, and Paula Deen making fried green tomatoes. Somehow, I landed on Tori & Dean. A reality show about Tori Spelling, teen star of Beverly Hills 90210 back in the '90s, and Dean McDermott, a D-list actor of Lifetime movie fame.

The Konamis is a webcomic by Jack Crawford and Bookmans own Tavis Maiden (@tavismaiden). Updated each Monday, Wednesday and Friday, follow the adventures of The Konamis, a real comic tale about the real comic adventure of The Konamis (meaning "little waves"), the little ol' rock band that makes a big splash!

Breaking Dan

Hiya kids!

Oh, thank you so much to everybody who came out to our kids' tournament at Bookmans Mesa on Saturday, May 15th, 2010. With a total of 46 participants winning prizes, eating cupcakes and hanging out with ME, Mario, and my brother Luigi!

There were three top winners, James who won 3rd place, Tiffany who won 2nd place, and of course, who can forget Bryce, who won the grand prize trophy and a hundred dollars in Bookmans store credit!

There were more than 100 cupcakes consumed, 50 prize bags given, a ton of trivia hand outs, and of course a lot of Mario Kart Racing for Nintendo Wii! Check out all the great pictures from the event here.

See you all next time,

Mario (& Luigi, too!)

The 2010 Bookmans Reading Challenge may be over, but the kids at South Point Elementary are still going strong! With only 424 students, South Point Elementary read over 11,000 books in three months. Almost every single student increased their reading ability by two levels and the students are more excited about reading than ever. Today, I awarded the students for their dedication with an assembly. Heidi Bonfante, their reading mentor, and I spoke about the importance of reading and awarded their top performers in the school. With thunderous applause these lovely young ladies humbly accepted their bags of Bookmans goodies. Afterward, I was able to chat with the children and we all shared cookies. I heard that yesterday, Mrs. Henderson's fourth grade class had a field trip to Bookmans Phoenix where Miss Yvette showed them around the entire store and rewarded them with a party for reading the most books during the month of March. Congratulations South Point Elementary, your kids rock!

Read More...

• Add Comment
• Send to a Friend
• (+) Add this

Last weekend we had buying and selling events at the Coconino Center for the Arts and at the Flagstaff Chamber of Commerce. It would not have been possible without the hard work and dedication of our staff. Everyone did a fantastic job. We noticed a few that deserve special recognition for outstanding work.

For the second weekend in May, we would like to recognize Ben Williams and Regina Schantz!

The Konamis is a webcomic by Jack Crawford and Bookmans own Tavis Maiden (@tavismaiden). Updated each Monday, Wednesday and Friday, follow the adventures of The Konamis, a real comic tale about the real comic adventure of The Konamis (meaning "little waves"), the little ol' rock band that makes a big splash!

Mission Failed

The Konamis is a webcomic by Jack Crawford and Bookmans own Tavis Maiden (@tavismaiden). Updated each Monday, Wednesday and Friday, follow the adventures of The Konamis, a real comic tale about the real comic adventure of The Konamis (meaning "little waves"), the little ol' rock band that makes a big splash!

Today the Tucson Roller Derby gals knocked our blocks off by reading some of the greatest stories we've heard! Dea N. Hayze rocked "The Fox in Socks!" Helia had us spellbound with a story in Spanish and we learned about the roller derby, read some other cool stories and mashed some fig bars into the floor! Lotsa kids out for our first storytime in a long time at Grant! Hoo-rah! We've got more to come! Check out our cool kids events this summer - Click Here For Kids Summer Events! and check out the Tucson Roller Derby for their next match.

Who knew that my mom was cool? I always have; in this world where female gamers used to be so far and few between, my mom was an original. Last year when asked my first memory of video games, I shared my experience with Frogger as a child. I loved playing Frogger with my mom and at the age of three I often confused the word Frogger with a rather colorful word that also begins with the letter 'f'. But our time together playing video games did not end there.

I distinctly remember the age when I became critical of my parents. For at least ten years, I was sure I was just a tiny version of my mother, but, as my preteen years approached, I began to realize that even my mom (gasp!) wasn't perfect. Although I was unnecessarily unkind at times about my mother's shortcomings, I knew her so well that I was mostly correct in recognizing her faults! I won't air my amazing mother's imperfections here, but the point is, we all have them.

The Konamis is a webcomic by Jack Crawford and Bookmans own Tavis Maiden (@tavismaiden). Updated each Monday, Wednesday and Friday, follow the adventures of The Konamis, a real comic tale about the real comic adventure of The Konamis (meaning "little waves"), the little ol' rock band that makes a big splash!

Shing Shing

Our mothers- aren’t they just marvelous?! They always put themselves last to ensure that their families and duties are always taken care of first. Our mothers dedicate their lives to making sure we stay healthy, happy and raise us to be the strong and independent people we are today. They deserve special treatment every day of the year but especially on Mothers Day. Bookmans understands the sacrifice and dedication that all the moms and mother figures out there provide so we decided to get together and create a little something special for them just for Mothers Day while simultaneously helping “mother” nature!