Pulp Fiction Bookstore Moving To New Location

By Ryan Riley, Contributor

Pulp Fiction (the bookstore, not the Tarantino film) is closing the doors of its location at Lakewood & Carson on Saturday, June 27, 2009, and will be moving into a new, larger location at 1742 Clark Av. (near Atherton St.). The new storefront will be open for business on Wednesday, July 1, 2009, just in time for new comic book day.

It was about five years ago that Mike Lerner opened up Pulp Fiction bookstore near Long Beach City College. The store was smaller and more streamlined than what was typical for comic book stores in the area, like Amazing Comics and the now-defunct 5-Star Comics owned by Rob Van Dam. Due to the size constraints of the store, Lerner adopted a leaner business model that focused more on stocking new comics, graphic novels & manga along with a limited number of higher-end comic book back issues. It's a business model that has since been adopted out of necessity by many of the larger comic book stores because of the dwindling returns from direct back-issue sales.

I was curious about Pulp Fiction when it first popped up, especially since it was giving LBC locals an alternative to the juggernaut that was Amazing Comics. But my wife developed a taste for the Chinese food at LV Seafood and loved to shop at Nused Books, both of which were across the street on Norse Way. Because of that, I would wander over to PF to look for comics while my wife shopped for paperback novels on the cheap, and I got to know Mike rather well during that time. It was happenstance that brought me there, but it was the discounted graphic novels (I had long since abandoned purchasing single issues of comics) and Mike's laid back-yet-knowledgeable demeanor that kept me coming back long after my wife stopped eating at LV Seafood (she became a vegetarian).

It will be interesting to see how Pulp Fiction will evolve now that it will boast more in-store space (and more storage space). It should make for a more comfortable environment to conduct in-store signings, if nothing else. If future book signings are anything like last February's, when Zeb Wells & Todd Nauck were signing the Spider-Man comic with the Obama appearance, then the extra space will come in handy indeed!