PALMER -- The Henry Ford of books just blessed a little Alaska bookstore.
Best-selling author James Patterson gave Fireside Books in Palmer $7,500 this week -- no strings attached. The money will go to boost Alaska authors in this cozy store that helps anchor the main street of a town founded as a 1930s New Deal farm colony.
The store is small and quirky but neat and well organized. Its motto -- and URL -- is "Good books, bad coffee." A bumper sticker for sale at the counter proclaims, "Everything I know was learned behind the barn in Palmer, Alaska."
Despite such enticements, Patterson probably isn't planning a trip to Alaska anytime soon, a representative of his publisher said this week.
He's probably too busy.
Patterson -- with 300 million copies sold worldwide and more New York Times best-sellers than any other author -- is a big supporter of small bookstores. The money going to Fireside is part of a campaign to give away $1 million in 2014 to independent bookstores. He gave $1,008,300 to 178 independent bookstores with children's book sections, businesses from Bar Harbor, Maine, to Petaluma, California.
Fireside is the only Alaska bookstore to receive the funds.
Bookstore owner David Cheezem said an employee wrote to Patterson in the hopes of getting some kind of donation, but didn't clue him in.
"It was kind of a staff secret," Cheezem said. "I didn't know till we actually got the check ... It was really a fun surprise all around."
Fireside already stocks lots of Patterson, who's a big favorite with customers, he said. "I love the fact that he's very easy about how you use the funds, letting each bookstore decide what's the best way."
Some of Patterson's better-known books include titles for younger readers, such as "Middle School" and "I Funny," as well as the Alex Cross series for adults.
The bookstore will be putting together a "Thank You, James Patterson" display, probably this summer.
Vanity Fair reported this month that Patterson earned $90 million in the year ending in June and "has been the planet's best-selling author since 2001 (ahead of J.K. Rowling, Nora Roberts, Dr. Seuss, and John Grisham). Of all the hardcover fiction sold in the U.S. in 2013, books by Patterson accounted for one out of every 26."
Along with his nearly pathological productivity, Patterson has launched the #SaveOurBooks campaign to encourage national leaders to raise awareness about the "precarious state of reading," according to a press release emailed by publisher Little, Brown and Company. "He donated this money in direct response to the very real risks facing bookstores, libraries, and publishing in the United States today. He feels literacy in America is in jeopardy, as is the future of millions of children who will never grow up with a local bookstore, library, or access to real books."
This year, the release says, he plans to champion a new initiative centered on youth reading and supporting school libraries.
Patterson maintains a lively self-promoting and staunchly pro-book website.
Cheezem knows exactly what he's going to do with the money: promote Alaska authors. He said he wants to reach out to more readers in the hopes of embracing the state's ongoing "renaissance of Alaskan writing."
The store is planning an Alaska book club with a $15 gift certificate for every 10 Alaskana books bought and Cheezem wants to sink some of the money into advertising for events like a reading next month at nearby restaurant Turkey Red with Rachel Weaver, author of "Point of Direction," a debut novel set in a Southeast lighthouse.
The store already features the works of well-known Alaska authors, like homegrown Eowyn Ivey's Pulitzer finalist, "The Snow Child," Juneau-based Nick Jans' "A Wolf Called Romeo," Helen Hegener's "The Matanuska Colony Barns" and what looks like a pretty complete selection of Chad Carpenter's "Tundra Comics" collections.
Cheezem called the writer's generosity a "one-of-a-kind" boost to his little store.
"There are many, many authors in the community who understand, maybe more so now than before, how important it is that small independent bookstores stay alive," he said. "He's really been kind of taking the lead in that role."