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Spencer Ruchti

@spencerruchti.bsky.social
539 followers 227 following 132 posts

bookseller in Seattle / author events / co-founder of the Cercador Prize for Literature in Translation

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Reposted by Spencer Ruchti
Caroline Casey @cacasey.bsky.social · 29/05/2026
@spencerruchti.bsky.social just said "Afraid I’m not exaggerating when I say [BURY YOUR DEAD] is the best book I’ve read all year....Cormac McCarthy can eat his heart out" (is 😍 wrong for a book about road kill / murder?)
thirdplacebooks.com
Bury Your Dead (Paperback)
By the International Booker Prize Shortlisted Author of On Earth As It Is BeneathEdgar Wilson has a gruesome job, one he is entirely unsentimental about--he cleans up roadkill in rural Brazil.
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KUOW Public Radio @kuow.org · 21/01/2026
It's a new year, which means there are new books to read — hundreds of them. KUOW’s Katie Campbell and Spencer Ruchti from Third Place Books are here to make building your TBRs a little easier this year.
kuow.org
Books we loved in 2025, plus what's already on our TBR for 2026
It's a new year, which means there are new books to read — hundreds of them.
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Katie Campbell, KUOW @katiecampbell.bsky.social · 21/01/2026
One of my fave local bookworms joined me for today's episode of Meet Me Here from @kuow.org! @spencerruchti.bsky.social talked about some of his top reads in 2025 and what he's looking forward to this year. Get your TBRs (or crazy Excel spreadsheets) ready and listen here 👇
kuow.org
Books We Loved in 2025
It's a new year, which means there are new books to read — hundreds of them. Honestly, it's overwhelming as someone with more than 600 books on my digital and physical TBRs.
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Two Lines Press @twolinespress.com · 17/11/2025
🎉 Congratulations to Christina MacSweeney and Jazmina Barrera! THE QUEEN OF SWORDS is the winner of the 2025 Cercador Prize! ⚔️ www.cercadorprize.com
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Northwest Translators & Interpreters Society (NOTIS) @notisnet.bsky.social · 15/11/2025
👉 This Thurs., 11/20, at Third Place Books 🔜 Natl. Book Award-winning translator Megan McDowell will sit down with @spencerruchti.bsky.social ( #ThirdPlaceBooks & the #CercadorPrize) to discuss her #translation of Mexican author Elena Garro. 💯 recommend‼️ www.thirdplacebooks.com/event/jazmin...
thirdplacebooks.com
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 17/11/2025
🎉 The committee for the Cercador Prize confers this year’s prize to Christina MacSweeney for her translation of ‘The Queen of Swords’ by Jazmina Barrera (Two Lines Press). Congratulations to Christina, Jazmina, and @twolinespress.com!
The book cover of QUEEN OF SWORDS by Jazmina Barrera, translated by Christina MacSweeney, overlayed on a graphic.
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The New York Times @nytimes.com · 09/10/2025
Breaking News: The Nobel Prize in Literature was awarded to Laszlo Krasznahorkai, the Hungarian novelist, for his “visionary oeuvre.”
nyti.ms
Laszlo Krasznahorkai Is Awarded Nobel Prize in Literature
The award comes with prize money of almost $1.2 million.
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Kim McNeill •📚🌿☕️ @joiedevivre9.bsky.social · 03/07/2025
I love this prize! Congrats @ryanhasbadtaste.bsky.social & @spencerruchti.bsky.social! @usrofc.bsky.social
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Gabriella Page-Fort @pagefort.bsky.social · 30/03/2025
I ♥️ Third Place Books @spencerruchti.bsky.social @seattletimes-rss.bsky.social www.seattletimes.com/entertainmen...
seattletimes.com
Third Place Books staff help bookstore live up to its name
With three Seattle-area locations, Third Place Books aims to be more than a bookstore. It's a place for people to gather, share ideas and spend time together.
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East Bay Booksellers @ebbooksellers.bsky.social · 23/02/2025
I’ve never met @davidnaimon.bsky.social, and yet his manner is such that I feel like we’re old friends. And I don’t listen to podcasts except for Between the Covers. This week’s is a doozy. Very highly recommended. tinhouse.com/podcast/omar...
tinhouse.com
Omar El Akkad : One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This - Tin House
In late October 2023, weeks into Israel’s bombing of northern Gaza, the novelist Omar El Akkad retweeted a video taken by a Gazan man. This video showed a lifeless moonscape with endless empty streets...
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 06/02/2025
Oof, buddy IS A RIVER ALIVE? coming this May
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 26/12/2024
I know how the TikTok girlies feel now. @fitzcarraldoeds.bsky.social
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 11/12/2024
Plot twist: after 15 minutes the AI author facsimile loses track of the conversation and starts ranting about how they think Nielsen BookScan works
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 11/12/2024
I was just saying to myself this morning, I wonder if there’s anything more AI could do to suck all joy out of the private experience of reading.
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Stephen Sparks @ssparks.bsky.social · 27/11/2024
“Walking thus, hour after hour, the senses keyed, one walks the flesh transparent.” - Nan Shepherd, The Living Mountain
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 27/11/2024
Yeah, try running author events for a living…
Seattle Times headline that reads: “Despite RSVPs, Oregon newlyweds show up to mostly empty wedding reception”
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 27/11/2024
Not the point of CJ’s post, but I think it’s crazy there hasn’t been an update or rebuttal to Bowker’s 3% statistic about translation in 20 years. (!!!) In that time, the iPhone was invented, the Kindle came to market. Even the idea of what it means to “publish a book” has changed.
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CJ Evans @categoryofoutcast.bsky.social · 27/11/2024
It has been 20 years since Bowker found only 3% of books were translations. Of the 100 “best books” by the ny times this year a whopping… 4 are translated. How far we’ve come.
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
Jeanine Cummins, it seems, has quietly moved to Henry Holt.
Book cover of 'Speak to Me of Home' by Jeanine Cummins, author of American Dirt
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
Oh fantastic news! This is a wild book… and I’m deeply appreciative it exists, and is receiving some honors. Congratulations Heather!
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
Over on Instagram, recommending a few of our favorite Percival Everett books with my friend Zac. @graywolfpress.bsky.social @nationalbook.bsky.social @doubledaybooks.bsky.social www.instagram.com/reel/DCp_VVy...
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Words Without Borders & WWB Campus @wwborders.bsky.social · 21/11/2024
Congratulations to Yáng Shuāng-zǐ and Lin King, writer and translator of the National Book Award-winning "Taiwan Travelogue!" Check out Jenna Tang's list of Taiwanese lit, which mentions "Taiwan Travelogue" and offers suggestions for more reading from Taiwan!
buff.ly
Literature in Translation from Taiwan: What to Read Next by Jenna Tang - Words Without Borders
Jenna Tang, translator of "Fang Si-Chi's First Love Paradise," recommends 8 books and short stories in translation from Taiwan to read now.
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Words Without Borders & WWB Campus @wwborders.bsky.social · 21/11/2024
Congrats to Thomas Bunstead, a WWB contributor! wordswithoutborders.org/contributors...
wordswithoutborders.org
Thomas Bunstead - Words Without Borders
Thomas Bunstead has translated some of the leading Spanish-language writers working today.
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 21/11/2024
For as long as I live, I’ll remember where I was when Percival Everett won the National Book Award… waiting in line for a burger, with friends, looking up briefly from the livestream on my phone to say: “Percy’s got it.”
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 20/11/2024
Not Mac Barnett in a Cercador Prize hat (sorry Mac)
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 19/11/2024
Another thing I’ll add. People who come into a bookstore and cover, hide, rearrange books—they suck, but mostly they’re just a nuisance. We put the books back. And then we display more on the subject. Literally the dumbest thing you can do in terms of “activism.” But Stephen says it best here.
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 19/11/2024
Oh hell yes.
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 19/11/2024
New Elizabeth Kolbert on GLACIERS.
Pulitzer Prize-winning author of THE SIXTH EXTINCTION Elizabeth Kolbert‘s ON ICE: HOW GLACIERS SHAPED OUR WORLD AND WILL DETERMINE OUR FUTURE, weaving natural history and the history of science with contemporary research to tell the story how of ice has shaped our past and how its melting triggers feedback loops that will produce a world that is unrecognizable; and LIFE ON A LITTLE KNOWN PLANET, a collection of her most important pieces about climate change and the natural world.
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Fitzcarraldo Editions @fitzcarraldoeds.bsky.social · 18/11/2024
We are thrilled that THE BOOK OF ALL LOVES by Agustín Fernandez Mallo, translated by Thomas Bunstead, has won The Cercador Prize. The prize committee said, 'THE BOOK OF ALL LOVES is a sheer pleasure, a text that reminded our committee why we read...' Details can be found at www.cercadorprize.com.
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Lit Hub @literaryhub.bsky.social · 18/11/2024
The 2024 Cercador Prize goes to...
lithub.com
The 2024 Cercador Prize goes to The Book of All Loves.
The Cercador Prize announced this morning that Thomas Bunstead has won the 2024 prize for his translation of Agustín Fernández Mallo’s The Book of All Loves. Established last year, the Cercad…
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 18/11/2024
The Cercador logo under "honors" in Edelweiss is the greatest of acknowledgments... we're in the metadata.
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 18/11/2024
Thanks @drewsof.bsky.social; in @literaryhub.bsky.social! "The Cercador Prize is an exciting entrant into the literary-prize sphere: recognizing works in translation published in the US, it is the only prize whose jury is made up entirely of independent booksellers." lithub.com/the-2024-cer...
lithub.com
The 2024 Cercador Prize goes to The Book of All Loves.
The Cercador Prize announced this morning that Thomas Bunstead has won the 2024 prize for his translation of Agustín Fernández Mallo’s The Book of All Loves. Established last year, the Cercad…
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Sasha Senderovich 🌻 @returnstosender.bsky.social · 18/11/2024
Really excited about this announcement of the second Cercador Prize for translated literature awarded today. @spencerruchti.bsky.social — who’s my Seattle landsman — and his colleagues are visionaries as booksellers promoting literary translation.
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Anthony Garrett @anthonygarrett.bsky.social · 18/11/2024
The Cercador Prize is one of the great innovations in publishing the last few years. I'm so glad for it and the books it brings attention to. I can't wait to read another Agustín Fernández Mallo.
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 18/11/2024
Since the Cercador Prize isn’t here yet, I’ll do the honors… The committee awards the 2024 prize to Thomas Bunstead for his translation of ‘The Book of All Loves’ by Agustín Fernández Mallo, published by Fitzcarraldo Editions.
An image of a blue book on a yellow background. The book is titles The Book of All Loves by Agustin Fernandez Mallo, translated by Thomas Bunstead. An image of Thomas BunsteadAn image of Agustin Fernandez MalloThe title page of The Book of All Loves
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 18/11/2024
Jon Fosse Catherine Lacey Enrique Vila-Matas Percival Everett Dubravka Ugrešić
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 18/11/2024
Emily is a credit to Birmingham and an extraordinary reader and also had one of the cutest dogs on the planet (second to Nora—though she’s scared of children so she may never be a true bookstore dog) Cercador announcement tomorrow AM!
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Cait_onthe_luce @caitluce.bsky.social · 17/11/2024
Tomorrow! The winner of the Cercador Prize will be announced! www.cercadorprize.com
cercadorprize.com
Cercador Prize
The Cercador Prize recognizes works of literature in translation as selected by a committee of independent booksellers based across the United States.
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 17/11/2024
In Jan 2020 I moved to Portland, and the next day went to Powell’s looking for a book by Carmen Boullosa. There I met a bookseller who told me he didn’t have the book, but after a beat asked if he knew me from somewhere? That bookseller was Justin Walls, and we’d interacted some on Twitter…
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 15/11/2024
That’s it… I need a full exposé on how PRH turned the guy who wrote GLYPH and DR NO into this year’s Bonnie Garmus. If he wins the National Book Award on Wednesday then I don’t know what timeline I’m living in.
B&N Picks ‘James’ as 2024 Book of the Year.
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 15/11/2024
This kind of solidarity is so awesome. I think the distinction between “bookseller” and “indie bookseller” (on the individual, frontline level) is no longer useful, and maybe never has. Booksellers are booksellers are retail workers, whether you work for Barnes & Noble or City Lights.
Publishers Lunch article that reads as follows.  The text “and were joined by workers from other  unionized bookstores including The Strand and Mcnally Jackson” is highlighted. 

“B&N Workers Rally for Union Contract

On Thursday, Barnes & Noble employees rallied outside of its flagship store and corporate headquarters in Union Square to demand their first contract be reached by the end of the year. The employees of the unionized stores in NYC--Union Square, Park Slope, and the Upper West Side--are members of RWDSU, and were joined by workers from other unionized bookstores including The Strand and McNally Jackson.

"The company’s refusal to pay a fair wage has thus far prevented the union from settling the first union contracts and getting union benefits, healthcare, and protection from store closure and relocation," the union said in a release. "(Note: the company has refused a master agreement even in single cities like New York where the union represents multiple stores.) As the largest brick and mortar corporate book retailer, what Barnes & Noble workers win in this contract will impact everyone in the industry."
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 15/11/2024
Wielding this in my pocket in case of emergency
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 15/11/2024
It’s in the hats. Wonderful time at the @aster1sm.bsky.social Books warehouse tonight. On a sidenote, the Cercador Prize winner is announced on Monday
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Sasha Senderovich 🌻 @returnstosender.bsky.social · 14/11/2024
This was a great event at Seattle’s Third Place Books with the Tajik-language writer Shahzada Samarqandi and translator Shelley Fairweather-Vega. I’m looking forward to reading my signed copy of “Mothersland.” slavica.indiana.edu/mothersland/
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 14/11/2024
We have an author all the way from Uzbekistan in the store tonight—and every seat is full, plus some. Congratulations to Shahzoda Samarqandi and her Seattle translator and community leader, Shelley Fairwether-Vega. (Pictured here in the red sweater)
A bookstore full of people sitting, some standing
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 12/11/2024
Happening soon.
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 11/11/2024
Going to be here more often for a variety of reasons. As proof of existence here is me and fellow Blueskyer @jamescrossley.bsky.social that I swear is from this morning (nice to see you James!)
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Misha (she/her) @ahsimlibrarian.bsky.social · 10/11/2024
Reading widely & diversely & challenging your perspectives is NOT medicine. Learning about people who are different than you, seeing the works through other eyes, benefits you & should be “fun” & engaging, too. Starting to feel really different about centering comfort in reading if it means this.
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Spencer Ruchti @spencerruchti.bsky.social · 10/11/2024
On Tuesday afternoon I’m jumping on Zoom to talk to Damion Searls about his new book, The Philosophy of Translation. If you’ve ever read and loved one of Damion’s translations, then this book will illuminate and delight in more ways than I can accurately communicate us06web.zoom.us/webinar/regi...
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