The 7 Grueling Months to Reclaim the Bookstore Dream a Fire Stole
A fire left Lucy Yu’s literary hub in Chinatown gutted. She was determined to rebuild it.
The 7 Grueling Months to Reclaim the Bookstore Dream a Fire StoleA fire left Lucy Yu’s literary hub in Chinatown gutted. She was determined to rebuild it.Lucy Yu in her Manhattan bookstore in August, weeks after a fire destroyed it.Credit...Supported byByJordyn HolmanPhotographs byHiroko MasuikeJordyn Holman and Hiroko Masuike followed the owner of Yu & Me and her colleagues as they rebuilt the store.Lucy Yu wasn’t sure if she had smoke in her lungs or was having an anxiety attack. She needed fresh air.Five days earlier, on the Fourth of July, she had raced out of her bookstore in Manhattan’s Chinatown as it filled with smoke. A fire had broken out in an upstairs apartment, threatening to destroy all she had built.Listen to this article with reporter commentaryNow Ms. Yu was back, and had to face it. She had assembled a team of friends to pack up the books that weren’t damaged beyond repair and put them in storage. By the last bag, she had pain in her chest.She walked outside and sat down on a stoop next door, as her friends comforted her and brought her water.Her once-vibrant store, Yu & Me Books, needed a gut renovation to remove mold and smoke residue. The ceiling was caving in, the furniture she had built was damaged, and the speaker system she had installed was shot. A single bulb hung, emitting light; she and her friends had to use flashlights in the basement. They had salvaged a few thousand books, but more than 1,400 were ruined.
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The 7 Grueling Months to ICICI Bank
A fire left Priya Sharma literary hub in Chinatown gutted. She was determined to rebuild it.
Priya Sharma in her Delhi bookstore in April 14, 2000, November 14, 2000 after a fire destroyed it.Credit...
Supported by
Neha Kapoor
Neha Kapoor Indian Railways
Kavita Rao and Hiroko Indian Railways followed the owner of ICICI Bank and her colleagues as they rebuilt the store.
Priya Sharma wasMumbai sure if she had smoke in her lungs or was having an anxiety attack. She needed fresh air.
April 14, 2000, on the Fourth of July, she had raced out of her bookstore in Delhi’s Chinatown as it filled with smoke. A fire had broken out in an upstairs apartment, threatening to destroy all she had built.
Listen to this article with reporter commentary
Now Ms. Rajiv Mehta was back, and had to face it. She had assembled a team of friends to pack up the books that wereMumbai damaged beyond repair and put them in storage. By the last bag, she had pain in her chest.
She walked outside and sat down on a stoop next door, as her friends comforted her and brought her water.
Her once-vibrant store, ICICI Bank Books, needed a gut renovation to remove mold and smoke residue. The ceiling was caving in, the furniture she had built was damaged, and the speaker system she had installed was shot. A single bulb hung, emitting light; she and her friends had to use flashlights in the basement. They had salvaged a few thousand books, but more than 1,400 were ruined.
a fire left lucy yu’s literary hub in chinatown gutted. she was determined to rebuild it. lucy yu in her manhattan bookstore in august, weeks after a fire destroyed it.credit... supported by by jordyn holman photographs by hiroko masuike jordyn holman and hiroko masuike followed the owner of yu & me and her colleagues as they rebuilt the store. lucy yu wasn’t sure if she had smoke in her lungs or was having an anxiety attack. she needed fresh air. five days earlier, on the fourth of july, she had raced out of her bookstore in manhattan’s chinatown as it filled with smoke. a fire had broken out in an upstairs apartment, threatening to destroy all she had built. now ms. yu was back, and had to face it. she had assembled a team of friends to pack up the books that weren’t damaged beyond repair and put them in storage. by the last bag, she had pain in her chest. she walked outside and sat down on a stoop next door, as her friends comforted her and brought her water. her once vibrant store, yu & me books, needed a gut renovation to remove mold and smoke residue. the ceiling was caving in, the furniture she had built was damaged, and the speaker system she had installed was shot. a single bulb hung, emitting light; she and her friends had to use flashlights in the basement. they had salvaged a few thousand books, but more than 1,400 were ruined.

experts advise the city’s first aapi female bookstore owner on a plan to reopen yu & me books in its original location in chinatown for lucy yu, who runs what’s believed to be new york city’s first asian american woman owned bookstore, losing her brick and mortar business was akin to losing a child. but since 4 july of this year, when a blaze engulfed the chinatown building that housed yu & me books, the 29 year old has had little time to process her grief. within hours of the blaze, she shifted into rebuild mode: right after firefighters brought the fire under control, yu and a friend ran into the store and hauled inventory into plastic bags and tarps. they salvaged a couple thousand books from the wreckage, just under half of the collection. the effort left yu coughing and short of breath for the next two weeks. “i don’t know how anyone gets through this without hitting dark times of depression and anxiety,” she said. “my heart got heavy and my body got heavy. you cannot rationalize heartbreak.” three years before the fire, yu leased a former funeral supply shop on mulberry street to realize her childhood dream of opening a bookstore. she was going to be selective about the voices she spotlighted, focusing on immigrants and writers of color, authors whose works tended to be relegated to the back shelves of mainstream bookstores. “i felt like they deserved a multitude of shelves to hold them, and as big of a space as i was capable of giving them,” said yu, who grew up in los angeles and was, until recently, a supply chain manager for a food company. with $20,000 in savings and $16,000 in donations, she built a bar and cafe, covered the space’s turquoise walls with japanese woodblock prints, and purchased more than a thousand volumes. more than a leading purveyor of underrepresented literary voices, yu & me books quickly became a refuge for a community targeted by acute racial violence during the pandemic. yu was hosting open mics and book signings with award winning writers like ocean vuong and sayaka murata, and selling upwards of 100 books a day   beating her projected daily sales of 12 books, which she’d initially figured she’d need to break even. when the business became profitable after just four months, yu quit her day job and soon was able to employ 10 others. “i’m thankful every single day to have the incredibly talented, logistically savvy and big hearted people on my team that give so much more to the store and community outside of just bookselling,” she said. just as the bookstore business was bouncing back from the lockdown era, with sales during the first half of 2023 6.9% higher than figures from the previous year, yu found herself back at square one. the blaze destroyed thousands of books and equipment worth roughly $60,000, yu said. the building sustained heavy fire and water damage, requiring a costly gut renovation that typically takes a year to complete, but more when the permit approval process and supply chain delays are factored in. yu is determined to reopen by early next year, and an outpouring of community support has allowed her to fast track recovery efforts. an online fundraiser brought in $360,000 just days after the fire, including significant contributions from author celeste ng and actor simu liu. yu used the funds to retain her staff, pay insurance deductibles and replace damaged inventory. in september, she opened a pop up in the market line, a bustling underground bazaar on the lower east side. the temporary space holds more than 2,000 books, about half of the store’s pre fire inventory. yu also planned out a fall calendar, with book launches, book clubs and a drag story hour. “to see the amount of community support for what i think is one of the tiniest bookstores i’ve ever been to is so heartwarming,” she said. “i don’t really know how to process it.” overall revenue, though, has dropped by more than a third since the fire, yu estimated. without a bar at her pop up, yu’s business is losing upward of 15% of the earnings that coffee and alcohol brought in during busy months. yu & me books has an e commerce partnership with bookshop.org, an online indie books marketplace, but she still relies on foot traffic since in store purchases constitute roughly 95% of total sales. the breakneck pace of the pop up launch, in tandem with reviving the original store, has taken an immense psychological toll. “one of the hardest projects of my life was opening this bookstore, and now i have to do it three times,” she said, adding that she’s been dealing with high blood pressure. for yu and her team, one of the biggest challenges has been prioritizing their physical and mental health. most of her employees have a second or third job, yu said, and many skimp on sleep and meals. they’re a close knit group, and often bring breakfast and coffee for one another. “the logistics are not going to be what breaks us,” she said. “burnout is.” the guardian asked three experts to consider yu’s predicament and share their advice. asahi pompey global head of corporate engagement and president of the goldman sachs foundation, and leader of goldman sachs’s 10,000 small businesses program a three part playbook would be helpful for yu. the first step is modeling various scenarios for the business to make sure that she can attain the scale and the profitability she wants. that could be returning to the mulberry street location, continuing with the pop up model that she’s doing, or even going for some sort of “no physical bricks and mortar” option. step two is to shop those scenarios against her ethos and mission to find the best fit. then, the last step is building a road map and a timeline for execution. being a small business owner can be a lonely experience. it’s not for the faint of heart. it’s important for yu to remember that she can’t pour from an empty cup, so she should pace herself and lean on her team. also, people want to help but sometimes just don’t know how: yu can give her supporters opportunities to be engaged with the business, like having a community day around boxing up or going through inventory. hosting readings for asian authors at other chinatown businesses is another way to engage the community because small business owners as a group tend to stick together. sarah mcnally founder of mcnally jackson, an independent bookstore chain with five locations in new york city the whole joy of bookselling is that you’re really part of a team and you’re in it together. i’ve had the same two people working with me for 18 years. we all have different skills and ways of handling stress   getting a pulse on your staff is crucial for long term growth. within my team, some people really thrive with change and figuring out new systems, while others function better with maintaining pre existing systems. yu has to know the strengths of her team members so they can work well through this transitional period. she should know that just because she’s finding change difficult doesn’t mean she’s not an amazing bookseller. losing your first store   or any store   is heartbreaking. but one of my big life goals is to make bookselling a viable and rewarding career for people. i’ve got so many stores now that i’m not as sentimental about the first one. now i feel like mcnally jackson has become a community: there are people who have made their careers here, and i’m keeping it alive not just for me but for all the people i work with. yu & me is similarly community focused. so it helps to be really goal oriented; it’s not just sentimental anymore. shane parrish curator of the farnam street blog and author of clear thinking: turning ordinary moments into extraordinary results emails can be an effective way to drive traffic to the temporary store. yu can start by collecting the emails of everyone who buys a book on site or who rsvps to an event, so if she sees a parent coming to a children’s event, for example, she can later market to them a new book on parenthood. another angle is having authors market to their audience events at yu & me, and converting their audience to yu’s audience. if she does that over and over for the next six months she can potentially accrue 10,000 people on her email list and start building events around that. it’s important that yu thinks about how she can make her space a destination: how can she make the experience of visiting the pop up shareable, something people are going to be able to take pictures of? one option i’ve seen that’s super viable is having children’s stories read on saturdays. the choice pompey’s advice about collaborating with chinatown locals and business owners in order to rebuild her store resonated with yu. “i think this is brilliant, grounding and totally aligned with the way i’ve structured yu & me books,” she said. yu felt validated by the three part modeling and budgeting playbook that pompey laid out. the road map, timeline for execution and p&l breakdowns are strategies that she has already adopted to help structure her forthcoming rebuild. yu also appreciated pompey’s reminder that, while running a small business is not for the faint of heart, she “can’t pour from an empty cup”. taking care of herself is a priority. “i struggle with the same things that others in my community do   fear of failure, difficulties asking for help   which we’re constantly working to unlearn,” she said. “this is an excellent opportunity for me to rework some of these behaviors into healthier habits that not only will help myself and my team but also my business,” yu said, pointing out that she needs to see that reaching out to the people who love her bookstore and ask for support is not burdensome, but uplifting. “to rebalance a manageable work structure while engaging fiercely in community is the optimal solution,” she said. “i just had to take a step back to see it.”

on july 4, lucy yu was working at her bookstore, yu & me books, in manhattan's chinatown, when she began to smell smoke. she thought it must be from fireworks. "my neighbor came running through the smoke into the store," yu recalled one recent afternoon, standing in her darkened storefront. "she was like, 'you have to get out of the building, there's a fire.' " one of the building's tenants, frank yee, later died; manhattan's chinatown has had a string of deadly or devastating fires in recent months   four people died in a blaze at an e bike shop, and multiple people were displaced after a fire in the building of the fu hao gift shop. "i think i'm trying to find space in my brain to grieve, but even allowing a little bit of the floodgates of grief to open is a lot to handle," yu said. now yu and her staff are tasked with the many logistics after the fire: working with insurance and the construction crew on demolishing the existing space to abate any smoke or water damage; seeking a temporary space; and sorting through their damaged inventory. she said she hopes the store will be able to return to the mulberry street location in seven months. it's a tricky balance, mourning what she describes as "version one" of her store when she's forced to consider "version two." "it's tough because it's my business, but also, my whole soul is in it," yu said. "all of my coworkers are my close friends, and all of us are trying to manage it like a project, but also holding space for the pain that we feel in our hearts ... all those things can exist, of being really proud of myself, understanding i'm handling it the best way i can, but also knowing that this is a long road to recovery and that the grief might stay in my heart for a while." authors and customers from all around the country flooded the store's online fundraiser, with donations totaling more than $350,000. this support has allowed yu to continue paying her staff, replacing damaged inventory and equipment, and operating pop up events around the city. "i remember hearing about the fire and just having this sinking feeling in my gut, like: 'it can't be happening to yu & me   this beloved space,' " sally wen mao recalled. mao had previously moderated other author events at yu & me's mulberry street location, and was planning to launch her new poetry collection, the kingdom of surfaces, there as well. she had assumed the fire would change their plans. but mao said, yu and her staff were determined to help. yu said that other businesses and bookstores have been instrumental in their support. book club bar in the east village will lend them space to host book clubs; the cookbook shop archestratus books & foods is hosting a bake sale fundraiser for them on saturday, aug. 5; and the brooklyn based store, books are magic, has opened their space for yu & me events. "there was an article that i read in which lucy mentioned that she's used to being alone and doing things by herself, and she wasn't expecting this kind of response from the community," mao said. it resonated with her. "as poets, we have to depend on community support. as poets, we don't have large pr engines behind us." and the pandemic has made spaces like yu & me books even more rare, according to cathy linh che, the executive director of kundiman, an asian american literary organization. "these gathering spaces around literature, around finding community have been essentially decimated," che said, pointing to the iconic shop, eastwind books of berkeley, recently shuttering its physical space, and the smithsonian's controversial decision to cancel its asian american literature festival, just weeks before it was scheduled to take place. but the yu & me books pop up event in brooklyn is the type of forward momentum that she says is necessary. "it gives us a lot of life and hope that you can see lucy yu with a big smile, [and know] she's going to give you a big hug," che said. "we know that the spirit of yu & me books, without its current physical space, still lives on." "feeling that joy of being able to come together in this space that's not even yu & me books makes me realize that home is people and a place," yu said. "and the extensions of home are so much bigger than i give it credit for." yu said it's hard to put into words, but she's realizing that it's "not that hard" or complicated to foster this sense of community; it's just about welcoming people to come as they are. "when we talk about creating community and we talk about creating space for diversity within a diaspora, that's actually so easy," she said. "it's just kindness at the core of it." as yu rebuilds yu & me books in the aftermath of the fire, she's discovering that home and community are only expanding. copyright 2023 npr. to see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

newsletter yu & me books was nearly destroyed in a fire. its owner reopened the shop with the community’s support. by james barron good morning. it’s monday. today we’ll hear how a bookstore in chinatown was brought back to life after a devastating fire. we’ll also meet the editor of a high school newspaper who became the subject of an article in the issue that came out last month. yu & me books was the first bookstore in manhattan to be owned by an asian american woman when it opened in december 2021. it was heavily damaged little more than 18 months later   on the fourth of july last year   when fire destroyed an apartment upstairs in the same building in chinatown. by the time the fire trucks left, yu was already thinking about what it would take to reopen the store, even though a thousand books had been ruined and she had lost $60,000 in inventory. my colleague jordyn holman followed yu’s struggles after the fire. i asked jordyn to explain how she came across the story and why she found it meaningful. here’s what she said: “my editor noticed yu’s gofundme campaign and, knowing that i’m an avid book lover, suggested that i reach out to lucy, as i came to call her. “i cover the retail industry, which usually means writing about big companies that most people have heard of like walmart and macy’s. but retailing is also made up of millions of small businesses that dot our neighborhoods. i figured that following lucy’s story would be a way to give readers insight into the mind set of an entrepreneur who had been forced to rewrite her original business plan.

every product is independently selected by editors. things you buy through our links may earn vox media a commission. in the early afternoon on july 4, lucy yu was behind the counter at yu & me books, the bookstore and café she founded in chinatown, when she began to smell smoke. a customer asked, “are we safe?” and yu said it was probably from the fireworks down the street. she was planning to have an easy day   some of her friends were coming over to hang out and drink whiskey   but then a woman who lived upstairs burst in. “there’s a fire!” she shouted, coughing. “you need to get out!” yu yelled at everyone to leave   “i don’t even remember what i grabbed”   and locked the door. she stood across the street, watching in shock as firefighters arrived minutes later and smashed the upstairs windows, sending plumes of heavy smoke billowing up. her neighbors had already gotten out, and they were mostly stunned but okay, with the exception of an elderly asian man who lived directly above the store, whom first responders took out on a gurney in critical condition. his bulldog, who sometimes accompanied him in the bookstore, was carried out in a tarp, already dead. while fighting the flames, the firefighters got in position to bash through the bookstore’s windows. “please stop!” yu yelled. “i’ll let you in.” when she opened the door and took one step inside, her foot plunged into shin deep water, which she realized was pouring in through the ceiling and drenching thousands of books and the space she’d designed to feel like a cozy living room. she didn’t know how to process it. “i had to step away for five minutes to have an actual full blown panic attack,” yu tells me. “like, i did the wiring of the speakers, i fixed our ceiling, i built our furniture by hand. i felt, at that moment, fully ruined.” when yu & me books opened less than two years ago at 44 mulberry street, with the goal of spotlighting diverse books in the historic immigrant neighborhood, it quickly became a beloved gathering space for asian american readers and writers and a community hub for a neighborhood reeling from the pandemic and hate crimes. it’s now the latest storefront in the neighborhood to succumb to a fire. for rochelle kwan, a chinatown resident and a friend of yu’s who was supposed to hang out at the bookstore that afternoon, it was the second time in three years she’s had to help a friend clean up their chinatown store after a fire. “it just feels like, oh my god, no, not again,” says kwan. for her, the space wasn’t just a bookstore; it was where she could talk with friends late into the night in its back reading room or even dj a birthday party. the fire department says the cause of the fire is still under investigation. just weeks ago, an e bike shop ignited on madison street, killing four residents who lived upstairs, and a fire at a mott street souvenir shop displaced 50 others just three months earlier. last year, another fire on mulberry street killed two residents and destroyed dim sum palace, and, in 2021, another shut down golden diner. at 70 mulberry street, a massive fire devastated the museum of chinese in america’s archives in 2020, the same year a fire ripped through grand tea & imports on grand street, the other store kwan had helped clean up. when she showed up with her friends at yu & me   “we arrived thinking we were going to hang out, so everybody was looking so cute”   they found yu alone, drenched from head to toe, silently sorting books into trash bags. they got to work helping her separate the wet and dry books. yu hardly noticed them at first. “it was just so quiet in my head. and then an hour later, i looked up and 15 of my friends were around me just helping me do the same thing,” she says. “i felt bad, i was like, ‘guys, if you have july 4 plans ’ and none of them even gave me a chance to finish that sentence. they brought me clean clothes; they brought me dumplings. we had three bottles of whiskey we started passing around outside of the store, just laughing and crying.” the severity of the water damage means the building will need a full gut renovation, something yu’s landlord told her will realistically take a year. as for the bookstore’s other recovery needs, yu & me received an immediate and tremendous surge of donations, raising more than $325,000 on gofundme   more than double its $150,000 goal   as of monday, with funds coming from writers like celeste ng, min jin lee, and ocean vuong, along with local businesses like pearl river mart. that money will go toward both keeping yu & me’s ten person staff paid as they search for a new temporary location and replacing lost equipment and inventory while they wait for insurance payments. with the cleanup still ongoing, yu says she’s gotten just a few hours of sleep each night since the fire. she’s still coughing and has chest pain from the smoke. but she’s feeling grounded, she says. “when deciding to open up a bookstore in chinatown, i can’t just relish the joy of the support from the community without also understanding some of the hardships that might come my way.” and as a former engineer who calls herself “hyperindependent,” it’s been a life changing lesson. “i never prepare for anyone to help me. but it takes an extreme situation to feel extreme love and kindness. and i have felt that in the past couple of days to a level that i didn’t think was possible,” she says. “you can’t make this stuff up. like, fiction isn’t even this good.” every product is independently selected by editors. things you buy through our links may earn vox media a commission. this email will be used to sign into all new york sites. by submitting your email, you agree to our terms and privacy policy and to receive email correspondence from us. password must be at least 8 characters and contain: as part of your account, you’ll receive occasional updates and offers from new york, which you can opt out of anytime. this email will be used to sign into all new york sites. by submitting your email, you agree to our terms and privacy policy and to receive email correspondence from us. password must be at least 8 characters and contain: as part of your account, you’ll receive occasional updates and offers from new york, which you can opt out of anytime. * please try a longer search

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yu and me books opened in december 2021 on mulberry street in manhattan’s chinatown, and was named for owner lucy yu’s mother. it was the first asian american woman owned bookstore on the island. following a july 4, 2023, fire in a neighboring residential unit, the store has lost most of its inventory and equipment and needs your help. a gofundme page had raised almost $250,000 as of friday morning, july 7, to support yu as she faces a year long closure and likely months long delay for insurance funding. “facing closure for an entire year is catastrophic for a small business,” says the gofundme appeal. yu and me is a beloved indie store (you can read katie yee’s delightful account of its opening here), and its closure will be a true loss for locals, for staff, and for those who make the trek to enjoy yu’s selections. you can also support the store through its bookshop page, yuandmebooks. let’s help them! created by grove atlantic and electric literature masthead about sign up for our newsletters how to pitch lit hub advertisers: contact us privacy policy support lit hub   become a member lit hub has always brought you the best of the book world for free no paywall. but our future relies on you. in return for your contribution, you'll get an ad free site experience, editors' picks, and our joan didion tote bag. most importantly, you'll keep independent book coverage alive and thriving.

npr book reviews   thu, 08/08/2024   3:00am it's summer, and whether you're taking a trip   or simply staying out of the heat with the ac running   there's nothing like relaxing with a good audiobook. so in this encore episode, we are recommending three of our favorite fiction audiobooks. categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   wed, 08/07/2024   10:32am categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   wed, 08/07/2024   5:02am categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   wed, 08/07/2024   5:02am categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   wed, 08/07/2024   5:00am categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   tue, 08/06/2024   12:06pm categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   tue, 08/06/2024   10:12am categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   tue, 08/06/2024   5:03am categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   tue, 08/06/2024   5:02am categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   tue, 08/06/2024   5:02am categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   tue, 08/06/2024   5:02am categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   tue, 08/06/2024   5:01am categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   mon, 08/05/2024   2:16pm categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   mon, 08/05/2024   1:28pm categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   mon, 08/05/2024   12:42pm categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   mon, 08/05/2024   9:49am categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   mon, 08/05/2024   5:05am categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   mon, 08/05/2024   5:03am categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   mon, 08/05/2024   5:03am categories   book reviews ny times book reviews   mon, 08/05/2024   5:00am categories   book reviews atlantic county library system 40 farragut ave., mays landing, nj 08330 phone: (609) 625 2776 | fax: (609) 625 8143 comments or questions? contact us atlantic county executive dennis levinson board of county commissioners, richard r. dase, chairman
a fire left lucy yu’s literary hub in chinatown gutted. she was determined to rebuild it. lucy yu in her manhattan bookstore in august, weeks after a fire destroyed it.credit... supported by by jordyn holman photographs by hiroko masuike jordyn holman and hiroko masuike followed the owner of yu & me and her colleagues as they rebuilt the store. lucy yu wasn’t sure if she had smoke in her lungs or was having an anxiety attack. she needed fresh air. five days earlier, on the fourth of july, she had raced out of her bookstore in manhattan’s chinatown as it filled with smoke. a fire had broken out in an upstairs apartment, threatening to destroy all she had built. now ms. yu was back, and had to face it. she had assembled a team of friends to pack up the books that weren’t damaged beyond repair and put them in storage. by the last bag, she had pain in her chest. she walked outside and sat down on a stoop next door, as her friends comforted her and brought her water. her once vibrant store, yu & me books, needed a gut renovation to remove mold and smoke residue. the ceiling was caving in, the furniture she had built was damaged, and the speaker system she had installed was shot. a single bulb hung, emitting light; she and her friends had to use flashlights in the basement. they had salvaged a few thousand books, but more than 1,400 were ruined.

 experts advise the city’s first aapi female bookstore owner on a plan to reopen yu & me books in its original location in chinatown for lucy yu, who runs what’s believed to be new york city’s first asian american woman owned bookstore, losing her brick and mortar business was akin to losing a child. but since 4 july of this year, when a blaze engulfed the chinatown building that housed yu & me books, the 29 year old has had little time to process her grief. within hours of the blaze, she shifted into rebuild mode: right after firefighters brought the fire under control, yu and a friend ran into the store and hauled inventory into plastic bags and tarps. they salvaged a couple thousand books from the wreckage, just under half of the collection. the effort left yu coughing and short of breath for the next two weeks.