By Phoebe Neidl
Brooklyn Daily Eagle

FORT GREENE -- Jessica Stockton Bagnulo is a woman who knows what she wants. The 29-year-old self-proclaimed “book nerd� is dead set on opening her own bookstore. “I felt it was my calling,� she says. “I’m good at it – creating space for books and readers.�

A veteran employee of several successful indie bookstores in the city, she says, “I first fell in love with the idea working at Three Lives Bookstore in the West Village and then got involved with the larger booksellers community. I started to think I wanted to bring all my ideas to one place, and at the same time I fell in love with Brooklyn.�

And Brooklyn has been good to her.

While she has been the events and publicity coordinator at McNally Jackson Books in Soho, the Park Slope resident has been leveraging all the resources her home borough has to offer. She took a course for beginning entrepreneurs with the Brooklyn Economic Development Corporation, and then earned a $15,000 grant by winning the 2007 Brooklyn Public Library PowerUp! Competition with her business plan for the store.

Now, residents of Fort Greene have essentially drafted her to open a bookstore for them and are throwing their full weight behind her dream.

Last year, while Bagnulo was tackling the “steep and scary learning curve� of becoming a businesswoman, the Fort Greene Association was surveying the neighborhood to find out what stores and services residents wanted most. And it turned out Fort Greene’s number one desire was to have more bookstores.

A survey of 380 Fort Greene residents, including people who live in the Whitman and Ingersoll public housing projects, showed that 74 percent said they wanted more options for buying books. (There was a strong demand for more food stores as well, and a supermarket was the number one request among African Americans.)

The neighborhood currently has one bookstore, Dare Books on Lafayette Street – not nearly enough for a neighborhood that claims Walt Whitman and Richard Wright as former residents.

Which is why Bagnulo was excited as soon as the Fort Greene Association got in touch with her. “Fort Greene seems like a good bet – it’s a great literary community with a lot of writers and other people in the book industry,� she says.

“After an extensive search, we decided to work with Jessica,� recalled Mike Gross, co-chair of the Fort Greene Indie Bookstore Initiative, a newly formed eight-member “spin-off committee� of the Fort Greene Association.

“She was the most ready and she had fantastic experience at a well known and successful bookstore,� said Gross.

“Most of the folks I know who have opened up independent bookstores in the last 10 years or so have had one of two things: a mortgage or a well-off relative or friend  I have neither of those things,� writes Bagnuli on her blog, “A Bookstore in Brooklyn: The Triumphs and Travails of a Book Nerd Becoming a Businesswoman.�

“Instead of hoping for some goodwill angel investor type, I am now preparing to formally solicit investors [or lenders],� she says.

Which is where the Fort Greene Indie Bookstore Initiative comes in. The group has organized a kickoff event for Sept. 16, the same weekend as the Brooklyn Book Festival, so that interested parties can meet Bagnulo. “Colossus of New York� author Colson Whitehead, a Fort Greene resident, will be in attendance, as well as authors Jennifer Egan and Kate Christensen.

“It’s really unusual and amazing,� Bagnulo says of the support she’s getting from the neighborhood. “All this support and before it’s even open – it’s completely unheard of. I’m so grateful to the community.�

The Sept. 16 event won’t just be for potential investors, but also for neighborhood residents to share their thoughts and ideas, as well as any helpful information in the search for an available space that’s affordable.

“The best bookstores are those that are tailored to the community and what they want,� says Bagnulo. “And ones where the staff are invested in the success of the store. It’s a space for conversation about literature, a space for the meeting of the minds,� she says.

“This is a strong neighborhood, and I really, truly think it would continue to build those bonds – to build the cultural and intellectual fabric of the neighborhood,� says Gross. “To have a place to see readings, talk to a knowledgeable bookseller, and to know what other people in the neighborhood are reading. It’s a unique support system to have,� he says.

The Fort Greene Indie Bookstore Initiative kick-off party will be at the Cumberland Greene (237 Cumberland Ave.) on September 16, from 7 p.m. to 9 p.m. RSVP to rsvp_fortgreeneindie@hotmail.com by Sept. 12.

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