Linda-Marie Barrett

LINDA-MARIE BARRETT is the executive director of SIBA. She works with the SIBA staff to create and develop programming and opportunities for SIBA booksellers to connect, learn, and improve their businesses. She is the co-founder of New Voices New Rooms (NVNR), an annual conference in partnership with the New Atlantic Independent Booksellers Association (NAIBA). From 1988-2017, she worked at Malaprop’s Bookstore/Cafe, where she wore many hats, including buyer, author events manager, general manager, and co-owner. She has an MA in Russian Literature and Slavic Linguistics from Cornell University, where she received a National Resource Fellowship and an Olin Fellowship. She edited and contributed to the regional bestselling serial novel Naked Came the Leaf Peeper, and is a contributor to Spinning Toward the Sun: Essays on Writing, Resilience, and the Creative Life, an anthology benefitting the recovery of Asheville, NC after Hurricane Helene. She is the author of Creating a Salon: The Magic of Conversations That Matter (Agate Publishing, 2025).