David Abel arrived at his bookshop on the first day of January to find smashed glass all over the floor, books scattered around.

Thieves had broken into Passages Bookshop’s small storefront, grabbed a hundred or so volumes from locked display cases and disappeared back into the night.

Abel’s heart sank as he looked around at the mess. He quickly realized he had lost some valuable items that meant a lot to him personally — including a rare issue of a 1960s poetry magazine with an iconic Andy Warhol-designed cover, plus an even harder-to-find version with the cover Warhol rejected. It took Abel 30 years to land both items.

The longtime bookseller had to keep his Northeast Portland shop closed for days as he cleaned up.

About two weeks after the break-in, Abel answered the phone one morning and heard a woman introduce herself.

“I didn’t even register the name,” he admits. The woman said she’d read a story The Oregonian/OregonLive had published about the break-in and noticed “that one of my books was among those taken. I can’t replace the Warhols, but I can send you a box of my books.”

By this point the name and the voice had clicked in: Patti Smith.

A signed hardcover edition of 1998’s “Patti Smith Complete: Lyrics, Reflections & Notes for the Future” had been lost to the burglars.

“That is so kind,” Abel managed to say into his phone.

“I really love bookstores," Smith responded. "They’re important to me.”

Abel gave the 1970s rock legend and National Book Award-winning author his address, and about a week later a box arrived. In it were copies of Smith’s acclaimed memoir “Just Kids,” as well as “The Year of the Monkey” and “M Train.” He also pulled out lesser-known Smith titles: “Devotion,” from Yale University’s “Why I Write” series, and a bilingual (Dutch/English) book of poetry, “New Jerusalem.” Plus a copy of “Patti Smith Complete,” the one that was stolen. All signed.

The aftermath of the Jan. 1, 2020, break-in at Passages Bookshop.

The call, Abel said, “was very sweet” — a balm he needed as he was dealing with his insurance company and getting his shop shipshape again.

And Smith wasn’t the only book lover to offer help.

Ai Sugiura, a Tokyo-based artist who’d been in the shop last summer, got in touch with Abel. She had a copy of one of the books on the stolen-volumes list he’d put on his website. She offered to send it to him.

A New York friend in the book business sent a box of books, and another friend told him she was setting volumes aside for him.

Abel also received many other calls, offering assistance cleaning up the store, suggesting an online fundraiser. And there was a meaningful uptick in customers as word got around about the burglary.

“These kinds of gestures of support and solidarity are kind of amazing,” he told The Oregonian/OregonLive.

A month after the break-in, none of the stolen books has turned up. On the Passages website you can see a partial list of the items stolen, including identifying markings such as author signatures and margin notes.

Passages, at 1223 N.E. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., specializes in what Abel calls “unusual books,” with an emphasis on literature and modern art. The newly received gifts from Patti Smith fit right in.

The signed books are not yet out for sale, Abel says, but they will be soon.

“Well,” he adds. “I think I will keep one for myself.”

-- Douglas Perry

@douglasmperry

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