Abobe Books in the Mission is beloved for being a great reading and event space.

Back in August, Shelf Awareness mentioned that Adobe Books in San Francisco was closing. The post linked to this run-down of the bay area’s best bookstores on the Bold Italic blog, which also reported that the store was closing at the end of August. Proprietor Andrew McKinley was cited as saying that his troubles were due to a major rent increase.

In a statement made on August 28th, McKinley said his “biggest mistake” was not buying the store’s building when he had a chance, but indicated that he has hope that the bookstore could be transitioned to a collective.

It looks like the happier ending may be coming true. Just this week, The Mission News and the San Francisco Gate have reported that Adobe Books will NOT close, with supporters posting a sign in the window of the store that says “Not Going out of Business Sale!” But another report in the San Francisco Weekly suggests that Adobe Books as well as another neighborhood store, Forest Books, are both still in serious trouble.

The Adobe Bookshop Collective is holding weekly meetings, and has an active working group with subcommittees focusing on issues ranging from fundraising and marketing to cooperative management and window display design. Although the group has put together a FAQ on those pages, it is still unclear if the cooperative will be able to gain control of the bookshop and move forward by the end of the year, which is their goal.

Pictures and videos of the bookstore’s history as an art space are being collected here, including the time in 2004 when volunteers and undergrads from UC Berkeley and the San Francisco Art Institute rearranged the bookstore by color as a temporary art installation, which was covered on NPR.