Niche Book Bar brings Black literature to Milwaukee via bike while the owner plans a permanent shop

Agya K. Aning
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
Cetonia Weston-Roy gathers books she reads to children at Carver Park. She aspires to open the first brick-and-mortar Black-owned bookstore in Wisconsin since the last one closed in 2017. Right now her bookstore, Niche Book Bar, exists as a tricycle with a bookshelf attached to the back of the bike.

Cetonia Weston-Roy runs what might be the only Black-owned bookstore with a physical location in Wisconsin.

But Niche Book Bar doesn’t have an address, a roof or even a front door for that matter. In their place instead is a used blue tricycle that carries a custom-built yellow bookshelf in the rear.

Weston-Roy pedals the Niche Book Bike to parks and public events around Milwaukee, where she unfurls the collapsible shelves and lines them on all sides with literature from Black writers or books that feature Black characters. Her dream is to transform the rolling boutique into an actual brick-and-mortar store in Bronzeville, the city's historical nexus of black culture and entrepreneurship.

"I love that they're trying to bring it back to the history that it once was," Weston-Roy said of Milwaukee's efforts to revitalize the neighborhood.

She is also a self-published author. Earlier this year she released her first book, "The Misadventures of Toni Macaroni in: The Mad Scientist." It tells the story of 7-year-old Toni Macaroni and her struggle to evade her father’s terrible cooking, which she likens to experiments that only a madman could devise. In protest of his devilish concoctions, Toni goes on a hunger strike.

What's more, Weston-Roy founded the Black Authors Collective, an online collaborative that boasts 75 members. About 90% of them are based in Milwaukee, but the group has recently welcomed writers from other parts of the country.

Her plan is to feature their work once she starts her own conventional bookstore, which would make it the first one owned by a Black person in the state since 2017. But first she needs funding.

To that end she hopes to win Brew City Match, an initiative focused on small business development in Milwaukee's less economically established neighborhoods. She is currently competing in the third and final track, which would supply her a grant if she comes out on top. But win or lose, she insists her dream will materialize.

'A chance to just be'

Growing up, one of the few places where Weston-Roy, 27, found characters resembling herself was in the books of Ann Cameron, a white author from Rice Lake. In Cameron's series "Julian’s World," “the children were kind of just allowed to be children,” Weston-Roy said.

“Every other book (with characters) that looked like me, you know, 'Roll of Thunder,'  'Hear My Cry,' all of those was about some form of pain, or how they didn't like themselves because of what was around them, or they weren't allowed to be everything they wanted to be because of the environment they lived in,” she said.

“Even though it was reflecting the truth in a lot of ways, it wasn’t always a positive experience to read those books.”

Weston-Roy's own book, "The Misadventures of Toni Macaroni," titled after her childhood nickname, gives Black kids “a chance to just be,” she said.

Front cover for 'The Misadventures of Toni Macaroni in: The Mad Scientist.'

This is seen in how Toni's parents let the young girl indulge her own quirks. She has a pet frog named Sir-Hops-A-Lot, who serves as her moral compass and was inspired by the author's childhood in Florida where she caught frogs.

Toni also wears her hair naturally in an Afro, a hairstyle that once had much less acceptance in wider society. One of her favorite things about being a published author is when young fans tell her how much they like Toni's hair.

"Toni Macaroni" is largely indebted to all of the things Weston-Roy did growing up, she said.

"I was just a very open, blunt child."

'I want to be around books'

In 2016, before Weston-Roy was an aspiring entrepreneur, she was in college and raising her then-1-year-old son. One night after putting him to sleep, she finally found the time to sit down with a glass of wine and a book.

It was “instant bliss,” she said. She then tweeted:

“someone… anyone PLEASE make a Barnes and nobles kind of place with a bar.”

She probed the idea further after a conversation with a co-worker a couple of years later made her think about her ideal future.

“I want to be around books. I want to talk about books," Weston-Roy said. "I wanna be in this environment where a child I help pick out books (with characters) that look like them will cause them to love reading. And then they come back with their children to start them off on reading adventures."

Once open, the shop will have coffee, tea, baked goods and wine "all ready to pair with a good book," as mentioned on Niche's Facebook page. And she wants the atmosphere to exude quirkiness and whimsy, sort of like the little girl from her book.

Until then, she'll continue her day job as a behavioral technician for children with autism, while laying the groundwork for her store.

One way she gets the word out is through social media. She uses Facebook to promote Black authors with "Marketing Monday," create discussion with "Topic Tuesday" and share books with "Recommendation Wednesday." She also holds virtual author meet and greets and gives out bookmark business cards.

And of course there's her three-wheeled bookstore, an idea partly inspired by seeing someone else carry ice cream on the back of a trike. The book bike also holds signature drinks from Swaye' Tea, a Black-owned tea shop in West Allis, which feature names like "Romance," "Thriller" and "The Bluest Eye."

A constellation of local, black writers

Weston-Roy arrived in Milwaukee in 2017, a little after The Reader's Choice, the last Black-owned bookstore in the state, closed after 28 years in business. After quitting her job and thinking more about starting a bookstore, Weston-Roy reached out to the former owner of The Reader's Choice.

The retired proprietor gave her tough love, Weston-Roy said. The young upstart was told running a bookstore was a bad way to make money, that she'll run into nasty people and she'll sometimes question the entire endeavor. Weston-Roy carried on anyway and asked herself what needed doing.

"And the first thought was like, well, I need to know the Black authors in the area," she said.

Thus, in May of last year, the group now known as Black Authors Collective was born.

Some of those assembled include Nicole Vick, who chronicled her journey into the world of public health; Dr. Shon Shree Lewis, who extolled the value of mental toughness; Lysz Flo, who wrote a fantasy-themed poetry collection; Alea Cross, who penned a poetic memoir; Paul Wellington, who produced a history of architecture in the Black community; and Trina Nicole, who shared her ongoing battle with fibromyalgia.

The group is based on teamwork and the desire to share resources and opportunities, Weston-Roy said. 

"She's very, very humble because I didn't even know that she had her own book," said Alea Cross, who is also a visual artist and educator. "I thought she was just, like, an organizer for black authors.

"Here you see this Black woman with glasses, and this wide smile, who is just illuminating light as she finally tells you — 'I'm Cetonia.'

"She really, like, gravitated (toward me) and put me on the list and there were different opportunities to, you know, pop up for meeting other Black authors," said Cross.

"She believes in community in a very unique and decentralized way," Cross said. "I think she gets that she's strong as the people who stand next to her."

Trina Nicole is a public speaker, host and makeup artist, in addition to being a writer. "She's very supportive," Nicole said about Weston-Roy. "She wants to see us win."

More than just trauma

After the death of George Floyd and the historic protests that followed, Weston-Roy noticed how so many people turned to literature for guidance.

While she acknowledges the importance of texts that address weighty — and lucrative — topics like racial violence and oppression, she wants her store to have more than that; she wants it to include a diversity of works, such as sci-fi and fantasy — her favorite genres going back to her teenage years.

"I'm trying to go for varied literature because we shouldn't just have trauma-based work presented in front of us," she said.

"When I started (Black Authors Collective) I kind of felt like it was just a me problem, that there weren't enough books in a varied amount of genres that reflected me," Weston-Roy said. "But as I did this more, I found out I wasn't the only one feeling this way, by far."

And she's betting there are enough potential customers who agree to justify a brick-and-mortar location.

"Numbers still say niche bookstores are doing well. But also I believe that's what the community wants to see in their neighborhoods, just from the feedback I've gotten," she said.

But even if she does open her own shop, with or without the grant from Brew City Match, her work is far from over.

"I recognize that it's significant, but I don't think I'll feel pride in being the only (Black-owned bookstore)," Weston-Roy said.

"If anything, I want to connect to other people to start making more."

Follow the reporter on Twitter @agyakaning