By Angela Twining
One BYU student was lucky enough Tuesday to purchase the BYU Bookstore''s 10,000th copy of President Gordon B. Hinckley''s book, 'Standing for Something.'
The Bookstore will celebrate the sale today at 8:15 a.m. by presenting the winner with a basket full of 16 items by or about President Hinckley.
Sheryl Stout, 21, a junior from Everett, Wash., majoring in history, happened to buy the right book at the right place at the right time.
'At first I was just told I won a gift - boy, was I surprised,' she said.
The wooden basket she will receive includes such things as 'The Walnut Tree,' telling the story of President Hinckley''s tree which became the Conference Center podium, 'Standing for Something' on compact disc, President Hinckley''s biography and the LDS Church Almanac.
Stout said she recently spoke with a non-member friend from Washington, and she was moved to buy her friend 'Standing for Something' as a gift.
Winning the promotion confirmed to Stout that she was supposed to call her friend, introduce her to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and give her a copy of President Hinckley''s book.
'These books are a great opportunity to help spread the gospel. What a blessing it is to win when I was just trying to help the work along,' Stout said.
Linda Brummett, manager of the general books department at the BYU Bookstore, said she put every book she could find on or about President Hinckley in the basket.
The giveaway was a promotion for what Brummett said is the fastest selling book at the BYU Bookstore since 1979, when it started tracking book sales.
'Standing for Something' came out last March and had sold over 4,000 copies by the end of April, Brummett said. It will be released into paperback this March.
The book was written mainly for a non-LDS audience, she said.
'Some people say ''Standing for Something'' is too elementary - President Hinckley didn''t write it for you,' Brummett said.
'I think sometimes members don''t realize he''s a prophet for the world.'
Brummett said the Bookstore doesn''t even really have to try to sell religious books - BYU students are already a targeted audience.
Having a bookstore with Latter-day Saint literature nearby is definitely a blessing for BYU students who in the past have had to travel great distances to buy LDS books, said Heidi Krum, 19, a sophomore from Arlington, Texas, majoring in psychology.
Krum said she traveled an hour to Dallas to buy religious books before she came to BYU, and
It is nice to be close to a great selection of books, she said.
'The books are clean, and you don''t have to worry about different interpretations,' Krum said. 'You can trust that they are written by the Spirit.'