Michael Lieberman

The Half-Life of Dan Brown and John Grisham

Tim Spalding over at LibraryThing did some number crunching from the various book swap sites that are integrated with LibraryThing to find out what the Top Wanted and Unwanted books are. Dan Brown not only took home the dubious honor of the book most people want to get out of their lives with the Da Vinci Code but he also secured the 2, 3, and 7 slot of the top twenty-five with his books Angels & Demons, Deception Point and Digital Fortress.But the award for the most books on the list goes to John Grisham with an astounding 13 titles on...

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Inside Donald Judd’s Library

The Main Library at Donald Judd's La Mansana de Chinati residence in Marfa, Texas. It has been sixteen years since the passing of Donald Judd. Though known as one of the foremost minimalist painters of the 20th century Judd was also a serious bibliophile. He claimed to have read the entire Encyclopedia Britannica as child which, given his minimalist leanings, is quite a feat. And wherever in the world his art took him he bought books and had them sent back to Marfa.Library Details:13,004 books in the library on 576 shelves.40 languages represented. 2286 duplicates - for Judd was fond...

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Tea Party Bookshop to Throw Its Name Overboard

 In  2008, JoAnne Kohler took a leap. With bookshops all over the country closing at an alarming rate she decided to open one in Salem, Oregon.  She named it the Tea Party Bookshop. Kohler thought that the some of the aspects of the Boston Tea Party (think independence, community involvement, and the desire to shop locally)  would mirror much of what she was trying to accomplish.From the About Us page of the Tea Party Bookshop website The historical Boston Tea Party took place December 23rd, 1774. This event inspired our name as it was the first instance where an American...

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The Camera Work of Allen Ginsberg

W. S. Burroughs at rest in the side-yard of his house..., 1991, gelatin silver print,  © Copyright 2010 The Allen Ginsberg LLC. All rights reserved. A new exhibition of the photographs of Allen Ginsberg opened this week at the National Gallery of Art. The exhibit, titled Beat Memories: The Photographs of Allen Ginsberg,  features 79 black-and-white portraits. Most were donated to the National Gallery by Gary S. Davis who acquired, via the poet's estate, one print of every photograph in Ginsberg's possession at the time of his death. Most of the usual suspects of the Beat Generation are represented.The exhibition is divided...

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Thrift Books ‘Aims for Domination of the Internet’

We are all well aware by now of how the internet and online bookselling has forever altered the trade. For many of the new players the book has become the latest commodity with all its cultural and material attributes having been stripped away. We are left with a torrent of cheap books.One of leaders in this new space is Thrift Books, an online only bookseller based in Auburn, Washington which, ironically enough, is in Amazon's backyard. They claim to be the "nation’s largest online seller of used books."Thrift Books has just issued a press release celebrating the selling of their...

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