A Bookseller's PrayerPlease God don't make me go in here.I promise to take care of all my booksand be as nice as possible to all my customers.I promise to treat each book and each customer asa special gift from you.Please God don't make me go in there.Flickr set from mistermajik2000Thanks to Library Stuff for the lead
Books in Pictures
This is the dust jacket of the first English language edition of Stefan Bollmann's Reading Women. It was published last year by Merrell with a foreword by Karen Jay Fowler. It is the first book devoted to the history of women reading in art. With one hundred color illustrations ranging from Simone Martini's Annunciation, 1333 which shows Jesus's mom Mary being a bit startled at having her reading interrupted by a golden angel, to Eve Arnold's photograph of Marilyn Monroe reading a copy of James Joyce's Ulysses. Each image is accompanied by a paragraph or two placing it in its...
E-Books Stink
No, really.CafeScribe, a new website devoted to the digital delivery of textbooks for students, announced plans yesterday to launch "the world's first smelly e-book."They commissioned Zogby to undertake a survey of 600 college students and this is what they found:43% identified smell –- either new book smell or old -- as the thing they most love about books as physical objects.3 in 10 of the surveyed students associated “mustiness” with the books they most loved, although 16% -- possibly those most likely to hit the books early in the day – associated best-loved books with the smell of “freshly-ground coffee.”Oh...
Contemporary Artists Tackle Their Favorite Books
Artist: Melissa FormanBook: "Fragile Things" by Neil GaimanTitle: "An Authentic Illusion"Size: 26 x 32 inchesMedium: oil on panelThe exhibition is titled Literartistry and it is currently on view at the Corey Heldford Gallery in Los Angeles."As Michelangelo was inspired by Dante's Divine Comedy and John Everett Millais by Ophelia in Shakespeare's Hamlet, each artist in Literartistry will base their piece on a book that has inspired or affected them."60 artists are represented offering visual interpretations of works that run the gamut from Dr. Suess to Neil Gaiman. A good portion of the show leans toward pop surrealismThe gallery has also...
A Megalister Exposed
If you look for books online with any regularity you know who they are.Their names show up on almost every search you do.Their prices, for the most part, are completely out of whack with the other listings for the book.Their descriptions are more often suited for the selling of commodities than books.Oh, and they don't own the books they are selling.A colleague of mine refers to them (and the online sellers who offer books for a penny) as the "termites eating away at the foundation of bookselling."Now it seems that one of these mega-listers, Anybook, has taken this insanity a...