“Lucius Beebe, who was larger than life, is dead. The famous author suffered a heart attack shortly after his ritual morning Turkish bath in his Hillsborough winter home yesterday” (obituary in the San Francisco Chronicle, Feb. 4, 1966)."If anything is worth doing it is worth doing in style, and on your own terms, and nobody's Goddamned else's!" - Lucius Beebe.“I admire most of all The Renaissance Man, and if it can be said without pretentiousness, I like to think of myself as one, at least in some small measure. Not a Michelangelo, mark you, but perhaps a poor man's Cellini...
Library Cats 45, Bookstore Cats 0
Before She Was Famous: A Rare Unretouched Photo of Stacks The Library Cat.Cats are drawn to quiet, solitary activity. Writers know that putting pen to paper, or fingers to keyboard, is a magnet for Kitty more potent than fresh catnip. Same goes for knitting, sewing, drawing, paying bills, folding laundry, and, of course, reading. So no surprise libraries and bookstores often have felines in residence. Two recent news stories reveal a trend in the area of literary felines: while library cats bask in the spotlight, bookstore cats are an endangered species.The State Journal-Register of Springfield, Illinois reports that the February...
Bookshops Rattled in Northern California Earthquake
Exterior of BookleggersA 6.5 magnitude earthquake shook the town of Eureka in Northern Californa late Saturday afternoon. Damage is widespread.These photos show the damage to two of the town's bookshops. They were taken by P. Scott Brown the owner of Eureka Books who also tweeted this soon after :"Overall, not too bad for a close 6.5 earthquake. Some shelves toppled upstairs, but it could be much worse. http://twitpic.com/xg11oInterior of Eureka Books
In Defense of the Book and the Bookshop
Adam PalmerThere are now enough e-readers' on the market for everyone in your family tree to have a different brand. With all the hoopla surrounding the new crop of e-reader's and tablets at this year's CES, it is a breath of fresh air (and a relief) to read Knute Berger's piece at Crosscut "Will the book survive?"Berger's piece is littered with sanity and hope for the book and, as importantly, the bookshop.Here are a few nuggets:"Kindle and products like it are a boon for readers, and I don't object to them. In fact, I was pleased to learn that my...
Partisanship Goes Retail: Book Store Slaps Conservative Hands
Rough political partisanship, having now officially supplanted baseball as America's favorite pastime, has raised its feral literary head and, like the pixilated elephant who walked through the wrong door and wound up in a donkey show, is making an obscene ass of itself.True Compass by Edward M. Kennedy is getting the treatment usually associated with Karl Rove in his Nixon dirty tricks days, and a book store has had to lay down the law and order:"CONSERVATIVES! PLEASE STOP FLIPPING OVER AND DEFACING THE BOOKS ABOUT LIBERAL POLITICIANS. THIS BOOKSHELF IS NOT YOUR BLOG"Now, lest Conservative readers of Book Patrol have...