"That was the day that I really understood I could buy books and sell them for more money. That was the day I got hooked by books."Taylor Bowie has been selling books in Seattle for over 40 years. My first job in the book trade back in the early 1990's was working for Taylor at Bowie & Company. At the time I was working as a residential therapist at an in-patient facility for troubled kids and was beginning to show signs of social service burn. Taylor's friend happened to be the cook at this place and Taylor and I would...
The Author Needs An Art Director
This past weekend the Design Research Conference was held at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago. Louis Rosenfeld, a leader in the field of information architecture, was one of the speakers and he addressed the role of design in the book world and the challenges that publishers face.It is no secret that the visual component of a book is directly tied to sales. Rosenfeld believes that design affects not only the inside and outside of the book but also the brand of the book and the author. The visual component of a book and its author now extend far...
The Dumbing of the American Bookseller
The image is a tapestry of the words "a novel" that appear on the covers or dust jackets of titles currently on the New York Times bestseller list.It was created by David Friedman for a post at the Ironic Sans blog. "I guess just being a work of fiction isn't enough anymore...You have to emblazen your book with a category on the cover so the book superstore employees know where it belongs." says Friedman.As Ron Hogan of Galleycat suggests "hasn't this tag been semi-ubiquitous for at least a decade?"I wouldn't be surprised to find a direct correlation of the use...
Another TexFake? Davy Crockett Letter Questioned
No, TexFake isn't a new term coining George W. Bush's attempt at being a President it is the title of a book written in 1994 by a rare book dealer that dealt with the "scandal surrounding the 1988 discovery of forged copies of the Texas Declaration of Independence."Now almost 20 years later a recent purchase by the Texas Historical Commission has all the makings of TexFake redux.Here's what happened:-Recently, the THC paid $490, 000 for a letter written by Davey Crockett to his family days before he was killed at the Battle of the Alamo.-The state bought the letter from...
George Gloss: A Bookseller to Remember
Picture this:It is 1969. The American Counterculture is peaking. Woodstock, Flower Power, and the Beats are upending the stale establishment. You're high as a kite walking around the streets of Boston and you see a covered wagon coming down the street. Horses, cowboys and the whole bit. From the covered wagon books are being thrown freely. On the side of the wagon it said: "Go West, Booklovers -- Go to 5 West Street -- Brattle Book Shop."Some people might not have recovered.This was the work of George Gloss, the owner of the Brattle Book Shop. A bookshop "As powerful a...