I’ll Never Have a Kindle, but…….


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The Bookworm Turns for Comic Book Stores and Nerds

“Real book” bookstores aren’t the only bookstores in peril of being taken down by technology. If you thought that just because comic bookstores survived the Amazon purge they were therefore safe from eXtinction, you are as stupid as Robin, when he allowed diabolically attractive Librarian Lydia Limpett to read him to sleep with her gaseous Sleepy-bye book (the only vaguely comic related reference I could think of).

There are fewer than 3,000 comic bookstores left in the United States – that may seem like a lot of comic books, but it’s down a third from their heyday in the mid 1990’s when there were more than 10,000. Savvy comic book publishers hope to take advantage of digital reading technology by integrating comics and eReaders, extending their sales to places where comic bookstores don’t exist. Like a 21st century digitalcomicbookmobile. Marvel Comics has developed a free application for the iPad that gives readers access to a digital library of more than 500 comics from its rich 70-year history (There is a Journey into Mystery: The Books That were Alive comic I would sure like to get my hands on without braving mean old comic book store guy). The software program, Marvel Comics App, developed by digital comics distributor comiXology, offers free access to the first issues of titles and vintage issues that can be downloaded for $1.99 each. Marvel’s claim that it sees the app as being complementary to the experience of buying and reading physical comics – rather than replacing it – seems dubious, but the software does include a location tool to guide you to the nearest comics store. Continue reading

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Robber Baron, A Captain of Industry or Just a Really Kick-Ass Guy?

If Iceland and Goldman Sachs have not gotten you sufficiently pissed off this week, then this is for you: Tirelessly chic and sickeningly industrious clothing designer Marc Jacobs bought beloved West Village bookstore Biography Book Shop to open his own, better bookstore. A Marc Jacobs bookstore, called Book Marc. 400 Bleeker Street will be Jacob’s seventh store in the area, and the first one to sidestep the standard protocol of rooting around in bins of $15 keychains, compacts and plastic jewelry to get to the adorable $200 anchor pattern, red and navy silk-blend nautical sweater or the $300 cherry blossom silk jacquard dress with puffy sleeves.

Seriously seven stores in a 20 square block radius? Carnegie, Rockefeller, Starbucks and Trump have nothing on this guy! That means there are 4 more Marc Jacobs stores than there are even Starbucks in the same area! Why there isn’t a MarcJacobsiGoogle gadget or iphone app to flag all the stores is a mystery. You could be in one Marc Jacobs store and your girlfriend could be waiting for you in another Marc Jacobs store and there is a good chance that both those stores could be on the same street and you would never even know!!   Continue reading

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Book Worm: Derogative, Hummel, Bibliophile, Ornament, Villain, Sofa, Eyeglass, Comic-Character, Costume, Silverfish, Shoe.

The Profile of a Bookworm Courtesy of Wikipedia is:

The classic bibliophile is one who loves to read, admire and collect books, often amassing a large and specialised collection. Bibliophiles do not necessarily want to possess the books they love; an alternative would be to admire them in old libraries. However, the bibliophile is usually an avid book collector, sometimes pursuing scholarship in the collection, sometimes putting form above content with an emphasis on old, rare, or expensive books, first editions, books with special or unusual bindings, autographed copies, etc.

An Actual Book Worm is this:

In Micrographia, a “study of the Minute Bodies made by the Magnifying Glass”, London, MDCLXVII, one of the earliest publications issued under the authority of the newly-formed Royal Society, Robert Hooke described in Observation LII the “small silver-colour’d Book-worm”, “which upon the removal of Books and Papers in the Summer, is often observed very nimbly to scud, and pack away to some lurking cranny”. The third figure of the 33rd scheme pictures a monster so formidable-looking that Blades1 may be forgiven the suggestion that Hooke “evolved both engraving and description from his inner consciousness”. Comparing, however, this earliest known drawing with one in Houlbert’s monograph, Les Insectes Ennemis des Livres, 1903, we find that the distinguished author of the Micrographia knew what he was about, as alike in text and figure he has given what Houlbert calls “une belle et exacte description” of the Lepisma saccharina, a formidable enemy of books, “one of the teeth of time”, as Hooke calls it. It is a fine bold figure, well executed, and the text is remarkable for a digression upon the different refrangibilities of light of the scales of the Lepisma, which cause the shining appearance, and explain the name “silver fish” given by children to this insect.

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$40

SUN STANDARD 2
The Sun Typewriter Co. N.Y., New York 1901
Serial #18040

From The Martin Howard Collection of Antique Typewriters:

This was the first keyboard typewriter to have used sheet metal in the construction of the main frame, rather than all cast iron, enabling it to be sold for the low price of $40. This typewriter does not use a ribbon, instead, as the type-bar approaches the platen, it brushes against a small inked roller. This small roller, when struck by the type-bar, swings to make contact with a larger inked roller, which acts as the ink reservoir. The larger roller is positioned under the nickel plated disc (size of a quarter) seen in the picture.   Continue reading

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It’s National Bookmobile Day!

Finally.

As a fan of libraries and their advocates, I recently wrote about pioneering Maryland Librarian Mary Titcomb – who developed the idea for the first mobile libraries back in 1905 – and provided a brief history of the bookmobile and it’s early years. Take a minute to follow the link and read the story of Mary Titcomb’s efforts to offer communities access to books, it is really awe-inspiring. Ms. Titcomb would be happy, or at least smugly self-satisfied, to know that her ingenuity and efforts are being honored today – as April 15th, 2010 has been designated National Bookmobile Day by the National Library Association. “An annual celebration of the contributions of our nation’s bookmobiles and the dedicated professionals who make quality bookmobile outreach possible in their communities.” In honor of this historic, somber and important event, I have put together an album of some of the more majestic and beauteous bookmobiles throughout the ages. Hop on board!

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Baron Weirwulf’s Haunted Library



via cover browser

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Dress For Success, Johnathan Livingston Seagull and that Dilbert Anthology Must Go.

Still collecting books for the Laredo,Texas used book, book drive.

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Maggie Tulliver, 150 Years Old.

Tom and Maggie overwhelmed by the flood Photo: Getty Images

On the 150th anniversary of the publication of The Mill on the Floss, Kathryn Hughes celebrates George Eliot’s most deeply autobiographical novel in the guardian uk,

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A Whydunnit in Q-Sharp Major….With A Message.

The shortlist for The Lost Man Booker Prize – a one-off prize to honour the books published in 1970 that were not eligible for consideration for the Booker Prize – was announced last week. The six books on the list are:

• The Birds on the Trees by Nina Bawden (Virago)
• Troubles by J G Farrell (Phoenix)
• The Bay of Noon by Shirley Hazzard (Virago)
• Fire From Heaven by Mary Renault (Arrow)
• The Driver’s Seat by Muriel Spark (Penguin)
• The Vivisector by Patrick White (Vintage)

Sadly, four of the six authors on the list are dead: J.G. Farrell died in 1979, Mary Renault in 1983, Patrick White in 1990 and Muriel Spark died just 4 years ago, in 2006. Muriel Spark is one of Britain’s grand dames of literature and one of my all time favorite authors. She is shortlisted for her masterpiece of modern weirdness, The Driver’s Seat. When I saw the cover of the new Penguin edition – which somehow captures her odious essence so perfectly – the memory of the Driver’s Seat and it’s queerly creepy heroine came flooding back. Continue reading

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