Artists don’t judge books by their covers, they’re inspired by them

Tuesday, 15 March, 2016

If filmmakers can be influenced by paintings, it surely stands to reason that the work of painters will be inspired by book covers. Makes sense to me.

Lately, a handful of well-read visual artists have looked to book design – specifically, the classic covers of the 20th century – as a source of raw material and inspiration. Some paint book covers straight up, carefully replicating type and illustration, as well as the marks of wear and tear on particular copies. Others alter existing designs or invent their own jackets and titles. It’s surely no coincidence that artists are choosing the book as a subject in this era of new reading technologies.

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Books that have been read by the famous, that can now be yours

Monday, 15 February, 2016

Read By Famous is a book seller with a difference, the books they stock have already been read. But not read by just anyone, rather by notable, or famous people. And what you’re buying is the actual title they’ve read, not a copy of it.

We sell books that were owned and read by people who have achieved high levels of recognition in their particular fields. Not copies of titles they have read, but the actual books that these people owned and read. The proceeds from the sales benefit book and literacy focused non-profits.

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Yoda, a nasty little green oven mitt, until proved otherwise?

Tuesday, 19 January, 2016

It’s fair to say that US scientist and science fiction author David Brin takes a reasonably dim view of the Star Wars films, especially the first six movies. It’s series creator George Lucas’ “sneering contempt for democracy and the common man”, that particularly gets on Brin’s goat, to say nothing of that “nasty little green oven mit” Yoda:

Yoda is pretty much, inarguably, the most evil figure ever in the history of any human mythology. I have defied folks to name one time when he says or does anything that is indisputably wise. The trail of destruction that follows him and every decision that he makes is inarguable and overwhelming.

Evil, and not much of a strategist either. Or was he?

I do hope folks will notice, for example, that Yoda, in Attack of the Clones, orders the Jedi into a suicide charge that kills most of them, then conveniently shows up with the new clone army that he ordered. An act of treachery and betrayal so stunning that I had to watch the movie twice. Perhaps that was Lucas’ evil plan.

Brin has written a book, Star Wars on Trial, that examines the good and bad aspects of the saga in court case fashion, where he, unsurprisingly, acts as the prosecuting attorney.

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Need somewhere to stay in Tokyo? Book a stay at the Book hotel…

Friday, 27 November, 2015

Book And Bed hotel

Book And Bed is not so much a bookshop, as it is a library where you stay overnight. With a tariff of about A$40, or US$30, per night for a “compact” room, cost would be no excuse for not partaking of the experience, for at least one night, while visiting Tokyo.

See more photos of the Book And Bed on Instagram.

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Warning, reading this may be detrimental to your health

Tuesday, 10 November, 2015

I would like to read a bit more than I do, but between work, writing, and procrastinating, little time is left in the day for such things.

Maybe this difficultly in reading is not so bad though, thinkers and experts in such matters have had reservations about reading for millennia, fearing those who partook might be doing themselves all sorts of mental and emotional harm. Booksellers it seems were deemed to be especially vulnerable, on account of the volume of reading they surely did:

By the late 18th and early 19th century, science was invoked to legitimise health warnings about reading. In his Medical Inquiries and Observations Upon the Diseases of the Mind (1812) – the first American text on psychiatry – Benjamin Rush, a founding father of the United States, noted that booksellers were peculiarly susceptible to mental derangement. Recasting Seneca’s ancient warnings in the language of psychology, Rush reported that booksellers were prone to mental illness because their profession required the “frequent and rapid transition of the mind from one subject to another”.

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How do bookshops stay in business in the electronic publishing age?

Monday, 21 September, 2015

By rights bookshops should have long since ceased to exist. Swept aside by ebooks, electronic publishing, and online communication, and square into the dustbin of history. Indeed by now these quaint shelf lined emporiums should only be recalled via dwindling references, solely in nostalgic exchanges between older and younger generations, about the way things once were.

But that’s not quite what has happened. Booksellers are still with us. And rather than going into retreat, some are expanding, and opening new shops even. For all their convenience then, why have bookworms refused to wholly embrace the electronic successors of the bound paper volume? So what is it that bookshops are doing today to prosper, and remain in business?

Rather than attempting to extract trade secrets, or delve through annual reports, I asked myself what I could learn from booksellers, simply by looking at the way they appear to be operating, on the basis I was going to open a shop. So consider this more of a thought experiment, and a series of deductions, rather than in-depth or scientific research.

Paperback is the new black

In order to broaden their customer base, booksellers have become more exclusive by making a concerted effort to reach out to a narrower band of consumers. Clearly these are people who favour the paper over the electronic, and see the endangered species that is the paper book, as having a certain desirability. But that’s not the only way booksellers define customers.

Harry Hartog, a name that somehow sounds like it should be familiar, is very much the new kid on the block when it comes to bookshops, having only opened in Canberra last October, and then Bondi Junction, Sydney, last month. But they have no doubt as to who their clientele are, being a “shop for the adventurer, the student of life and the next generation of reader”.

That’s no shop, that’s a boutique

If shopping for books was ever a perfunctory task, and a visit to a bookshop was uninspiring, and something to be dreaded, it certainly isn’t anymore. It’s not as if buyers have to navigate bland rows of overladen shelves bleaching in the cold glow of harsh fluorescent lights. Indeed, a keen eye to aesthetics on the part of booksellers, has transformed book shopping in recent years.

It’s not just about books

Once upon a time a bookshop used to be just that, a bookshop. You may have been able to source items of stationery, and maybe there was a shelf or two bearing accessories of some sort, but that was it. Today booksellers stock just about anything you care to imagine, from chocolate, lamps, posters, ornaments, toys, board games, to DVDs, and more, but why should I go on?

Ariel Booksellers, in Paddington, Sydney is a case in point. Scan through some of the photos of their merchandise and it becomes clear that booksellers are turning to diversification as a means of attracting, and retaining customers. Bookshops don’t have to become one stop shops, but it can’t be too bad for business to offer customers a few extra options.

Engaging customers

Social media, and the likes of Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, are boons for contemporary bookshops. Here are platforms that allow them to quickly and readily connect with their customers, helping them maintain a vital edge. Online channels aren’t the only ways of fostering interaction though, and book launches, and community events, also play a role.

Small is better?

In the bookshop survival stakes, you’d think the bigger operators would have the upper hand, on account of being part of a wider chain, and the benefits that must bestow. Sadly, that’s not always the situation, as shop closures, some years ago, by high profile sellers such as Borders, and Angus and Robertson, illustrates. So if the big shops can’t make it, what hope do others have?

More than you might imagine. Smaller, independent, booksellers, especially owner operated stores, are probably more motivated to focus on their customers, and build up relationships, something that may not always be a priority for the bigger players. Buyers are also more likely to find staff at smaller shops better attuned to their interests, than they might elsewhere.

Electronic purveyors of paper

So far it’s been a case of the electronic supplanting the paper when it comes to books, but Sydney based bookseller Big Ego Books have adopted another tack, they operate as an electronic, or online only, seller of paper books. Hardly groundbreaking, but perhaps their specialty, sourcing “rare and hard-to-find titles”, is. There’s market niche for you.

And there we have it…

Well, a few suggestions at least. I for one am not keen to see the end of bookshops, but it certainly looks like plenty are doing something right, so hopefully they’ll be with us for a long time to come. As to the notion of opening a bookshop, it could hardly be considered a lost cause, even if it might not be easy, but here at least are a few pieces of the puzzle.

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One hundred of the best novels written in English

Wednesday, 2 September, 2015

A list of the one hundred best English language novels ever written, as complied by British writer and editor Robert McCrum. Robinson Crusoe, Frankenstein, Wuthering Heights, The Scarlet Letter, and A Passage to India, are among titles that are included.

I expect some choices will be questioned, but it nonetheless makes for a good starting point, if you’re looking for reading suggestions.

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“Go Set a Watchman”, a first look

Monday, 20 July, 2015

Go Set a Watchman, the much anticipated follow-up to Harper Lee’s iconic 1960 novel To Kill a Mockingbird, was released last week, although some of the first reviews aren’t exactly flattering.

I have no idea when I’ll get to it, since I only read “To Kill a Mockingbird” for first time last year, but if you’re keen for a taste, here is the book’s first chapter, along with some animated illustrations. There’s also a recording of US actor Reese Witherspoon reading the chapter aloud, if you’d rather listen instead.

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A list of books that can be read in less than an hour

Monday, 8 June, 2015

Reading for six minutes can reduce stress by about two-thirds, says some 2009 University of Sussex research, so more reading might therefore be a good thing. But with so much reading material to choose from, and so little time to partake, what to do?

Obtain a bookmark, and read a little each day? That might work, but if it’s a feeling of accomplishment you desire, such as reading a book in a single, less than sixty minute sitting, then these suggestions, that include titles by Annie Proulx, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Stephen King, Edgar Allan Poe, and Elizabeth Kaye, might just fit such a bill.

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The ghostwriting factories of unlimited mystery and imagination

Friday, 5 June, 2015

I was a reader of The Hardy Boys mystery books when I was at middle school, and I probably even took in a couple of Nancy Drew titles as well.

What I didn’t realise though, until just now, is that the stories, the many, numerous, stories, that were first published nearly ninety years ago, were all the products of ghostwriters, who worked what on what appeared to be a well organised production line, churning out title after title:

If writing seems like a lonely profession, try ghostwriting children’s books. “You’re usually in touch with one person, the editor,” says Christopher Lampton, who wrote 11 Hardy Boys books in the 1980s. He sent his books not to a publisher but to a packager called Megabooks – effectively a conduit between the writer and the publisher, Simon & Schuster. When Lampton mailed in drafts, they came back with comments written in several colors. “There were other people, looking at your books, making comments. They’re phantoms,” he says.

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