Miami Book Fair International: A Week of All Things Literary

From November 13^th through the 20^th the city of Miami will be playing host to its annual Book Fair, which features over 350 authors and activities such as:

• Ibero-American Authors Program: a full program in Spanish
• Children’s Alley: fun, interactive activities for young readers
• Student Literary Encounters: sessions with students, on campus and outreach locations
• Antiquarian Annex: a rare books showcase.

 

Each evening will feature selected readings and discussions with authors from around the world. Also more than 250 publishers and book sellers will be in attendance with a plethora of books. So if your like me, and have a ongoing list of books to read you'll be sure to find those and so much more.  

For more information about the fair look here, and if you'd like to watch footage from the 2010 fair take a look here. So if you live close, or can take the time I'd say a jaunt to Miami will be the perfect trip for November.

Website of the Week: Calibre

So you have your Kindle, or your Nook, or your Sony Reader. Or all of them. And you also have a passel of ebooks in different formats. How to organize everything into a cogent library? Enter Calibre, an ebook Manager. It downloads metadata on your books, allows you to store books on your computer and browse them, and can even change the format of the ebook. Want to change Kindle to ePub? Nook to Sony Reader. Even the iPad. Done with a click. You can check out more features on the 16 minute demo on the home page or read this independent review at LifeHacker.

I like this because it puts the control ebooks back into the hands of the reader, not Amazon, Google, or anyone else. Calibre will also pull reading content from the web, perhaps opening the door to small publishers and magazines down the line to easy distribution. That sounds good to us.

Banned Books Week

Next week is Banned Books Week. I am trying to take more notice of this “holiday” this year. It’s perfectly fine to wear your pins with Huck Finn on them and give another pin wearer a “Rock on” and a nod (or maybe a high-five) during the day as this week goes on. But as writers, we should never forget that when people talk about banned books, they are talking about banning us. That is, they are preventing writers from writing and readers from reading, though in some cases they haven't even read the book they are banning.

Writers are often among first ones imprisoned in a repressive regime. You can take a look at Pen American Center’s list of authors that have been imprisoned or tortured for their work here. Also PEN lists five things you can do to protect freedom of expression abroad and at home. Free speech is only as strong as those who will defend it. Get involved, so that in the United States the right to write, publish, and read what you want remains for you and your readers. We’re always saying it’s all about the work, right? So let’s protect it.

You can check out more of the American Library Association’s excellent Banned Books Weeks site at the link above. One of my favorites is this page of 100 banned classics. You can also check out the American Booksellers for Free Expression. And you can’t forget the ACLU. They have their own top 100, a list of the books most frequently challenged in the last 15 years. Still think we’re not in trouble? Don’t blame me when they come for your copy of Song of Solomon.

A Guide to Independent Bookstores

Marc Fitten is turning his book tour for his new book Valeria’s Last Stand, into an Indie extravaganza. Fitten is visiting 100 independent bookstores while on tour and then posting reviews of each store on his blog. So far he has worked his way through 25 of them, covering a large portion of New England and the South.

Some of the review language is chatty and slight (it’s good to know that Amherst Books ‘smells nice’ but that not really how I pick my bookstores), but it is a representation of some great independents gathered in one place. Good luck and godspeed, Marc, I’m a little envious of all the great stores you’re going to.

The Best Bookstore in Phoenix

I can’t keep the secret anymore.

Usually I hold the information about where I buy my books very close. You won’t be able to pry from me the locations of my favorite thrift stores or second-hand sales. They are sources that I guard like Woodward guarded Deep Throat.

But finally the guilt has become too much, and I want to shed my miserly ways. So I’m going to make up for it by giving away my crown jewel; I’m going to tell you what I believe is the best used bookstore in Phoenix, AZ. Now listen to me carefully, because you may not believe it at first: The best used bookstore in the Valley of the Sun is in the Arizona State University Textbook store on the Tempe Campus.

Go inside those big glass doors. Ignore the foam fingers, ballcaps, and mascot shot glasses. Go to your right. On the wall you will see six book bays (with three facing shelf units) with signs quietly announcing the the used book section. You won't need any help finding the good stuff. Good stuff like: T.C. Boyle’s Stories (for $8.95!), Echo Maker by Richard Powers ($7.95), Richard Ford’s short story collection Multitude of Sin ($6.95), which is also the price of Alice Munro’s View From Castle Rock. Now I know you’re thinking those prices are pretty typical for used quality paperbacks, but each of the above quotes refers to a good quality hardback copy that has been lovingly wrapped in Brodart. The paperback prices are so cheap I’m not even going to mention them for fear I won’t see any the next time I go.

Long-time resident bibiophiles might recognize here the handiwork of Scott Krause, the former proprietor of Reid’s, a small bookstore on Apache Blvd in Tempe that from ’96-’99 carried more bang per board foot than anywhere else. It was a sad thing when Reid's closed, and to see Scott’s discerning eye at work again quickens a book lover’s heart.

Though he still refers to it as a ‘side-project’, the title depth is awesome, the books are cheaper than cheap, and (and this is the real Scott Krause hallmark) their condition is excellent. If you want a copy to own, a copy to sit on your shelves and be enjoyed multiple times, this is the place to find it. The section relies on its own merits to produce sales, with no one hand selling the tomes. But Krause sees that as an advantage. “People should be rewarded for browsing,” he says. I couldn’t agree more.

So stop by. Now is the perfect time since most of the student body is away and the shelves are heavy with literary fruit waiting to be picked. Everything but that $7.95 hardback copy of Ann Beattie’s Park City. That’s one thing I’m not sharing.

The ASU bookstore (which is independent and not part of a textbook chain) is at the ASU Tempe Campus on Orange Mall between the Computing Commons and Physical Education building. Parking is free along Apache Boulevard. For an interactive map of the campus, click here.

The Independent Choice

The American Bookseller’s Association announced its Indie Choice Book Awards last week. The Award’s categories are not typical, including "Best Indie Buzz Book (Fiction)," "Best Conversation Starter (Nonfiction)" and "Best Author Discovery." I talked to Meg Smith, the Chief Marketing Officer from the American Booksellers Association about how they were chosen. They are geared, Smith said, to try to duplicate on a national level what independent booksellers do every day in the store for customers, giving common sense reviews about things they have read and liked. The awards match the format of IndieBound, ABA's new incarnation of its Booksense program. Smith stated that they wanted to retool the old program to match the growth of Buy Local and community-based consumer movements, many of which had independent bookstores as members.

If you are tired of having the New York Times (or a chain store's payola-funded front tables) dictate to you what is good, check out the buzz on these awards and the whole IndieBound program.

A Bookstore Autopsy

In a time when there is bad news and then more bad news for booksellers (today, Barnes & Noble announced downsizing at its corporate headquarters in New York, eliminating 100 jobs, 4% of its workforce there), it is hard to feel hopeful about the publishing industry, or certain about the future of your favorite independent bookstore. This post might not leave you with a warm, fuzzy feeling (except in its exhortation that you keep shopping locally!), but an article from BusinessWeek might help by providing some analysis. "Autopsy of an Indie Bookseller" explores what happened to Cody's Books, the Berkely-based institution that shut down this past June after 52 years of as a hub for literary and political culture.

See also this slideshow, which shows the rise and fall of Cody's through pictures.