The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop
by Lewis Buzbee
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Publisher: Graywolf Press
Salesrank: 210162
Released: 2006-05-30List Price: $17.00
Our Price: $8.99
Used Price: $7.45
Media: Book
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Charming (2008-03-22)
Although the act of reading can be considered a solitary act, Buzbee describes how the book lovers among us share an unspoken bond in our book ventures. From the excitement of receiving a new Scholastic booklist to the feeling of browsing through unexplored novels in a bookshop, Buzbee has captured the essence of what it is like to be in love with books. Unlike many other nonfiction books, the interesting historical tidbits were just that, interesting.Books and Bookshops (2008-03-21)
Lewis Buzbee’s celebration of the bookstore springs from his observation that 90 percent of people who buy books still leave home to do their shopping in a bookstore. These are the people who know they could more easily buy the book they are searching for by clicking their mouse around Amazon’s website, but they cannot resist the lure of a real bookstore. There is just something special about being surrounded by books and other people who, to one degree or another, feel the same as we about books. As Buzbee says, even if we do not actually speak to other shoppers, they are part of the experience of shopping for books and they can often accidentally lead us to a book we would have otherwise missed.
The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop is a combination memoir and book/bookstore history. Along the way, Buzbee explains the evolution of the book from rare hand-copied pages affordable only to the wealthy upper class to mass produced paperbacks that sometimes sell in the millions of copies. He does the same for the bookseller, a calling that for many feels like a vocation they were destined for from birth. Buzbee’s has been a life centered around his love for books, and the memories he shares of his days working in bookstores and as a publisher’s sales rep are the heart of The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop.
Not surprisingly, Buzbee’s focus is on independent bookstores rather than on the big chains which, along with Amazon, dominate the bookselling business today and he emphasizes just how difficult a business it can be for bookstores, authors and publishers alike. Avid readers often moan about the cost of new books but Buzbee provides the numbers that explain where the money goes: bookstores can receive as much as a 45 percent markdown on the cover price, the publisher gets about 35 percent of the price, the printer about 12 percent, and the author maybe 8 percent. That means that each hardcover sold puts about $2 in the author’s pockets, an amount that he or she probably shares with an agent. Keeping in mind that most books are published in numbers of less than 10,000 copies, it is easy to see that few authors will become millionaires from the proceeds of their books. And though it might appear that the bookstore’s cut is an inappropriately high percentage of the money generated, Buzbee points out that an independent bookstore with gross sales between one and two million dollars will be lucky to net more than $100,000 for the year. Bookselling is not a high margin business for anyone involved.
The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop is filled with stories and thoughts that will intrigue and delight book lovers, those readers who are always drawn to books about books. We are an optimistic lot when it comes to the future of books and bookstores although we do tend to get a little nervous when we read of the closings of so many independent bookstores and the supposed pending death of the publishing industry as we know it today. Buzbee has heard all the “gloom and doom” talk and he closes his book with this reminder: “It is important to remember that the death of literature, of a literary culture, is not an idea that we twenty-first centurions invented. In the nineteenth century, the invention of the bicycle was believed to mark the end of civilization; we would become leisure addicts and reading would surely cease. The same was said of radio in the 1920s and of television in the 1950s. And at later dates, rock-and-roll, premarital sex, and the jet ski would be cited as literary destroyers. Let’s not forget that critics also wailed and gnashed their teeth when parchment replaced papyrus, and when Gutenberg printed his first Bible.”
Buzbee’s writing style is a little dry at times but his little book has a lot to offer to the booklovers amongst us.
A ‘must have’ book for ALL bibliophiles! (2008-03-20)
I really enjoyed reading this book from start to finish. It’s small and manageable; not too long, not too short. Although described as a memoir, it’s not all about the author but contains snippets of information and history that all booklovers will devour. It’s quite nicely bound and is lightweight enough to carry around. All-in-all if you’re a true bibliophile, then this book is for YOU.
Lewis Buzbee tells his story as a partial memoir; the history of his interest, and then love, of books is described in some detail. He writes about his career as a bookseller (although always as an employee - he never ran his own shop) and as a publishers rep, and he writes about his love of visiting bookshops of all shapes and sizes. In-between this narrative is neatly woven a basic potted history of bookselling, from ancient times, through the Gutenberg press, and on into the production of mass market paperbacks. I was particularly fascinated to read about the scandal surrounding the publication of James Joyce’s ‘Ulysses’, and how the publishing of the book was taken on by one of Joyce’s friends, the proprietor of the little but exclusive Shakespeare & Co. bookshop in Paris. Copies of the book then had to find their way into England and America where it had already been censored. A fascinating account.
I have a couple of very small quibbles about Buzbee’s style. At one point early on he mentions shop-lifting a book as a teenager; he narrates this in such a way that it sounds as though this is considered acceptable practice, or at the very least is an activity which lots of people have done and can understand. This did shock me a bit and marred my enjoyment slightly. In a couple of places he does also go over a point he’s already mentioned which is a little repetitive. However, tiny quibbles aside, I found this book a delightful journey from cover to cover and will be cherishing my copy for some years to come.A confused book (2007-12-18)
This book could have easily been made into two books. One, a history of bookmaking, the other his own experiences in the book world. Unfortunately the combination doesn’t make for a great book. It just feels muddled. Also, from the intermittent descriptions of his travels in the book world it’s just not that exciting. He doesn’t describe the unusual “characters” he meets and certainly there must be some.
This isn’t to say the book isn’t worthwhile. It certainly is if only for the history of bookmaking.
I far prefer “The Adventures of a Treasure Hunter: A Rare Bookman in Search of American History”. While it may not be up to date it is a far more exciting read.For the love of books (2007-11-04)
I love reading books. I love looking at books. I love smelling books. I love learning about people. I love helping people find a book that will grab them. I love getting book recommendations. Therefore, I love working at a book store. This book is a story of a man’s love of all of the above and how he had originally thought he’d go into the business world but while in college he got a part time job at a local independent and never left the industry. It is about the lifelong relationships he built while working at the book stores he worked at and how learning and discovering new things were as important to him as they are to me. This is probably my most favorite book in the world because I can relate to it so very much. It made me laugh in parts and cry in others, I didn’t want it to end and that is why I have a stack of books about books on my floor by my bed. I’m looking for the next great book that will bring me back to that yellow lighted bookshop.
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