After reading these articles on independent bookstores closing their doors, I’m wondering if small towns are not the best place for small box booksellers.
Via Books, Inq., New York City’s Coliseum Books is closing: Competition is killing independent U.S. bookstores. The owner says, “Chain-store sales and the Internet are far more practical. People will go to places closer to them. Places like Barnes & Noble.”
Can you blame anyone for doing that?
Also in New York City, the landlord raised the rent on Murder Ink, “the oldest mystery-themed bookstore in the world,” and has forced it out. The owner, Jay Pearsall, says, “I was a little outraged that a well-run bookstore couldn’t make it in the best book-buying neighborhood in the world, but there’s no business model that can work.”
I wonder what the blogosphere’s role in small business America is. Do we generally support or undermine high-service, select-quantity booksellers? I know of two new independent bookstores in my area, both downtown though in different towns. Are they fools waiting for a pit to fall into?

Here’s an article on buying intellectual books for home decorating, giving visitors the impression that the buyer has a formidible mind or at least keeps very good literary company. This reminds me of a story, which I believe Ravi Zacharias tells, of browsing a used bookstore and overhearing a man in overalls ask for a certain length of books, say 35 feet. He didn’t know what books to order. He just wanted to fill a 35′ long shelf so that his union boss would appear to have the intellect to negotiate with management.

The English Bibles blog lists the top selling Bibles sold by Christian retailers. Here’s part of that list.

1. New International Version

2. New King James Version

3. King James Version

4. New Living Translation

5. English Standard Version

6. Reina Valera 1960 (Spanish)

The Literary Saloon links to a list of “most overrated and underrated” books in Prospect, which claims to be “the most intelligent magazine of current affairs and cultural debate in Britain.” Of course, the Saloon notes a few of its own.

On the overrated list, Everyman, by Philip Roth. “A slickly written, shallow and predictable novel of American self-regard and deserved decline.” and The God Delusion. Playwright Samantha Ellis nominates On Beauty,by Zadie Smith, saying it is “massively overrated. Why read a tribute to Forster when you can just read him?”

On the underrated list, Why Truth Matters, by Ophelia Benson & Jeremy Stangroom, Alentejo Blue, by Monica Ali, and The Human Touch, by Michael Frayn. Writer Allan Massie states, “William McIlvanney is the finest Scottish novelist of my generation, but Weekend, his first novel for ten years, received less attention than it deserved. This account of a university study-group meeting at a faux-baronial castle on a Scottish island, is wise, funny and often moving.”

Here’s a shout out to Read and Relax bookseller in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, for supplying me with a new copy of Wolf Time when Amazon.com could not.

Also, kudos go to Sea Shell Books of Clearwater, Florida for another copy of the same book and a few others. Sea Shell has under 400,000 titles for sale through Alibris.com, if not other used book networks.

World’s blog points out some bestsellers, and I note that The Accidental, by Ali Smith is on the list. Writing for the Alibris.com blog, Jeff asks if this book is a classic in the vein of Tony Morrison’s Beloved.

I’m with Bill Peschel on this one. Abebooks.com should rethink, perhaps retool, and refocus (via Frank Wilson).

In case you are unaware, here’s a simple plug for a good little bookstore.

This one by Ken Sande is a book I need to chew on a while.

You can begin voting for The Quill Book Awards now on MSNBC. I hope to compose a thoughtful post to tell you how you should vote, or at least how I voted, later this week. With twenty categories, I may have to write a few posts.

How many copies does the average American book sell? Everything is on the table, so don’t think of fiction only (which is probably why the number is so low). Common Grounds has some statistics.