AbeBooks' Reading Copy

Washington Post looks at what they call the great “might have-beens” 1. The Man Without Qualities, by Robert Musil. The man of the title may not have qualities, but this novel certainly does, among them the brilliance of its depiction of Austria in its last years as an imperial power. The novel’s omniscient narrator refers [...]

While other folks were reading McCarthy, Roth, or Rushdie over the weekend, I read a book called Stuff White People Like by Christian Lander. It’s another blog that became a book. As a middle class 40-year-old white person, I found Stuff White People Like very enjoyable. It has 150 mini-chapters (or blog postings if you [...]

Wisconsin police are cracking down hard on people who don’t return their library books. Question – of all the books to not return, why hang on to two Dan Brown books?

The internet is at fault for the tsunami of obtusely long book titles that are washing onto our literary shores. The premise is that publishers wish to optimize their book titles for search engine results and so they are jamming as many key words into a title as they can, which means lots of colons [...]

To celebrate 10 years of Harry Potter, Scholastic is going to open the doors of its NYC headquarters on September 23rd for a 10-hour reading marathon where fans will be able to participate in a collective reading – while taking turns sitting in the throne Rowling used during past Harry Potter events at Radio City [...]

A few weeks ago I wrote a feature about the role of gas stations in literature. A rather notable omission has just been pointed out to me by Peter from the UK, who wrote…. “I enjoyed this piece but you omitted a classic of the genre: Ed Ruscha’s 1962 book of photographs, Twenty-Six Gasoline Stations. [...]

Authors hate it when they have to sit and sign 3000 books in a row, but they also hate it more when no one shows up. The Independent looks at the pros and cons of the book signing. From those who are incredibly successful… There’s a shocking story about Stephen King signing books in a [...]

The Guardian has a great story from the UK about Jacqueline Wilson’s children’s book, My Sister Jodie. Three parents have complained about use of a particular word – let’s say the word is being replaced with the word ‘twit and only a single letter has been changed. The book is aimed at 10 years old [...]

Most students are gearing up to head back to class in two weeks which means it’s a busy time here at AbeBooks HQ. This week is when the largest number of students will go online and search for the textbooks they need for the coming year. AbeBooks recieves upwards of 90 searches per second from [...]

Keeping with signed books, it’s no wonder publishers are trying to hire shmucks off craigslist to sign books for their authors… after reading David Sedaris’ and his take on signings I’m starting to understand the appeal… I mean standing in line for autographs is bad enough; actually signing them has to be worse. This whole [...]