AbeBooks' Reading Copy

I recently took a trip to Atlanta, and was lucky enough to stumble across word of Gladys Knight’s Chicken and Waffles restaurant. We went, we ate (fried chicken! waffles! macaroni and cheese! collard greens! etc.) and it was glorious. One of my true disappointments in life thus far is that we were too full to [...]

The publishing sensation that just won’t quit… still hasn’t. E.L. James’ naughty, erotic Fifty Shades Trilogy still shows little signs of slowing. Rumors abound about who’s playing Christian Grey and Anastasia Steele in the movie version. Police sketch composite technology is used to generate a picture of Christian Grey. Otherwise respectable women in their thirties [...]

And in a strange, boomerang twist of cross-marketing, the Self-helpers behind the Chicken Soup for the Soul series of books are now trying their hands at….soup! But not soul soup. Not emotional soup. Not soup that’s actually just nice words to inspire you and make you feel spiritual. Just actual soup. “Launching the line will [...]

This ir our first “Ask AbeBooks” video, in which we recommend unusual cookbooks to Marjorie, who wrote to us from Wichita asking for gift suggestions. Enjoy. And if you’d like, you can read about even more weird cookbooks.

An interesting find on the site today, especially for any lover or collector of Coca-Cola and collectible Coca-Cola memorabilia: it’s a Government and State Officials’ Report on Coca-Cola from 1907. From the description accompanying he 11-page report: “By 1902, practically all of the cocaine had had been removed from Coca-Cola, notwithstanding the continued use of [...]

I liked this post about various authors and the way they like to eat. Papa Ernest Hemingway’s description of pan-frying a trout the right way made my stomach rumble: “The proper way is to cook over coals. Have several cans of Crisco or Cotosuet or one of the vegetable shortenings along that are as good [...]

We usually try to keep the content between our AbeBooks UK blog and this blog different, but this entry was just too good not to steal. I’m sorry to come back to Fifty Shades of Grey once again but frankly there is a story a day at the moment. Richard’s Cakes (their tagline is ‘Quality [...]

Take the greatest food writing from the past 400 years and apply some modern design magic. Penguin’s Great Food Series is simply sumptuous and a true feast for the eyes. True to form, Penguin has taken already-wonderful books and upped their appeal enormously with a series of fantastic covers that would make any shelf proud. [...]

An illuminated manuscript is any manuscript whose text is accompanied by decoration. It originally referred only to silver or gilt adornments, but came to be acceptable terminology for any manuscript with drawings, paintings or decorations such as ornate initials, borders, floral accoutrements and the like. Often the illuminations would depict a historical or rural/pastoral scene. [...]

We’ve explored the weird, weird world of A.J. Jacobs before. He decided to read the entire Encyclopedia Britannica in The Know-It-All: One Man’s Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World, decided to spend a year living as faithfully to the bible as he could in The Year of Living Biblically: One Man’s [...]