In a Q&A in yesterday's New York Times Magazine, Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos talked about the Kindle ("It won't be too long before we're selling more electronic books than we are physical books") and his initial interest in bookselling ("there's something very unusual about the book category. There are more items in the book category than there are items in any other product category. One of the things it was obvious you could do with an online store is have a much more complete selection.").

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Speaking of Amazon, the Times of London reported yesterday that Amazon U.K. has "launched a secret search for bricks-and-mortar stores to support its rapidly growing website. It is understood to be scouring the country for high-profile sites just as the Borders book chain is shutting up shop.... Amazon wants to cash in on rising customer demand for click and collect services where shoppers buy online and then pick up their goods from a nearby store. Consumers who are fed up with waiting at home for deliveries are increasingly choosing to buy online and collecting goods at a time that suits them.... It is understood that some of the sites will be out of town because of worries over parking."

Later in the day, Amazon denied the report, according to UKPA. An Amazon spokesman said: "We have no plans to open physical stores anywhere in the world." At least one observer noted that this did not necessarily preclude sites to pick up orders.

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Another Nook delay. Barnes & Noble customers won't be able to browse, buy and take home B&N's e-reader at some B&N stores today as planned, according to the Wall Street Journal.

"Based on the high volume of preorders and our commitment to fulfilling those preorders, we've decided to hold off on providing inventory to the stores until after the holidays," B&N spokesperson Mary Ellen Keating told the paper.

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Next December, the Mercer Bookstore, operated by Barnes & Noble, will move to a new mixed-used development on the Mercer University campus, Macon, Ga., the Macon Telegraph reported. The development will feature stores and apartments that appeal to local residents as well as the school community.

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The Monday before Thanksgiving, Anderson's Bookshop, Naperville and Downers Grove, Ill., opened Two Doors East, a specialty gift store that "features gifts, games, wall art, fun food items, an expanded selection of greeting cards and more. The new Two Doors replaces a luggage store on Jefferson that closed within the past 60 days," the Chicago Sun-Times reported.

"We were approached by the landlord of the luggage store since our shop is part of the same building," manager Kris Nugent said. "He wanted the space filled immediately; and so when the opportunity came along, the decision to go for it had to be made quickly. There were no previous plans to expand, and we didn't learn about the space opening until October.

"We've always carried greeting cards and seasonal items, but now we have more space to expand that part of the business," she noted. "This new store gives us about 25% more space." Nugent added that the move will have a positive impact for the bookstore as well. "We'll obviously have more room for books, which will mean the shelves aren't so tightly pressed together, and people will have more room to walk around. We'll also be able to stock more titles on the floor and not need to go downstairs to replenish shelves as often."

A grand opening ceremony for Two Doors East is scheduled for December 10.

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Common Language Bookstore, Ann Arbor, Mich., "has made a life-or-death appeal to the community," co-owner Keith Orr told the AnnArbor.com. Over the weekend, the LGBT bookshop held a Book-a-Palooza sale and fundraiser.

Orr, who estimated that there are as few as 50 LGBT bookstores remaining in the U.S. (see following store about Lambda Rising's imminent closing), said, "Borders and Barnes & Nobles are not our competition. They serve different functions than we do. We have 7,500 books on our shelves and I'd be surprised if they have more than 100-200 (LGBT) books. Our survival is threatened by Amazon....  It's a little more painful because (LGBT) bookstores often serve as a community center."

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Tickets for Sarah Palin's Going Rogue signing last Friday at Legacy Books, Plano, Tex., "were circulating online Thursday night on websites such as Craigslist. But with asking prices as high as $500, many fans of the former Alaska governor were left out in the cold," NBC Dallas-Fort Worth reported.

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Author Jon Scieszka recommended his "Favorite Children's Books for Holiday Gift-Giving" on CBS's Early Show.

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The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review recommended "hiking, field guides [to] help fill a winter's day."

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Precious keys. At auction at Christie's, Cormac McCarthy's longtime Olivetti typewriter, sold for $254,500, way beyond the estimate of $15,000-$20,000, the New York Times reported. As noted here last week (Shelf Awareness, December 1, 2009), McCarthy bought the typewriter in 1963 and estimates that he has written five million words on it. The proceeds for the sale are going to the Santa Fe Institute.

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Book trailer of the Day: 600 Hours of Edward by Craig Lancaster (Riverbend Publishing).

Sad news: Lambda Rising, the gay and lesbian bookstore with locations in Washington, D.C., and Rehoboth Beach, Del., will shut down in early January. The stores have started holiday sales and will hold liquidation sales after Christmas.

In a long statement, Deacon Maccubbin, who owns the store with his husband, Jim Bennett, put the closing in a positive light, saying that when he founded Lambda Rising in 1974, it was virtually impossible to find gay books in general bookstores or libraries. "We thought if we could show that there was a demand for our literature, that bookstores could be profitable selling it, we could encourage the writing and publishing of glbt books, and sooner or later other bookstores would put those books on their own shelves and there would be less need for a specifically gay and lesbian bookstore. Today 35 years later, nearly every general bookstore carries glbt books, often featuring them in special sections."

He added: "But the book market has been changing dramatically, the GLBT community has been making progress by leaps and bounds, and 35 years is enough time for any person to devote to any one thing. It's just time to move on."

The first Lambda Rising stocked 250 books in a 300-sq.-ft. room in a townhouse in Washington. In the beginning, the store was harassed and Maccubbin was unable to advertise in the Washington Post or the Yellow Pages, which would not run ads that used the words "gay" or "lesbian."

Lambda Rising also hosted the first five Gay Pride Days in Washington before giving it to a nonprofit foundation. The event now draws more than 200,000 people a year.

Besides the Rehoboth Beach store, Lambda also opened stores in Baltimore, Md., and Norfolk, Va.; purchased (and later sold) the Oscar Wilde Bookshop in New York City; began the Lambda Book Report; and founded the Lammy Awards, which are now run by the Lambda Literary Foundation.

Jim Bennett commented: "I spent 20 years working in Lambda Rising and it was a marvelous experience. The store has touched the lives of so many people--it was never just a bookstore, but always so much more. Every day I went to work there, I knew I was doing something that made a difference."

Today on CNN's Campbell Brown: Walter Isaacson, author of American Sketches: Great Leaders, Creative Thinkers, and Heroes of a Hurricane (Simon & Schuster, $25.99, 9781439180648/1439180644).

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Today on the Laura Ingraham Show: William J. Bennett, author of The True Saint Nicholas: Why He Matters to Christmas (Howard Books, $16.99, 9781416567462/1416567461). Bennett is also on Hannity tomorrow.

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Today on the Wendy Williams Show: Steven Ward and JoAnn Ward, authors of Crash Course in Love (VH1, $17.99, 9781439177334/1439177333).

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Today on the View: Michael F. Roizen and Mehmet C. Oz, authors of YOU: Having a Baby: The Owner's Manual to a Happy and Healthy Pregnancy (Free Press, $26.99, 9781416572367/1416572368).

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Tonight on the Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien: Howie Mandel, author of Here's the Deal: Don't Touch Me (Bantam, $25, 9780553807868/0553807862).

Also on Tonight: Deepak Chopra, author of Reinventing the Body, Resurrecting the Soul: How to Create a New You (Harmony, $25, 9780307452337/0307452336).

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Tomorrow on Talk of the Nation: Paul Mooney, author of Black Is the New White (Simon Spotlight, $24.99, 9781416587958/1416587950).

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Tomorrow on Oprah, in a repeat: Mackenzie Phillips, author of High on Arrival (Simon Spotlight, $25.99, 9781439153857/143915385X).

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Tomorrow on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart: Mike Huckabee, author of A Simple Christmas: Twelve Stories that Celebrate the True Holiday Spirit (Sentinel HC, $19.95, 9781595230621/1595230629).

 

The film rights to Jonathan Lethem's early novel, Gun, with Occasional Music (Mariner Books, $14, 9780156028974/0156028972), which "has drawn interest from film players for more than a decade," have been optioned by Gabe and Alan Polsky, according to the Hollywood Reporter, which added that the "Polsky brothers also have adaptations of John Williams' Butcher's Crossing and Christopher Buckley's God Is My Broker in development."

 

Continuing our series of gift books for the holidays, today we offer books for logophiles:
 
I'm Not Hanging Noodles on Your Ears and Other Intriguing Idioms from Around the World by Jag Bhalla (National Geographic, $12.95 trade paper, 9781426204586/1426204582, June 2009)

Jag Bhalla loves language and happily wants to share his passion in this charming and erudite book. Clinical trials to support possible therapeutic claims for Noodles are underway, but until results are in, you'll have see for yourself. With themes like colors, love, false friends and animals, Bhalla finds idioms for almost anything you could imagine. Some favorites: the Italians say, "For me this is Arabic" to mean "incomprehensible," but the Germans say, "I only understand train station." Spaniards say, "When snakes wore vests" to mean "very long ago." For a Russian, gossip is called "itchy teeth," for the Japanese, itchy teeth means one feels important. This book will make you smile--or peel your teeth, as they say in Mexico.
 
Obsolete: An Encyclopedia of Once-Common Things Passing Us By by Anna Jane Grossman, illustrated by James Gulliver Hancock (Abrams Image, $15.95, 9780810978492/0810978490, September 2009)
This is a funny and sometimes sad compilation of things we grew up with or, depending on our age, heard about but that are now going the way of the dodo. Grossman pays homage to photo albums, plaster casts, girdles, encyclopedias, checks, coffee cups referred to as "large" and "small" and my personal favorite, short basketball shorts. I don't care if Kobe Bryant thinks they feel like thongs or feels naked wearing them. Bring back the legs.
 
Poisoned Pen: Literary Invective from Amis to Zola, edited by Gary Dexter (Frances Lincoln, $16.95, 9780711229297/0711229295, October 2009)
Writers attacking other writers makes for a quite entertaining book--we seem to have an insatiable appetite for spleen and venom, at least at a distance. Many of the attacks are longer than quotation-length and are thoughtful as well as rancorous, but the short quotations are certainly fun. Cyril Connolly on George Orwell: "He would not blow his nose without moralizing on conditions in the handkerchief industry." Samuel Butler on Thomas Carlyle: "Yes it was very good of God to let Carlyle and Mrs. Carlyle marry one another and so make only two people miserable instead of four." And the book is a steal at $16.95 hardcover and 240 pages.
 
They Said What? Astonishing Quotes on American Democracy, Power and Dissent by Jim Hunt (PoliPoint Press, $12.95, 9780981709161/0981709168, October 2009)
Retired history teacher Hunt has collected some pretty amazing quotations that reveal a piece of our history that is often glossed over or left out. Some current ones, starting with Ann Coulter: "It's too bad Timothy McVeigh didn't go to the New York Times building." Laura Ingraham on Fox News: "Al Sharpton was invited to the White House? I hope they nailed down all the valuables." And in the Orwellian mode, David Frum, White House speechwriter in 2003: "The sooner the fighting begins in Iraq, the nearer we are to its imminent end. Which means, in other words, this 'rush to war' should really be seen as the ultimate 'rush to peace.'"
 
50 Things to Do with a Book (Now That Reading Is Dead) by Bruce McCall (It Books, $16.99, 9780061703669/0061703664, October 2009)
If you get tired of words and reading (but how could you?), here's a little book that will give you some ideas for recycling. How about elevator shoes made with books? Use duct tape and matching copies of The Stand, and you'll tower over your office mates. Or wrap a dirty book in cheap lingerie and throw it through the window of the one who double-crossed you in love. Need something for the hamster cage? "Blenders and books seldom mix, but if your blender has a supersized bowl and heavy-duty blades...." The best idea: build a catapult and load it with "dim-bulb celebrity bios, ghostwritten political memoirs, and stupid cookbooks," then calculate the exact location and distance of the nearest strip mall and aim accordingly.--Marilyn Dahl

Charlie Kochman got to know Will Eisner when they worked together on The Will Eisner Companion (DC Comics, 2004). When Kochman told Eisner that he was moving to Abrams, "Will was thrilled," Kochman said. "That was the best you could do, as an artist, to have a book at Abrams."

Since moving to Abrams in January 2005, Kochman has tried to bring the quality of Abrams's renowned reputation as an art books publisher to the projects he has worked on. He believes, he said, that each book "needs to fit comfortably alongside Matisse and Renoir." Kochman brought that sensibility to Kirby: King of Comics by Mark Evanier (March 2008), who started as Kirby's assistant in 1969 and later become his official biographer; to Al Jaffee's Tall Tales (September 2008), a presentation of the newspaper strip syndicated internationally by the New York Herald Tribune from 1957-1963; as well as to Wacky Packages by the Topps Company, with an introduction by Art Spiegelman (June 2008).

"We were looking at the list and realizing we had these comic books that had a different look than the others," Kochman recalled. That's when Abrams decided to create a separate comics imprint. "ComicArts wasn't something we set out to do, but rather [an answer to the question of] how do we continue to publish these books and give them a proper place in the market and in house? More than dipping our toe in, we were committed to this kind of book."

If Kochman were a physician, you might say he did his internship and residency at DC Comics, where he spent 12 years. "We [would] take the DC characters and try to sell them beyond the regular comic book buyers," he commented. "Every time I edited a comic book, [I edited it as] if I knew nothing about comics. Everything I needed to know was contained in this book." He cites as an example Spy vs. Spy: The Complete Case Book by Antonio Prohias (published in partnership with Watson-Guptill, 2001), for which he included essays, one by a Cuban reporter about what Prohias's influence was on the political scene in Cuba (Prohias fled that country in 1960) and another about Peter Kuper, who took over the strip from Prohias, among others.

Because the author of Maus cut his teeth writing copy for the Topps's Wacky Packages, "For Wacky Packages, it was essential to have the introduction by Art Spiegelman which gives you a context," he said. The wax jacket mimics that experience for readers, and, under the wrapper, there's a photograph of the gum "because that's what you expected when you opened it," Kochman continued. "I'm probably the least capricious editor because I spend a lot of time with that material to find the right way to present it."

The Art of Harvey Kurtzman: The Mad Genius of Comics by Denis Kitchen and Paul Buhle with an introduction by Harry Shearer was released in July from the Abrams ComicArts imprint and, along with Kirby, Kochman sees Kurtzman as part of the "triumvirate of seminal comics artists." Kochman is still searching for the right author to work on a book about Will Eisner, the third in the triumvirate.  

At ComicArts, Kochman also is presenting contemporary influential artists, a prime example being The Art of Jaime Hernandez: The Secrets of Life and Death by Todd Hignite, designed by Jordan Crane, coming in spring 2010. "Like any art book company, [Abrams was] doing books on [past] masters and contemporary masters." He offers the example of Avedon. "We were his publisher because we publish great photography and here was a great contemporary photographer," Kochman said. "The model for ComicArts should reflect that. Someone like Jaime is one of the great artists who ever worked in comics; he's beloved and respected, and deserves to sit next to Kirby and Eisner. It's commercial but also smart and hits a different demographic. He doesn't appeal just to comic book fans. The longevity for this material lies in the real world."

Kochman differentiates Hernandez's work, for instance, from that of Brian Fies. "As much as I love Brian Fies, he's not ready for a book about his art; he hasn't been around long enough. Jaime has been." Kochman also uses Dread & Superficiality: Woody Allen as Comic Strip by Stuart Hample and R. Buckminster Fuller, which was released this month, as an example of "what Abrams does that other publishers don't." The book's contents are shot from the original strips so that it looks "exactly as it would on a museum wall," Kochman explains. "Other [publishers] would shoot [the strips] as line art, so you wouldn't see the white-outs, etc. You can look at an aspect of Woody Allen's career that a lot of people don't know about." The strip was syndicated widely during the height of the comedian-filmmaker's career, from 1976-1984, the period when he was working on Annie Hall through Broadway Danny Rose. "When you see that material, you respond to it as a Woody Allen fan or even if you're not. [Allen] approved everything from cover to design to title. It had to reflect the sensibility of the rest of his work."

The Toon Treasury of Classic Children's Comics edited by Françoise Mouly and Art Spiegelman (September 2009) is another such example, presenting children's comics from the Golden Age through the 1960s. "In the same way that RAW [co-edited by Mouly and Spiegelman] said, 'These are the great artists of underground comics,' they're doing that now with children's comics," Kochman explained. "These are the masters--Walt Kelly, POGO; also the great animal comics that no one has every fully acknowledged, like Carl Barks, Jules Feiffer. They're meant to be read by kids, not collectors. It's not vintage, but classic."

Another big fall book is Manga Kamishibai: The Art of Japanese Paper Theater by Eric Nash (September 2009), a writer for the New York Times. "It's the antecedent to manga, when stories were told orally," Kochman explained. "The kamishibai man had single panels that he put on a proscenium [mounted] on a bicycle. There were monster stories, covering [World War II] from the [Japanese] point of view, the atomic bomb, the way Americans were from their reality. It's never been reprinted in this country." Kochman would like to see Abrams do for manga with this book what Graffiti World by Nicholas Ganz edited by Tristan Mancodid (Abrams, 2004) did for graffiti artists.

While two of the early books Kochman published, Mom's Cancer by Brian Fies and The Diary of a Wimpy Kid, started as Web comics, "we are still in the early days of Web comics," he said. "But I think, in the same way that for comic strip artists or comic book artists, it wasn't enough to be widely read in the newspapers, you always wanted the collected hardcover or paperback edition." Kochman continued, "For George Herriman and Krazy Kat, there were always collected books. No one dreamed there'd be these vintage editions. You felt the newspaper was disposable, and at the end of the day they were gone, other than the ones you clipped for the refrigerator." Kochman said that Wimpy Kid to this day still exists completely online, and that hasn't affected the sale of the books. "With kids, you have a prescribed amount of time in front of the computer. In cars, in restaurants, a book is still the way to enjoy it." But Kochman also believes that's true for a book like A.D.: New Orleans After the Deluge by Josh Neufeld (Pantheon, August 2009) about Hurricane Katrina. "It was a great Web comic and utilized the web in a wonderful way," Kochman said. "If you're interested in reading about Katrina and what Josh did, I don't know if people will spend a half hour online as easily as they will lingering over a book. Having the book will always be the gold standard you strive for."--Jennifer M. Brown