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The Art of Libromancy: On Selling Books and Reading Books in the Twenty-First Century
Current price:
$18.95
Publication Date: August 22nd, 2023
Publisher:
Biblioasis
ISBN:
9781771965415
Pages:
240
Off the Beaten Path Bookstore
6 on hand, as of Apr 27 5:23am
(Literature)
On Our Shelves Now
Staff Reviews
This one is pretty meta if you work in the bookselling industry, but I thoroughly enjoyed reading it nonetheless. Josh Cook has been a bookseller since 2004, and The Art of Libromancy is more or less an essay collection that distills some of the lessons he’s learned in those years, as well as ways in which the book industry has room to grow. As a bookseller I adored reading this collection and came away with some great ideas for our store, but if you’re interested in learning about the nuts-and-bolts of the book industry, I highly recommend this book. It doesn’t hurt that Cook is also a phenomenal writer and injects plenty of off-color humor into his essays.
—
Megan
Description
ONE OF LIT HUB'S MOST ANTICIPATED BOOKS OF 2023 - ESQUIRE's August 2023 Book Club Pick
"If books are important to you because you're a reader or a writer, then how books are sold should be important to you as well. If it matters to you that your vegetables are organic, your clothes made without child labor, your beer brewed without a culture of misogyny, then it should matter how books are made and sold to you."
With Amazon's growing power in both bookselling and publishing, considering where and how we get our books is more important now than ever. The simple act of putting a book in a reader's hands-what booksellers call handselling--becomes a catalyst for an exploration of the moral, financial, and political pressures all indie bookstores face. From the relationship between bookselling and white supremacy, to censorship and the spread of misinformation, to the consolidation of the publishing industry, veteran bookseller and writer Josh Cook turns a generous yet critical eye to an industry at the heart of American culture, sharing tips and techniques for becoming a better reader and, of course, recommending great books along the way.
