The Last Bookstore in America

The Last Bookstore in America
Author: Amy Stewart
Publisher: Amy Stewart
Total Pages: 243
Release: 2011
Genre: Bookstores
ISBN:

Bestselling author and bookstore owner Amy Stewart takes an offbeat and lighthearted look at the future of the book.After the ebook renders bookstores obsolete, a young couple finds themselves in the unlikely position of owning one of the last bookstores in America. But if it isn't keeping itself afloat selling books, what is it selling? A hilarious glimpse at a future that is almost here.Nothing is what it seems in the offbeat and out-of-the-way town of Eureka, California. Shrouded in fog and hidden behind a curtain of redwoods, this rundown mill town is home to a peculiar cast of characters, a unique homegrown horticultural industry, and one of the last bookstores in America.No one is more surprised by the unlikely survival of the Firebreathing Dragon than Lewis Hartman, its newest owner. By the time his uncle Sy died and left the bookstore to Lewis, even the most ardent bibliophiles had abandoned printed books in favor of a charming and highly literate digital device called the Gizmo. Bookstores all over the country had closed their doors. But somehow, the Firebreathing Dragon has kept going.So how has the Firebreathing Dragon managed to survive the death of the book? And if it isn't keeping itself afloat selling books, what is it selling? Reporters, federal agents, and corporate executives out to salvage their own imperiled industries all converge on the bookstore to uncover its secrets. What they discover is a small town that has fallen under the spell of the Firebreathing Dragon's unique offerings.In her first work of fiction, Amy Stewart explores the strange dynamics of small-town life and the future of that marvelous two thousand year-old communication device, the printed book.

In Search of Nice Americans

In Search of Nice Americans
Author: Geoff Steward
Publisher: Biteback Publishing
Total Pages: 265
Release: 2017-08-15
Genre: Travel
ISBN: 1785903063

How one man's mid-career crisis turned into an odyssey into the weirder side of American life. Like most of us, Geoff Steward was rocked by 2016's litany of horrors. Unlike most of us, Geoff did something about it. Turning his back on his day job as a lawyer - and the requirement to account for every six minutes of his time - Geoff set off across America in hot pursuit of bears, honky-tonk bars and, above all, nice Americans to restore his faith in the world. Armed only with his blend of waspish wit and mischievous charm, Geoff roamed from New York to Alaska, meeting ordinary Americans such as Joe le Taxi, the former NYPD police officer who was one of the first on the scene at the Twin Towers; Pam and Bob, a paranoid psychiatrist and a failed actor who once saw the back of Meryl Streep's head; and Sheriff Duke of Calhoun County, who reintroduced Geoff to the long (and armed) arm of the law. For anyone at a crossroads, contemplating a temporary or permanent career break, this hilarious travel romp offers a new hope.

The Last Stand of Mr America

The Last Stand of Mr America
Author: Jason Flores-Williams
Publisher: Nobody Rocks Press
Total Pages: 209
Release: 2009-03-23
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0981964702

American Amnesia

American Amnesia
Author: Helen E. Krieble
Publisher: Encounter Books
Total Pages: 116
Release: 2022-12-27
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1641772816

People are who they are because of what they have been through, where they came from, who they learned from, and all the things that have happened to them. The same is true not just for individuals, but also for families, communities, and nations. America, too, has its own unique character, also formed by its memories, history, things it has been through, and what it has learned. If people, communities, or even nations lose their memory, they lose their character. That is why cultures throughout the world work at maintaining their identity and passing traditions along to future generations. But what if a nation purposely decides it no longer wants to remember its history? What if a country imposes amnesia on itself? Helen Krieble argues persuasively that this is precisely what has happened to America. It has lost the memory of its own founding principles, and the sacrifices made over the past 250 years to preserve them. The nation is losing its character. She writes that America cannot be preserved as “the last best hope of Earth” if its own people no longer understand why that is true and are no longer willing to do what it takes to preserve it. “The duties of citizenship are vitally important,” Krieble writes, “but they are not complicated. It is our duty, as the owners, to defend our freedom against all threats, and to pass it along to future generations undiminished.” Americans are failing in that duty, but Krieble says there is still time to cure our national amnesia. It begins with rebuilding our understanding of, and commitment to, those founding principles, regaining our national memory.

A History of the Book in America

A History of the Book in America
Author: David Paul Nord
Publisher: UNC Press Books
Total Pages: 637
Release: 2015-12-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 1469625830

The fifth volume of A History of the Book in America addresses the economic, social, and cultural shifts affecting print culture from World War II to the present. During this period factors such as the expansion of government, the growth of higher education, the climate of the Cold War, globalization, and the development of multimedia and digital technologies influenced the patterns of consolidation and diversification established earlier. The thirty-three contributors to the volume explore the evolution of the publishing industry and the business of bookselling. The histories of government publishing, law and policy, the periodical press, literary criticism, and reading--in settings such as schools, libraries, book clubs, self-help programs, and collectors' societies--receive imaginative scrutiny as well. The Enduring Book demonstrates that the corporate consolidations of the last half-century have left space for the independent publisher, that multiplicity continues to define American print culture, and that even in the digital age, the book endures. Contributors: David Abrahamson, Northwestern University James L. Baughman, University of Wisconsin-Madison Kenneth Cmiel (d. 2006) James Danky, University of Wisconsin-Madison Robert DeMaria Jr., Vassar College Donald A. Downs, University of Wisconsin-Madison Robert W. Frase (d. 2003) Paul C. Gutjahr, Indiana University David D. Hall, Harvard Divinity School John B. Hench, American Antiquarian Society Patrick Henry, New York City College of Technology Dan Lacy (d. 2001) Marshall Leaffer, Indiana University Bruce Lewenstein, Cornell University Elizabeth Long, Rice University Beth Luey, Arizona State University Tom McCarthy, Beirut, Lebanon Laura J. Miller, Brandeis University Priscilla Coit Murphy, Chapel Hill, N.C. David Paul Nord, Indiana University Carol Polsgrove, Indiana University David Reinking, Clemson University Jane Rhodes, Macalester College John V. Richardson Jr., University of California, Los Angeles Joan Shelley Rubin, University of Rochester Michael Schudson, University of California, San Diego, and Columbia University Linda Scott, University of Oxford Dan Simon, Seven Stories Press Ilan Stavans, Amherst College Harvey M. Teres, Syracuse University John B. Thompson, University of Cambridge Trysh Travis, University of Florida Jonathan Zimmerman, New York University

A History of the Book in America

A History of the Book in America
Author: Hugh Amory
Publisher: Univ of North Carolina Press
Total Pages: 665
Release: 2009-09-15
Genre: History
ISBN: 0807868000

The Colonial Book in the Atlantic World carries the interrelated stories of publishing, writing, and reading from the beginning of the colonial period in America up to 1790. Three major themes run through the volume: the persisting connections between the book trade in the Old World and the New, evidenced in modes of intellectual and cultural exchange and the dominance of imported, chiefly English books; the gradual emergence of a competitive book trade in which newspapers were the largest form of production; and the institution of a "culture of the Word," organized around an essentially theological understanding of print, authorship, and reading, complemented by other frameworks of meaning that included the culture of republicanism. The Colonial Book in the Atlantic World also traces the histories of literary and learned culture, censorship and "freedom of the press," and literacy and orality. Contributors: Hugh Amory Ross W. Beales, The College of the Holy Cross John Bidwell, Princeton University Library Richard D. Brown, University of Connecticut Charles E. Clark, University of New Hampshire James N. Green, Library Company of Philadelphia David D. Hall, Harvard Divinity School Russell L. Martin, Southern Methodist University E. Jennifer Monaghan, Brooklyn College of The City University of New York James Raven, University of Essex Elizabeth Carroll Reilly, Hardwick, Massachusetts A. Gregg Roeber, Pennsylvania State University David S. Shields, University of South Carolina Calhoun Winton, University of Maryland

A History of Small Business in America

A History of Small Business in America
Author: Mansel G. Blackford
Publisher: UNC Press Books
Total Pages: 238
Release: 2003
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780807854532

From the colonial era to the present day, small businesses have been an integral part of American life. First published in 1991 and now thoroughly updated, this study explores the central but ever-changing role played by small enterprises in the nation's economic, political and cultural development.

A History of the Book in America: Volume 1, The Colonial Book in the Atlantic World

A History of the Book in America: Volume 1, The Colonial Book in the Atlantic World
Author: Hugh Amory
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 676
Release: 2000
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9780521482561

Volume 1 of A History of the Book in America, The Colonial Book in the Atlantic World, encompasses the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. It is organized around three major themes: the persisting colonial relationship between European settlements and the Old World; the gradual emergence of a pluralistic book trade that differentiated printers from booksellers; and the transition from a 'culture of the Word', organized around an understanding of print as a vehicle of the sacred, to the culture of republicanism, epitomized by Benjamin Franklin, and culminating in the uses of print during the Revolutionary era. The volume will also describe nascent forms of literary and learned culture (including the circulation of manuscripts), literacy and censorship, orality, and the efforts by Europeans to introduce written literary to Native Americans and African Americans.

I'm Your Girl

I'm Your Girl
Author: J.J. Murray
Publisher: Kensington Books
Total Pages: 404
Release: 2010-03-01
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0758257139

For public library clerk Diane Anderson, reading romance novels and living vicariously is far easier than attracting a flesh-and-blood man of her own. It seems she's too voluptuous in the wrong places to attract the kind of black man her mama requires as a son-in-law. . .and just exotic enough to attract the kind of white man Mama forbids. But there's something about that lost-looking guy who comes into the library one afternoon. And when he reveals that Diane is his muse, well, she can't help being intrigued. . . After months spent mourning a personal tragedy, novelist Jack Browning is struggling to get back to work. Under pressure to write his second novel, Jack hits the library for ideas. The clerk who helps him is smart, sassy--and curvy in all the right places. He finds himself thinking of Diane as he creates the heroine of his book. And soon, she's knocking down the wall he'd built around himself, becoming the inspiration for his art. . .and maybe even for his life. . . "Murray writes a gentle romance about cultural differences and deep commonalities in a unique tale about white-black relationships." --Booklist