The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop

I finished The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop by Lewis Buzbee. Tree, you should read this. Respighi, read this. Urban, since you were in the San Francisco area, you should read this. Spidey, read this. All you others who have book-lust should read it.
Buzbee takes us back to his childhood when he discovered “important” books and authors. His first was Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath. He worked as a bookseller, and publisher sales representative for over 30 years. He talks about getting that Scholastic catalog and ordering books in grade school, and the excitement when they arrived and were handed out from the teacher’s desk
Buzbee discusses important booksellers like Sylvia Beach who opened Shakespeare & Co in Paris and how that store became a magnet for authors like Gertrude Stein, Hemingway, and James Joyce, and how she saved her inventory from being destroyed by the Nazis.
Buzbee talks about present day banned books and the Patriot Act which proclaims that booksellers and libraries must give the government access to your personal reading habits without notifying you when they do so. He promotes buying books with cold hard cash so your purchases cannot be traced.
He describes bookstore ambience, the actual process of writing, publishing, marketing, shelving and selling books and why this is important to civilization—all without being stuffy.
At $17, it’s an important and charming book