Tuesday, December 22, 2009

Review: The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop by Lewis Buzbee


Buzbee spent many years as a bookseller and publisher's sales rep so he would appear to be uniquely suited to writing a book about bookstores labelled both a memoir and a history. Unfortunately, the latter overwhelms the former at almost every turn so instead of a history peppered with personal anecdotes about working in a bookstore, especially the colorful independents where Buzbee spent so much time, this is instead mostly a timeline of the emergence and growth of the bookstore, from the beginnings of libraries with their illuminated manuscripts to scribes to the printing press to stall holders and onward. While this could be interesting itself, it wasn't really enough to sustain the book. As a former bookstore employee myself, I know just how much Buzbee missed mining in a very fertile field when he chose to make this less personal and more generic. And while there were a few chosen bits about his obsessive love of reading and words here, overall, it was a much drier and slower read than I had anticipated. In poking around the internet, I seem to be in a minority in my feelings on this book but I just didn't see the charm and delight that other reviewers felt in reading this. Mostly I found it lackluster and was disappointed that I already knew all of the history that it presented.

6 comments:

  1. This sounds like a good introduction to the history of publishing and selling books, but not a satisfying read. Thanks for the honest review!

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  2. Oh, that's unfortunate! I have always thought this would be a bit like The King's English, which is about working and owning an indie store. Maybe check that one out!

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  3. Bummer, but that book cover is awesome!

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  4. Kristin....I too had almost exactly the same reaction to this book when I read it last year. I was terribly disappointed.

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  5. That's a shame... but Aarti's recommendation of The King's English might make up for it. I looked it up on Amazon and am planning to get a copy! Thanks and Happy Monday!

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  6. Sorry for the disappointing read, I hate it when that happens. At least it sounds like you've found some others who agreed - it drives me nuts when I don't enjoy a book everyone else does!

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