How the military-industrial complex made Gatsby a classic

Every time I think I qualify as a nerd, something like this proves me wrong:

"Today’s publishing landscape increasingly looks like Vulcan shortly after the Romulans injected Red Matter into the planet core."

A new fundraising method from our Australian friends:

"Book a 15-minute slot at Pages & Pages to sit outside the front of our store and read aloud from your favourite book. Get your friends and family to sponsor you and the money you raise Book Busking will go to Fred Hollows and the Indigenous Literacy Project."

Huh. Did not know this:

"The Great Gatsby was not popular when it was published despite positive reviews and in its first fifteen years sold less than 25,000 copies... But then, during World War II, the Armed Services Editions... gave away a few copies of the novel to American military."

If anyone wants to give this guy a book deal, I'm all for it:

"Taking old World War II photos, Russian photographer Sergey Larenkov carefully photoshops them over more recent shots to make the past come alive."

But there is this one, an old favorite:

"One of the things I learned as a bookseller was that there is an incredible interest in sci-fi among middle grade readers and not a lot of books for that market.  And when I say middle grade sci-fi I don’t mean books about aliens who take over as school teachers, there’s a lot of that. I mean actual science-based speculative work, the kind of mind-probing, thought-bending examinations of all that exists within the adult sci-fi genre."

Why we stay in this business:

"Because books are still the most valuable commodities we have. Because books can transport you to a different world, or change your own perception of the one you live in. Because the notion of 'getting lost in a good book' transcends time, generation, and even the page itself."

Fantasy leagues for the bookish set:

"The winner of The Bookseller Fantasy League 2010 will be the person whose books sell the most. Feel free to invite others to participate—clients, family members, friends, enemies, pets, etc."

When customers are happy and they tell the world:

"I am just one customer and if Fountain bookstore had decided not to try to get the books to me, they wouldn’t have gone bankrupt. I think that’s why I had pretty much convinced myself it wasn’t going to happen. But see, I had forgotten one important piece of information: Fountain bookstore is an indie."