Saturday, July 10, 2010

SF & fantasy bookshops

Today, I came across a YouTube video of a mass book signing in the Mystery & Imagination bookshop in Glendale, LA. Jan and I visited that store during our too-brief stay in Los Angeles a couple of years ago. When we visited the store it was all but deserted -- but that was okay: it provided a lot of space to browse, browse and browse. In the video, authors Ray Bradbury, Bill Nolan, Dennis Etchison and others are beseiged by fans brandishing piles of books.

The clip reminds me of Birmingham (Britain)'s Andromeda Planet, run by Rog, Ped and others. When I lived in Brum weekly visits to Andromeda were a routine. It was a very sad occasion when this shop shut. When was it? Five years ago? Now, we've also lost the wonderful Fantasy Centre in Holloway Road, London. All very depressing.

Even if Amazon is less expensive, buying books on line just doesn't compensate.

The link is to a clip of Bradbury talking about his early days. Fascinating.

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