At one of America's oldest bookshops, there are just as many stories to be told outside the pages as in them. Join bookseller Kenneth Gloss and co-host Jordan Rich as they share entertaining conversations and histories surrounding Boston's favorite spot for bibliophiles.
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On this week's Brattlecast we're talking photoplays: souvenir books that were created to promote classic films during the golden age of Hollywood. They made them for King Kong, The Sheik, and even Moby Dick. So, which is better, the book or the movie? Ken weighs in on a particularly contentious case.
Ken receives a popular new novel as a birthday gift. Much to his dismay he finds an evil twin lurking in its pages. The book contains a character who is nearly identical to him, but with some sinister variations. Ken is an honest, well respected bookseller and his shop is thriving; his fictional doppelgänger is the criminally unethical proprietor of a failing book shop on the very same Boston street. An edge-of-your-seat legal thriller ensues as Ken tries to solve the mystery of why best-selling author John Grisham, a total stranger, would want to hurt his feelings like this.
What does the future hold for brick and mortar book shops? Things are looking bright! As the internet has decimated big box book retailers, small independent book shops have reemerged as vital community spaces. These shops offer the author readings and events, fortuitous browsing discoveries, and simple human interactions that you just can't find online. So what's the greatest threat to modern booksellers? It isn't the Kindle: it's the rising rents.
A family wedding in Kenya inspires Ken to start reading about Africa-and thinking about the book collections that could be made up of works about this vast and varied continent. From the early exploration narratives of the 1700's to the novels of Ernest Hemingway and Isak Dinesen, the possibilities are almost as diverse as Africa is.
