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The Last Bookstore In America
 
 

The Last Bookstore In America [Kindle Edition]

Amy Stewart
4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)

Digital List Price: $3.99 What's this?
Kindle Price: $3.99 includes free wireless delivery via Amazon Whispernet



Editorial Reviews

Product Description

A comic novel about the future of books and bookstores by New York Times bestselling author Amy Stewart.

Nothing is what it seems in the offbeat and out-of-the-way town of Eureka, California. Shrouded in fog and hidden behind a curtain of redwoods, this rundown mill town is home to a peculiar cast of characters, a unique homegrown horticultural industry, and one of the last bookstores in America.

No one is more surprised by the unlikely survival of the Firebreathing Dragon than Lewis Hartman, its newest owner. By the time his uncle Sy died and left the bookstore to Lewis, even the most ardent bibliophiles had abandoned printed books in favor of a charming and highly literate digital device called the Gizmo. Bookstores all over the country had closed their doors. But somehow, the Firebreathing Dragon has kept going.

Lewis and his wife Emily find themselves in the unlikely position of owning one of the last bookstores in America. But how has the Firebreathing Dragon managed to survive the death of the book? And if it isn't keeping itself afloat selling books, what is it selling? Reporters, federal agents, and corporate executives out to salvage their own imperiled industries all converge on the bookstore to uncover its secrets. What they discover is a small town that has fallen under the spell of the Firebreathing Dragon's unique offerings.

In her first work of fiction, bestselling author and bookstore owner Amy Stewart takes an offbeat and lighthearted look at small-town life and the future of that marvelous two thousand year-old communication device, the printed book.


Product Details

  • Format: Kindle Edition
  • File Size: 364 KB
  • Print Length: 221 pages
  • Publisher: Amy Stewart (July 1, 2009)
  • Sold by: Amazon Digital Services
  • Language: English
  • ASIN: B002FU6LYC
  • Text-to-Speech: Enabled
  • Lending: Enabled
  • Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #95,371 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
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Customer Reviews

11 Reviews
5 star:
 (7)
4 star:
 (3)
3 star:
 (1)
2 star:    (0)
1 star:    (0)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
4.5 out of 5 stars (11 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Loved this novel even if a beta version!, November 11, 2009
By 
Kathleen B. Shores (Malibu, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
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This review is from: The Last Bookstore In America (Kindle Edition)
I welcomed the discomfort of the cognitive dissonance of reading "The Last Bookstore in America" on my Kindle. It made the novel even more delightful! Although the Gizmo seems a real possibility in the near future, I had never intellectually pursued its logical end result. I feel strangely compelled to defend my e-book ownership: Since June, the 60 Kindle books I've read are not swaying in dangerous 4-to-5-foot towers in front of the eight floor-to-ceiling bookcases in our house.

Also because our daughter graduated three years ago from Humboldt State University in contiguous Arcata, I am familiar with Eureka, its Old Town, and the waterfront. I love the North Coast culture.

Amazingly, as a writing professor and lover of books and bookstores, I found no plot line, character development, or local description that I would recommend Amy Stewart to change before final publication.

I'm putting this on all amazonian.com's required reading list. Read it now!
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10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars The Last Bookstore in America, November 21, 2010
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This review is from: The Last Bookstore In America (Kindle Edition)
I have just about finished reading this very funny "book" on my Kindle -- how ironic. I must say that the premise and the story itself was thought provoking. I thought the character development was charming and I grew to like being in the company of most of these people right away.
I was disappointed however with the editing. It was quite jarring in places how many spelling and grammatical errors were in this manuscript. Do e-books not get edited for this kind of thing?
I would recommend this as a fun romp of a read. I will NEVER give up books and I think most readers -- however much they love there e-readers -- feel the same way. No Gizmos for us.
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23 of 28 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Fantastic read on the Kindle - loved the premise, gorgeous writing, July 5, 2009
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This review is from: The Last Bookstore In America (Kindle Edition)
Length:: 5:54 Mins

This was a cracking good read. As a Kindle owner, I was fascinated by the premise - a world with a Kindle-like device which is so great it obliterates the printed book, and nobody's disappointed about it, either.

Against this backdrop, Lewis and Emily inherit one of the last five bookstores in America from Lewis' eccentric Uncle Sy, and they travel to sleepy Humboldt County, CA to check out this romantic relic of a bookstore.

Unfortunately, the bookstore isn't actually selling books anymore, at least not in the way we're used to. People come into the bookstore and request a book in a certain price range, rather than browsing the stacks for something interesting, and the real product being sold is the fine Humboldt strain of marijuana that's slipped into the bag with the book.

In real life, Humboldt County is the country's biggest producer of marijuana, so as a resident of the county, it wasn't any surprise to me to learn how the bookstore was really staying alive! We have so many stores that are obviously a front for another type of business, so this wasn't a stretch for my imagination.

The book itself was beautifully crafted - I loved the characters, the setting and details were so easy to imagine, and the writing was witty and full of personality. On the Kindle, you can highlight your favorite parts, and I found myself highlighting every other page through the entire book - there were so many gorgeous snippets of perfect writing throughout.

While you may find the premise of a world without books and with marijuana hard to believe, it wasn't a stretch for me. I read this book on my Kindle in the county the book is set in, so the concept of nearly-legal pot and digital books replacing the dead-tree versions wasn't hard to imagine.

In fact, as an environmentalist, I think the idea of paper books are kind of outdated, much as I personally love them. It seems like we're moving forward into a world with clean and cheap energy, and in the future, it's going to seem irresponsible to cut down trees to read when we could use a few cents' worth of clean energy instead.

Anyway, if you're a fan of Amy's non-fiction about gardening and the outdoor world, you are going to love this book. There's some of the best garden writing and imagery in this book that I have read anywhere, and the rest of the book was so full of liveliness and personality that you're sure to love it as much as I did.

And once you finish, join the discussion at Amy's site by doing an internet search for Last Bookstore in America. Give feedback on the book and become part of the community by sharing what you think about digital media, legalization, and the demise of the paper book.
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More About the Author

Welcome! I am the author of five books on the perils and pleasures of the natural world. I live in Eureka, California, where my husband and I own an antiquarian bookstore called Eureka Books.

When I'm not writing books or traveling to do research, I'm on the road speaking to audiences at garden clubs, bookstores, botanical gardens, libraries, and universities. I've even started doing "virtual" author visits by webcam or videoconference.

Check the blog posts below for more information and updates. I hope you'll get in touch!

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