Publisher's Synopsis
This book collects thirty-three of Nicholas Basbanes' most engaging articles grouped into three sections: Book Culture; People; and Places. Basbanes writes passionately about bibliomania, bibliokleptomania, and biblioclasms, as well as book people like Otto Bettmann, Tom Wolfe, Michael Zinnman, and others. He travels the world, visiting and reporting on libraries in Sweden, Germany, Iraq, and New York. Basbanes selected the essays in this collection precisely because they were not replicated in substantial ways in his other books. Over one-third of the essays in the book are published here for the first time in their full, uncut versions, and one essay and the introduction have never been previously published at all. Most of the essays include an endnote, telling the behind-the-scenes story about the article and bringing the subject up-to-date.
