Earth as Art
I love walking through the travel aisle and finding a customer standing transfixed in front of our map browser, gazing at the brilliant colors of our Tyvek map, contemplating the World Upside Down, or...
View ArticleAssociated Press: Travel Books As Gifts
Associated Press travel editor Beth Harpaz recently interviewed several travel experts, including Pauline Frommer and Don George, for holiday gift ideas for the traveler. Harpaz also checked in with...
View ArticleImagined Cities
In the winter, I read to escape. Whether it is from the stress of holiday retail to a silent, open landscape or to a sunny beach from the bleak cold of January, I rely on books to take me to better...
View ArticleOut of the Waiting Room, Into the World
I usually reserve light reading for the waiting room of my dentist’s office. Maybe that’s why I always get a bad taste in my mouth when flipping through a magazine. Or a headache from the perfume...
View ArticleFrom Blizzards to Tropics
Today was the first day I ventured out to work after the blizzard. The first customer I found in the travel aisle was shivering in front of our wide selection of Caribbean guidebooks. I asked if she...
View ArticleTwenty-four Hours with Proust
A few years ago, as my friend Tera and I were wandering around the Bibliothèque nationale in Paris, I wondered aloud if Proust’s manuscripts were there, either on display or hidden away in some dusty...
View ArticleThe Shamrock Shakes of Irish Literature
Last week, my brother-in-law, who moved to Boston last summer, asked me if McDonalds on the East Coast served up Shamrock shakes for Saint Patrick’s Day, like they did back in the Midwest. A Boston...
View ArticleAWP Boston, or the Noise before the Silence
Over half our staff at Booksmith are writers. So many of us were delighted to hear that AWP (the annual Association of Writers & Writing Programs conference) would be held in Boston this year....
View ArticleSAMURAI!!! or, Destination of the Month: Japan
Has anyone made it to the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston to see the new exhibition of Japanese armor? The MFA has been marketing the exhibit simply as “Samurai!” which I find very effective. This month,...
View ArticleReading the Boston Marathon
L’esprit du lieu has always had a powerful influence over my sensibility, a fact which once made a visit to a concentration camp in Germany unbearable and which last week transformed a walk down...
View ArticleReturn to Book Expo America
New York City’s Bryant Park is lovely on a summer evening. Back-lit by the warm glow of the New York Public Library, the park’s green lawn spreads across the square, empty save for a sprinkler system...
View ArticleHappy Anniversary, Rand McNally Atlas!
It may seem strange to celebrate the anniversary of an atlas, but ever since we got the 2014 Anniversary edition of the Rand McNally Road Atlas to North America in, I haven’t been able to stop selling...
View ArticleMontreal and Quebec City, or the week that just kept getting prettier
Every few steps in Quebec City, the view gets prettier. You may have oooohed and ahhhhed and taken pictures from every angle, but now you’re going to have to start over, because now you’re up even...
View ArticleBack to School
The summer is winding to an end, and while there’s still time to get a last trip or two in before schools start up, if you’re a teacher, it may be time to start thinking about getting back behind...
View ArticleAdvice for the Travel Writer
A few weeks ago while teaching a travel writing seminar, I had students place themselves on a map on the wall. Where were they from? Where had they been? Soon the map was covered with post-its. Between...
View ArticleWithout a Map
“It’s not down on any map—the true places never are.” (Herman Melville, Moby Dick) A job offer in Minneapolis kept me busy this weekend, scouring ads for a new apartment and packing up the old. But in...
View ArticleWhat’s New before the New Year
The holidays just blew through the store in a twinkling blur! Now I have to go back to eating grown up food and not dreaming about all the maps selling out and Oprah choosing a National Geographic map...
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