Publisher hype from Paul Ford, who despite being only slightly more prolific than this nearly lapsed blogger, remains on my A-list:

We thrill as she casts off her grim past to join a Wall Street investment firm, finds love, and indulges in fine sweaters.

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• Friend-of-Using Books Spencer Sundell finds a surprising blindspot in the usually impecable selection at the University of Washington’s University Book Store.
• Karlsruhe Virtual Catalog, another meta-library search to supplement WorldCat.org searches.
• The KVK link was via David Brass Rare Books, who seem to have built a fully featured website (searchable catalog, shopping cart, articles, and weblog) using just WordPress and WordPress plugins.

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Gift cards from chain bookstores might seem like a safe bet for the book lover on your gift list. But there are also a few indy options that remain convenient even if your gift recipient lives across the country.

The Book Sense Gift Card can be used at more than 300 U.S. bookstores. These stores are members of the ABA, a trade group for independent bookstores (largely dealers of new books or new/used hybrid shops). The gift card is available in denominations of $10-$100. You can verify that there are participating stores near your book lover using this search form. Cards can be purchased at stores or from many of their websites. Here’s a link to the gift card at Skylight Books’ site.

Gift certificate offerings are surprisingly absent from many of the indy-friendly book marketplace sites. Biblio.com is one of the few that has them. Gift certificates, delivered by email, are available starting at $5.00. Biblio.com is an online book marketplace with “over 5000 independent book sellers worldwide, listing over 50 million used, rare, out-of-print books, and hard-to-find books.”

Gift certificates can often be purchased, online or over the phone, from your book lover’s local bookshop. Also, many online book dealers, including Using Books, sell them.

Though I risk a deluge of comment spam by even leaving the comments open on an entry with “gift certificates” in the title, I’d love to hear of other indy gift certificate options for book lovers in the comments.

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Last weekend I missed the Seattle Public Library Book Sale. This weekend, I’m missing the Seattle Antiquarian Book Fair.

I’ve made it to a few Southern California Friends of the Library book sales in the last few weeks. None of them approach the size of Seattle’s hangar-filling sale, but I’ve picked up some solid stock. I haven’t seen as much aggressive behavior down here. I’ve been skipping the preview sales which tend to be more cutthroat.

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My family and I will be staying in Los Angeles, in the Silver Lake neighborhood, until mid-December. My online book business is on hiatus while I’m here, but I’d like to stay in the business, see what other people are doing, and pick up a couple of paychecks. I’m looking for: short term book business openings, occasional bookstore shifts that need to be covered, or tech-related contract gigs (FileMaker or Access database setup, web programming and design, EDI implementation, or general computer help). Here’s my resume (PDF).

Barring any of that, I’d be happy just to meet up with other book dealers in the area for a coffee or beer.

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