New Arrivals: Twain, Bernhard, Used Books x 1200

In across the counter: Mark Twain's brand new award-winning uncensored 750 page doorstop, Thomas Bernard's long essay My Prizes (first appearance in English!), and 40-odd boxes of miscellaneous fiction and nonfiction, just unpacked this morning and currently piled 6' high end-to-end on the desk  Plus some leatherbound gold-edged Franklin Library classics, a really nice hardcover edition of Marco Polo's Travels, and $800 of lumber for the new shelves that will be going up in the front room early next week.

NYT "10 Best Books of 2010" List Out; PFB Underwhelmed

The NYT, apparently following the Giller Prize's lead of showering praise on the obscure, the unorderable, and the absurdly expensive, coughs up its Best-of-the-Year list for 2010.  (With one brief concession to popular taste).

The Guardian has a longer and much more interesting list.  Unsurprisingly, that Franzen guy is on it, too.

The PFB Best-of-2010 list isn't really objective or scientific, but here it is anyway:

John Valliant, The Tiger

Lydia Davis (trans.), Madame Bovary

Gary Shteyngart, Super Sad True Love Story

Michael Lewis, The Big Short

Daniel Clowes, Wilson

Sheila Heti, How Should a Person Be?

Sam Lipsyte, The Ask

Jennifer Egan, A Visit From the Goon Squad

Most of these are here on the shelves right now.

Live @ PFB: Sarah Leavitt

Our friend, long-time customer, and recent media celebrity Sarah Leavitt will be presenting a multi-media slideshow/reading based on her critically acclaimed new autobiographical graphic novel, Tangles, in Main Street's front room this Thursday, December 2nd, as part of the UBC Creative Writing Department's monthly Locution event.  Doors @ 6:45pm; books and beverages available behind the counter.