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"There are rare books all the way up to the ceiling, so absurdly far up (like 27 feet or something) that they are almost guaranteed to never come down. In addition to the shelves, both fixed and (apparently) movable, there are piles of books. Everywhere. There are paper bags and paper bags and paper bags filled with books, on the floor and in the aisles, and there are cabinets filled with prints and folios and ephemera and beetles and god knows what else..." "This is the single most amazing place I have ever been! When I dream about getting lost in a maze of forgotten books... this is what it looks like."

The February 2010 Los Angeles Book Fair was a lovely fair with a chance for all of us to see old friends and colleagues. What was different this year was that there were quite a few new dealers. Impossible, people say ... the antiquarian book trade is dying with us old folks. If you think that, then you didn't come to the Los Angeles Book Fair where I got to talk to quite a few new dealers while Gordon took some pictures. I chatted with dealers who were very positive about being in the book trade and about being at the Los Angeles fair at the Century Plaza, an historic hotel located in Los Angeles' wealthy west side. I was also interested in hearing from the new dealers about how the "old" dealers treated them and everyone I spoke with (with some exceptions not chronicled here) thought they were very welcomed by the experienced dealers. I wanted the new dealers to speak for themselves and so some of the comments here are from questions I asked and some are in answer to how they felt about the Los Angeles fair.

On April 29, 2010, the family and close friends of Barney Rosenthal met at the renowned Family Club in San Francisco to celebrate Barney's 90th birthday. In addition to Barney, his wife Ruth, and his son David, about 40 librarians, collectors, dealers, printers, and binders, gathered to honor the great man.

This is a report from what has been a little bit like Ice Station Zebra since 23rd December. Today is 13th January and we have had our first postal delivery at home for ten days. I was impressed by our postman, Rob, who said he felt the mail was starting to pile up (snow-like) at the sorting office, so went well out of his way, slithering on ice, to bring us the backlog.

The antiquarian book trade in Hungary is emerging. The young generation opens up to the international market and shows more and more that Budapest – like Vienna – is a European city full of cultural highlights, covering not only the history of arts, but the history of printing from its invention in the 15th century up to 20th century Avantgarde books. An interview with Zoltán Földvári (Budapest) and Norbert Donhofer (Vienna) about rare books in Hungary and the future of the antiquarian book trade.