From the Editor by Craig Stark >#56, 21 November 2005

Today's newsletter is, in a word, big. Ordinarily I'd take full responsibility for this, but not this time. This one's on Gene Medenwald. Gene, you see, agreed to do a Bookseller Profile for us some weeks back, but little did I know he'd return with a small treatise on bookselling - not to mention life itself. When I send profile templates out, I always invite elaborations and additions. Gene took this to heart. The good news is that, if you get half as much out of it as I did, it'll be time well spent.

But first, "How to Succeed in Bookselling without Really Trying" is back. Part III illustrates how accidentally screwing things up can sometimes produce a far better result than doing it right in the first place.

If you've been to the home page lately, you may have noticed that a new BookThink service, eBay Critique, quietly slipped into view on Wednesday evening. This is Phase I of what will soon become a full-featured bookselling consulting service. More details are here.