The next time you’re browsing between bookshelves in the library, consider this. In 1968, at Northwestern University, an empty section of wood shelving fell against other shelves that were full of books in a domino effect that dumped 264,000 books, ruining more than 8,000 of them. The avalanche shattered solid oak chairs and flattened metal footstools. No one was injured. However, deaths have been reported in similar catastrophes. Earthquakes can be especially destructive to libraries. The information for this account came from a Longmont Library book appropriately called The Library: A Catalogue of Wonders (027.009KEL). The author is Stuart Kells, a book historian. When looking for this and other reading material, you may wish to leave your bike helmet on.
You may not recognize the name, Todd H. Bol (1956—2018), but you’ve no doubt heard about what he did. This was the remarkable man who, to honor his late mother, erected a wooden doll house stocked with books in his yard for his neighbors and strangers to use as a library—the Little Free Library. The idea was simple—take books, donate books—and it caught on fast. Currently there are more than 75,000 Little Free Libraries around the world, and probably more that the organization he founded doesn’t know about. Longmont has at least one—you can locate it on the map at littlefreelibrary.org. Also on that website is information about how to set up your own book-sharing station. P.S. The Longmont Library has three of our own Little Free Libraries in our community — located at Affolter Park, Rothrock Dell Park and Kanemoto Park. Check ’em out!
How time gallops by. Award-winning writer for children and teens Beverly Cleary is now 102, going on 103. Her advice to readers is, “If you don’t see the book you want on the shelf, write it yourself.” If you do aspire to write, keep in mind what Gilbert K. Chesterton said: “A good novel tells us the truth about its hero; but a bad novel tells us the truth about its author.” And Mark Twain observed, “A successful book is not made of what is in it, but what is left out of it.” Obviously that didn’t apply to War and Peace.
*Written by Carol Cail — Read more from Carol at carolcail.com
You remember Get Smart’s joke gadget, the Cone of Silence? Have you heard of a real privacy invention called the Isolator Helmet, meant to give a writer peace and quiet for working? You can buy it on-line for about $35,000. An amusing essay in the August 20th Publishers Weekly sent me in search of information about Hugo Gernsback, inventor, writer, editor, publisher, and the fellow for whom the science fiction award Hugo is named. He founded the first science fiction magazine, Amazing Stories, in 1926, and was known for questionable business practices; his writers received extremely low fees and sometimes none at all. He owned 80 patented inventions at his death in 1967, including the aforementioned helmet. It resembles a diver’s helmet, with a box at the mouth for smoking, and an oxygen tank which costs extra. Somehow those two features don’t seem compatible. 
So aren’t we fortunate to be able to walk into our lovely library and check out armloads of uncensored books? If you don’t mind waiting in line for one with more than a hundred readers ahead of you, consider putting a hold on The Library Book by Susan Orlean. (The line is shorter for the audio, e-book, or large print version.) Ms. Orlean has written a tribute to public libraries in general, and, in particular, an account of the 1986 Los Angeles Central Library fire, the worst American library fire ever; about 400,000 books were destroyed and 700,000 more damaged. 
An Edison Research consumer survey wanted to know when audio book users were listening to their books. Most of the time, it was while driving, 65 percent. Relaxing before falling asleep was 52 percent. Doing housework or chores was 45 percent. Since this adds up to 162 percent, someone’s listening during all of the above. 
For the older kiddies, the latest classroom sensation is classics in manga, comic books in the Japanese style. Teachers are enthusiastic about the books, which are not simplified. Hamlet, for instance, is more than 500 pages. The goal of the publisher, Manga Classics, is to “create the most faithful adaptation possible in the graphic form.” The thirteen titles available so far include Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Jane Eyre, The Count of Monte Cristo, and The Scarlet Letter. Visit 
Have you ever wished you had enough books and shelves you’d need a ladder to reach the topmost? Especially one of those sliding hooked-on-a-rail ladders? Melvil Dewey encountered his first one of those in the late nineteenth century in a Philadelphia library. He was not amused; the bronze hooks running along a pipe made “an annoying metal-on-metal sound.” Of course, there have been accidents, librarians falling off, sometimes fatal. Surely a partner with a belaying rope would solve that problem.
You all know the Boulder Book Store on Pearl Street Mall. Publishers Weekly has named it 2018’s Bookstore of the Year. In business for 45 years, the store is 20,000 square feet of new books (65%), used and remaindered books (16%), and non-book sidelines (19%), totaling 100,000 items for sale. Be glad that come January, you don’t have to count their inventory.