The Last Bookstore in America by Amy Stewart

When Lewis gets a call from a lawyer in Eureka, California, telling him his uncle died and he’s inherited The Firebreathing Dragon, one of the last few bookstores in America, he and his reluctant wife Emily are soon on their way to take over the store. They are surprised and excited to discover the bookstore brings in 1.2 million a year at a time when other bookstores are failing. Except The Firebreathing Dragon isn’t exactly just a bookstore.

The cognitive dissonance of reading a book on my Kindle and that book spending lots of time lamenting the end of paper books and trashing reading on the “Gizmo” (which sometimes sounds like an ereader and sometimes sounds like an app on the phone) is just weird. Pinning the downfall of bookstores (the author owns a bookstore) on “Nile.Com” which of course is pretty much Amazon is also weird. I think it was an attempt at humor, but it came across more as bitter. I also never could figure out if the author is pro- or anti-pot. Some parts of the book were funny and entertaining. The Last Bookstore In America is worth reading if you have some time to kill. You just might not want to read it on a Kindle because it might make your brain hurt.

3 (out of 5) Stars

Books Read in 2016: 130
Pages Read in 2016: 35,692
Hours Listened: 27 hours 2 minutes
Read 52 Books in 52 Weeks (more book reviews!)