Working Titlez

Bauman Rare Books seeks an articulate, well-read, energetic individual for a long-term, full-time bookseller position at our Las Vegas gallery.

Experience with antiquarian books is not crucial, but a strong liberal arts background is required. A minimum of a bachelor’s degree is necessary. Excellent verbal and social skills are essential in this position to communicate effectively by phone, in writing, and in person. Applicants must be comfortable selling in a results-driven, luxury retail environment.

Booksellers are also responsible for mastering a great deal of historical, bibliographic, and market information in a short span. Applicants must be available to work weekends and nights.

As a dynamic, highly motivated team of booksellers, we provide our clientele of largely private collectors with exceptional customer service and expertise in our field. Learn more about our company and the type of material we offer on our website: www.baumanrarebooks.com.

To apply, please forward your resume/CV and a brief cover letter detailing your interest in antiquarian books and relevant experience to this posting. Any phone or in-person inquiries will be asked to do the same. Qualified candidates will receive our application.

Bauman Rare Books sells rare books, fine bindings and autographs in all fields, dating from the 15th through the 21st centuries. The company has three locations: offices in Philadelphia, a gallery on Madison Avenue in New York, and a gallery at the Palazzo in Las Vegas.

For great cities aren’t just described by great novels. They are defined and shaped by them.

It comes as no surprise to writers (and readers, for that matter) that the setting is an important part of a story – whether novel or non-fiction – and often, can become a character in itself. The surprise is in finding a literary work that creates an identifiable backdrop – or captures the essence of a city’s character.

Las Vegas is certainly a character – and as a setting – quite popular. Unfortunately, Sin City is also an enigma, as book reviewer Patrick Coolican of the Las Vegas Sun remarks,  and few writers have been able to harness its pulse and put into words. Cynical by profession, Coolican readily admits that tackling the city that never sleeps is a challenge best left alone.

But then came Crit, Andrew Kiraly’s fast-paced vividly descriptive debut novel that isn’t about Las Vegas and until the end, doesn’t even take place in Las Vegas, but still, manages to impress Coolican with its “on-the-money” portrayal of the 24-hour desert town.  Kiraly’s talent gives hope to Coolican that the great Las Vegas novel is within reach. For the full article, read here:

Oh! Oh! Oh! The UK’s Guardian has named FADE SAG CRUMBLE (www.fadesagcrumble.com) one of the ten BEST BOOKS SET IN LAS VEGAS! Right alongside Hunter S. Thompson, Larry McMurtry, James Ellroy, Tom Wolfe, Dave Hickey, Charles Bock, and John O’Brien. Whoa, that’s exalted company! So proud of our editor Scott Dickensheets and our amazing gang of ten authors! Danielle Kelly’s essay on decay and the Neon Museum is quoted in the article. Thrilled!!

The book is the signature project of the 2011 Vegas Valley Book Festival and features ten of the finest Las Vegas writers exploring decay.

10 of the best books set in Las Vegas

Michael Vernetti is interviewed by the KLAS-TV Channel 8 investigative news team regarding his book, Lies Within Lies, which chronicles the life and times of Nevada’s infamous federal judge, Harry Claiborne. Vernetti speaks candidly about Claiborne, one of Nevada’s most colorful characters.

Brady, our protagonist, is in a jam. Big Trouble. Chapter Four of Restless City has just been released with Leah Bailly in the driver’s seat. A signature project of the 2009 Vegas Valley Book Festival, Restless City is a serial novel, with seven Las Vegas authors each writing a sequential chapter. If you’ve been following along, you can read Leah’s chapter here. Or you can start at the beginning here.

Exciting news! From the press release . . .

CityLife partners with

Stephens Press to publish books

Stephens Press, the book publishing division of Stephens Media, has launched a new imprint called CityLife Books.

CityLife Books will publish up to four titles per year in a trade paperback format. The books will be available directly to CityLife newspaper readers and at area bookstores and online retailers.

CityLife Publisher Geoff Schumacher, the imprint’s editor, said he is looking for nonfiction and fiction proposals and manuscripts that speak to regular readers of the alternative weekly newspaper. “This imprint aims to create a new outlet for local writers who have something provocative or important to say about Southern Nevada,” Schumacher says. “We want to publish books that question the conventional wisdom and offer new ways of looking at this region and its people. Great writing will be paramount.”

Schumacher, who has written two books published by Stephens Press and edited several others, says he expects to receive a great many manuscripts. “I will look at them all, but of course we can publish only a tiny fraction of what we receive,” he says. “Quality comes first, but we also will focus on books that we believe a large number of readers will want to buy.”

Stephens Press President Carolyn Hayes Uber says she is excited to help talented writers share their voice and vision. “CityLife readers are outspoken and passionate about popular culture, politics and causes,” Uber says. “CityLife Books, whether fiction or nonfiction, will reflect and embrace this perspective the newspaper has fostered.”

Submissions to CityLife Books should follow the guidelines set forth on the Stephens Press website (www.stephenspress.com).

My colleague Geoff Schumacher recently presented a workshop on journalism for the Las Vegas Writers Conference. Included in his handouts was this essay about writing. I thought it deserved to be shared with other writers and lovers of writing, so I sought his permission to post it here.

“I write because I can’t do normal work like other people.”

Orhan Pamuk, winner of 2006 Nobel Prize for Literature

“Words on a page give the world coherence.”

Alberto Manguel, Into the Looking-Glass Wood: Essays on Books, Reading, and the World

Photo courtesy Scriatic (CC)

Writers write. If you’re a writer, you can’t help yourself. Putting words on paper, or onto a computer screen, is part of who you are. Writing helps us understand and give order to our chaotic lives and to a turbulent world.

Most writers want others to read their work. We want attention, validation, reassurance, fame. We want to be praised, questioned, challenged. We can’t help but write, but we like it better when our words are disseminated widely.

Despite our economic troubles, there never has been a better time to be a writer, because there never have been so many avenues to publication. Consider: You can set up a Facebook or Twitter page in about two minutes and start publishing your words to your friends and colleagues. Or you can set up a blog in about five minutes and start publishing for all the world to see.

These may seem like mundane forms of publishing, but I disagree. I have 255 friends on Facebook. If I write an essay and post it on my Facebook page, it is immediately available for perusal by 255 people who, because they know me, are likely to take a look at it. How would you have accomplished such an endeavor 30 years ago? If you wrote an essay and wanted to share it with your friends and colleagues, you would have had to make photocopies and either hand them out or put them in the mail to reach those 255 people. That’s a lot of copies, a lot of envelopes, a lot of addresses to track down and a lot of stamps. This process also would take a lot more time – days, maybe weeks.

Of course, we also would like to be compensated for our writing. We want our writing to be a money-making venture, not just an obsession or hobby. This complicates matters, but it’s not an unreasonable request. In order to be paid for writing, though, we must write something that a publication is willing to buy. This often means writing that is substantially different in style and substance from what we might post on Facebook or in a personal blog.

More often than not, what we’re talking about is journalism: facts, figures, interviews, research. We must be thorough, accurate. We must explore multiple perspectives. We must delve into subjects we might not otherwise care about. And then, once we’ve gathered the materials we need, we must organize all those facts, figures, quotes and multiple perspectives into a coherent and entertaining piece of writing.

It looks easy. It’s not.

But it’s also not brain surgery. Journalism is a craft that requires a set of skills that can be developed by most people who know how to read and to write a clear sentence.

The most important trait of a good journalist is curiosity. Successful journalists are innately curious about how things work. They follow a road to see where it leads. They ask lots of questions and genuinely want to know the answers. They aren’t afraid of talking to strangers. They aren’t satisfied with the conventional wisdom.

Successful journalists also are persistent. When they ask questions, they expect answers. They aren’t deterred by roadblocks. They know there is more than one way to get the information they seek.

Sometimes, journalism isn’t such a serious business. But writing a restaurant review or reporting on a ball game still demands the same skills needed to uncover the Watergate scandal.

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Geoff Schumacher, a veteran journalist, is the director of community publications for Stephens Media. He is also the publisher of CityLife and Big Island Weekly. He has written two books, Sun, Sin & Suburbia: An Essential History of Modern Las Vegas and Howard Hughes: Power, Paranoia & Palace Intrigue (Stephens Press) and is working on two more. Schumacher was recently named editor of CityLife Books, a Stephens Press imprint. He writes a weekly column for the Las Vegas Review-Journal. For more information, see www.geoffschumacher.com.

Thursday night I was invited to speak to the Las Vegas Writers Group, a dynamic bunch of writers here in the Vegas Valley. My topic was on editing and manuscript prep — how to polish your manuscript so it shines before sending it off to agents and publishers. I also talked about the editing process once your book has been selected for publication and the author’s role — and offered up some resources and tips. LVWG “Scribe” Megan Edwards wrote a comprehensive summary of my presentation and she’s graciously allowed me to post it on the Downloads page. Thanks Megan!