Lemuria Bookstore Blog

Locavesting: The Revolution in Local Investing and How to Profit from It by Amy Cortese (John Wiley, 2011) Having just completed in October my 36th year as a small business owner, I was interested in reading Cortese’s book as soon as I learned of it. Having always been interested in the promotion of importance and [...]

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The Accidental Creative: How to Be Brilliant at a Moment’s Notice by Todd Henry (Portfolio/Penguin, July 2011) It seems to me that now is the perfect time to read this book. As a result of the recession, those of us in small business have been slammed with challenges  in which we don’t have defined skill [...]

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Driving Excellence: Transforming your Organization’s Culture and Achieve Revolutionary Results by Mark Aesch (Hyperion, 2011) Our recession has pointed out to struggling businesses that in case you didn’t already know it, your business is broken. You can’t do things the old way and survive. As Dylan used to say, “The times they are a changin’.” [...]

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Booksellers are in a unique position in that they constantly watch what people read and get new ideas for reading adventures from their customers. I had a fun experience learning about the latest book by Paul Sullivan. My first encounter with Clutch was in September at a Texas airport having a beer. The young pretty [...]

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The New Rules of Retail is the most important book I’ve read on small business retailing since Paul Hawken’s Growing a Business nearly 25 years ago. A couple of other booksellers at Lemuria have also read New Rules. We all feel this book provides crucial insight as independent bookstores reposition in the book industry. To [...]

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Drive: The Surprising Truth about What Motivates Us by Daniel H. Pink (Riverside, 2009) Having been in small business for so long, I’m always facing issues of self-motivation: my drive to do my part in making a good bookstore; my drive to continue my book selling actualization while wanting to reaffirm the quality and customer [...]

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Predictable Success breaks down the business journey. Beginning with the early struggles of a business, the fun of fast growth and early success, reaching a plateau at status quo. Hopefully, you don’t find yourself in a rut filled with growing problems and the final big question: Could this could be the end? It’s not easy [...]

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Practically Radical: Not So Crazy Ways to Transform Your Company, Shake up Your Industry, and Challenge Yourself by William C. Taylor (Morrow, 2011) In the mornings during this Christmas season, while working very hard, I read Practically Radical. I knew a wave was coming in my industry with the emerging e-reading devices. Book buying and [...]

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Real-Time Marketing and PR: How to Engage Your Market, Connect with Customers, and Create Products That Grow Your Business Now by David Meerman Scott John Wiley Publishing (November 2010) As we seem to be coming out of the tough last two years, it’s obvious that doing business will be different than before the recession. Marketing [...]

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The Referral Engine: Teaching Your Business to Market Itself by John Jantsch Portfolio (2010) As I continue to read business books to help me come up with recession battling ideas for Lemuria, Referral Engine gave me plenty to think about. With the broadening of our blog and Facebook work, we are discovering new ways for [...]

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