Eureka Books Blog

New Store Slogan?

This is an ad for the restaurant and bar that used to occupy our building. I found this in a 1920 promotional brochure for Eureka. I'm thinking we should revive the Louvre slogan: Pretty girls! Jazzy music! Good books! That's us! Eureka Books * 426 Second Street, Eureka Cal.

Found in a Book

A newspaper clipping claiming to be "Bret Harte's First Poem, which was Written for, and Published in, the Humboldt Times," from July 25, 1857 (this clipping is a reprint from about 1905):

'Tis a town that is one of your queer kind of places

So noted for lumber and beautiful faces

There are dry goods and billiards, and shops where you victual

and every convenience—nor is it so little;

But once 'twas quite lost to the country around it,

And they called it "Eureka" to show that they found it.

(The rest of the poem is a rather forced rhyme about a drinking man and his bubbling attempts at wooing a young woman. I'll spare you, you've suffered enough already.)

Great Set Countdown III

We have another Great Set Countdown going - this time we're offering the Britannica Great Books of the Western World set - all 54 volumes of knowledge, from Aristotle to Darwin. The way this works is that the price drops $5 per day until it's free. This set started at $140 on February 1 and on March 1 it will be free. Right now, it's just $95 (which is about half of what they go for on eBay). Tomorrow it will be $90, unless someone snaps it up before we close today. If you've wanted this set, don't wait too long! Sold on February 19 for $50!

It Was a Dark and Stormy Night

The Works of Edward Bulwer Lytton, complete in nine volumes, circa 1885. Lord Lytton is hardly a household name today, but he was one of the most popular writers of the late 19th century, famous for prose as ornate as the Victorian architecture of the era. He is not widely read today, but you know the beginning of the first line of a novel you’ve never heard of, Paul Clifford (volume 8 of this set):

“It was a dark and stormy night; the rain fell in torrents—except at occasional intervals, when it was checked by a violent gust of wind which swept the streets (for it is in London that our scene lies), rattling along the housetops, and fiercely agitating the scanty flame of the lamps that struggled against the darkness.”

$30

Best in Show

Congratulations to Linda Mitchell, a local artist and friend of the store, for winning Best in Show at the Redwood Art Association exhibition at the Morris Graves Museum of Art. Linda's winning painting is of Eureka Books' grand re-opening, held to celebrate our purchase of the store in 2007.

Oh, the Places You'll Go...

...if you're a bookseller.

Or this could be titled "How I spent my weekend..." Just remember, we do it for you, our customers.

I Hope We Don't Look This Goofy in Person

We're helping to judge a Flash Fiction contest sponsored by the North Coast Journal. One of their photographers, Bob Doran, came by and took this picture of us last week. Since the contest was for fiction under 100 words, we decided to pose with small books. From left to right: Jess Friedlander, Mark Shikuma, Amy Stewart, and Scott Brown.

Bob has posted more photographs of Humboldt County's independent booksellers here.