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Saturday 13 October 2012

Yet Another Newsletter


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The Penang Bookshelf
Yet Another Newsletter
 
Bookshelves
From The Penang Bookshelf
Dear Friend

8-8  - The New Normal 
  
Why the long silence? Retired? If I were so lucky lah!

On a whim, masquerading as a carefully considered judgement, I pulled down the shutters on my pseudo street presence in Penang in May to retire to the supposed serenity of my Bati Ferringhi flat. Ha ha. Since then I've sold more books to visitors at the flat than I ever sold in any shop, the internet side of the business has gone beserk (50 books sold this week is now normal), and all sorts of people are making all sorts of proposals, mainly decent, to The Penang Bookshelf.

When we bought the flat I stupidly hadn't paid attention to my wife's warning about the significance of the address - the eigth unit on the eight floor. Go take a crash course in Chinese numerology, if you don't understand what that means.

Wake Up Writing Workshop

Obviously too many people now get to read this newsletter and think I could do with a few tips on style. I presume this is what prompted the Lincoln Resource Center of the US Embassy in Kuala Lumpur to ask The Penang Bookshelf to help host  a mini writing workshop in Penang at 9.30 am this Monday 15th October. The experienced writer Paul Sochaczewski will be on hand to give tips on how to make your writing sparkle. I'll just be attending to try to find out how he manages to be bald and handsome at the same time. Join the scramble for a place by contacting me,

Come back, Singapore! All is Forgiven!As I've said before, I come from a family which looked down on 'trade,' so learning to be a blood sucking capitalist hasn't been easy. My customers occasionally prod me into action.
Ousted! - Patrick Keith.

A new Singaporean customer, of which there are an increasing number, tried a clever trick in bargaining. Would I send his books post free? When I investigated it, I discovered that posting over 2kg of books to Singapore was significantly cheaper than posting a lighter parcel. So from now onwards The Penang Bookshelf posts free to Singapore for all orders over 2kg.

Attraction, Rather Than Promotion

Of course, while I'm getting rid of so many books, I'm always fretting on how I'll replace them. Fortunately increased sales have also attracted people who either want to sell their books to The Penang Bookshelf or want The Penang Bookshelf to sell books on their behalf. They now come in at such a rate that I struggle to get them up onto my website in time. As an intermediary measure I list new acquisitions on The Penang Bookshelf Blog. You'll find a couple of examples, on a comprehensive range of books on Orchids and Chinese Ceramics have been added in the last few months. As you'll see customers have been buying straight from the Blog too. Other similar posts include this one and yet another both of which were the result of my August raids on UK bookshops. 

Emergence of the Musties 

Not that there's much that there's very musty in the Malaysian book business. There hasn't been too much that's been in print for all that long. However as The Penang Bookshelf becomes better known a few more will arrive on its virtual shelves. There have been a couple just recently. Both are 'unique masterpieces'. OK enough of the puff. If you're not fed up with the blog, have a look at this collection associated with the late Dr Wu Lien-Teh. And just to prove that The Penang Bookshelf caters for all tastes, we have probably the first Arabic-Jawi Dictionary for sale too. 

Of course I could write more, but this really is enough.  

Thanks for reading this far.   
  
William Knox
The Penang Bookshelf






News Snippets 

The Penang Bookshelf Becomes A Team


Of course The Penang Bookshelf's sudden expansion couldn't continue to be handled by one grumpy pensioner. So grudgingly he's roped in a few part time companions - Angus in Edinburgh, Craig in Park Ridge, Illinois and, the least part-time of them all, Teresa, here in Penang. What they all do's as much a mystery to them as it is to me, but they haven't started complaining - yet.

Linkage the Antidote to Shrinkage?

The Penang Bookshelf's been associated for a while with Spyral Synergy, the people who make it happen in Penang. A couple of weeks ago they made it happen again when we brought Dennis De Witt the author of History of the Dutch in Malaysia to give a talk to what appeared to be a very satisfied group of guests at Clove Hall, one of Penang's lovelier boutique hotels.

Which reminds me...I've discovered a brilliant substitute for sitting in a shop - get others to do it for you. The Penang Bookshelf's in the middle of talks with hotels  and tour companies to place its incomprable (sic) range of books with others who are more adept at sweet talking customers than I am.

Basically bookselling's quite easy - buy, sell, bullsh*t, buy, sell etc. However there's one Penang Bookshelf customer who's far more crazily energetic. He runs a travel website, Malaysia Traveller, and actually tests all the amazingly strenuous places he recommends. However he does have moments of sanity too, the webiste recommends The Penang Bookshelf's books.

Even though I narrowly missed being trampled by a British police horse at an Anti-Vietnam War Rally in 1968, my pink tendencies haven't dimmed. So I was very honoured when The Penang Bookshelf was approched by  Gerakbudaya, publishers and distributors of most of the sensible stuff that's written about Malaysia, to work with them in promoting their catalogue. In  future The Penang Bookshelf will be carrying much more of their stock online.   

The Penang Bookshelf seems to have been bitten by the Borneo Bug ever since our trip to Kota Kinabalu in July. So much so that we've even opened up a special Borneo category on the     
website. Also in KK we met up with the people who run, Borneo Books, another niche bookseller in Malaysia. We swapped trading experiences and tips and looked at ways of working together. One of our first joint ventures is likely to be the purchase of a large Malaysian library in the UK next month.  

Whereas I thought people only wrote about this country in Malay, Chinese, Tamil or English, I  recently met a Frenchman who has an amazing webiste where he proves that there has been plenty written in French as well. Of course one of the best known novels written by an expatriate about Malaysia was written by Henri Fauconnier. Pierre Boulle wrote one or two as well. The Penang Bookshelf does have two or three books in French which have yet to appear on the website.

It suddenly dawned on me in amidst all this frazzle that The Penang Bookshelf's second internet anniversary is almost upon us, so why not be generous for a change? Although The Penang Sketchbook is out of print and being sold for an exhorbitant price at The Penang Bookshelf, its publisher, Editions Didier Millet, produces masses of  other worthwhile books about Malaysia and Southeast Asia. They've teamed up with The Penang Bookshelf to offer massive discounts on their entire catalogue.  

I'm still reading some of the books I sell and still writing random reviews, although there haven't been any published recently. There are about four either half written or waiting to be written which I'll try and get out before the next newsletter. In the meantime a kind customer has come to the rescue with his own review of an obsure, but worthwhile book which, of course, is part of The Penang Bookshelf's inventory. 




About The Penang Bookshelf
The Penang Bookshelf specialises in providing book lovers with a broad range of new and second-hand books, both fiction and non-fiction, primarily about Malaysia, but also about other parts of Asia as well. 

IOBALogo
Independent Online Booksellers Association, Professional Member.


Websites:www.penangbookshelf.com

Also at:
Biblio.com ,Ebay and at IOBAbooks
Category Pages - Asian Fiction,      Asian History,     Asian ReligionsBorneo  Chinese Ceramics   Malaysian Architecture  Malaysian Agriculture   Malaysian Arts and Culture  Malaysia: CartoonsMalaysian Chinese Community  Malaysian Cooking and Food Malaysia: Colonial Biography,     Malaysia: Modern Biography,   Malaysia - Fiction  Malaysia: Journalism,    Malaysia: Language & Linguistics,     Malaysia: Literature, Malaysia: Malay Community   Malaysia & Singapore: 19th Century History,   Malaysia: Post-Independence HistoryMalaysia: Miscellaneous, Malaysian Nature and Wildlife    Orang Asli (Indigenous People)    Malaysian Poetry  Malaysian Politics  Malaysia: Religion   Malaysia & Singapore: World War II  Perak    Singapore: Anthropology & Sociology     Singapore Fiction

Email: penangbookshelf@gmail.com

Telephone: +60-12-972-6485 
Business Address:  Aquarius, 4-8-8 Jalan Low Yat, Batu Ferringhi, 11100, Penang. (The Penang Bookshelf's entire inventory is available for browsing. Please call to fix an appointment.)  
Mailing Address: 36, Cheeseman Road, 11600 Penang, Malaysia

Registered Business No: PG0282219-D


This email was sent to ewvknox@gmail.com by penangbookshelf@gmail.com |  
The Penang Bookshelf | 36 Cheeseman Road | Penang | 11600 | Malaysia

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