Flutterby™! : Joy of Booksmith

Whyte's Booksmith, in San Anselmo, is my bookstore. At the last Scotch Night, one of the topics was bookstores, and it was remarked that I got books as fast as Amazon could ship them, whereas with the chain stores all orders took weeks. Charlene had gone in to Booksmith to order Stephen Wolfram's A New Kind of Science, and they'd told her it wasn't available from them. I went in today, and they said "Oh sure, it's a publisher order and won't be out 'til March". This is why I like small vendors; it's possible to develop a relationship and get superlative service, but it requires building that trust, and knowing that I'm a customer who will be there for them.