The Bookshop: A History of the American Bookstore

by Evan Friss

You don’t have to read them. You are safe. Nobody any more talks about the books they have read.

In 1981, the French government established fixed prices for books, something many American booksellers have long wished for. Without the ability to discount, larger bookstores couldn’t dominate smaller ones—that was the idea, at least. It meant Amazon couldn’t sell books for less than any bookstore on rue de Rivoli.