Thar’s gold — and books! — in them there hills. From an article in the Los Angeles Times:
No less a personage than Richard Booth, who turned Hay-on-Wye in Wales into the world’s first book town, had given his blessing to the Gold Cities Book Town Assn., placing the neighboring Gold Rush hamlets of Grass Valley and Nevada City, Calif., in the company of such other bookish venues as Larry McMurtry’s Archer City, Texas; Kedah Darul Aman, Malaysia; St.-Pierre-de-Clages, Switzerland; and Fjaerland, Norway.
Not only was the Gold Country a lot closer than Fjaerland, but it also promised to be at least as pleasant, an area whose relaxed ambience, crisp mountain air and splendid scenery had turned writers including poet Gary Snyder into permanent residents. The location, a couple of hours north of Sacramento, proved as charming as the wine country without the hurly-burly of the consumption industry.
Key quote: Biblioholism — “the habitual longing to purchase, read, store, admire and consume books in excess.”
NewMexiKen pleads guilty, as charged.