For me a visit to a book store, is like a wonderful meal starting with the appetizing business section, I have a few sips of some authentic, full-bodied self-help, then onto fresh, well-roasted biographies & memoirs, to finish off with a dessert of rich chocolaty fiction.

This meal is best enjoyed in a small intimate place but all to often we have to go to an indistinguishable cafeteria. Where the experience is inevitably one without flavor or connection with the staff or other guests.

In Banff, Alberta there is a bookstore called Banff Book & Art Den & they are going head to head with the Indigo chain of bookstores. I obviously hope that they can hold there own against this retail giant. This is more than yet another small business being swallowed up, it is about the whole experience of book browsing and buying and you either get that or you don’t.