This should be the post where I list all the great books I've read in the past year, and rhapsodize about the great things in store for books and the book industry in the coming year. But I have to admit my enthusiasm and energy are at a bit of an ebb tide at the moment. Maybe it's post-holiday letdown (and our store had a wonderful, exhausting, expectation-exceeding holiday). Maybe it's that my energy has been drained by a too-long wrestle with the flu. Maybe it's just that Mercury is retrograde, as one bookstore customer always insisted was the cause when things were going wrong. It's an easy time to get to feeling down. There are plenty of stories going around about the number of bookstores closed this year, or about to close. Interestingly, the New York Times has in-depth pieces about three of those closing stores: Coliseum, Micawber Books, and Murder Ink / Ivy's. I find the words of the proprietors of each of those stores rather illuminating regardi...