It’s been a year since Duthie Books, Vancouver’s largest independent bookstore, succumbed to the mega-store onslaught and went out of business. Owner Celia Duthie had to do something in her next life, so she started a book-lovers retreat on the Gulf Islands. “Book clubs have taken off across the continent over the past decade, whether they’re small groups of friends who once studied English lit together or TV audiences turned on to reading by book-promoting celebrities such as Oprah Winfrey. Even the rise of megabookstores like Chapters and Indigo signal a new corporate awareness of the appetite for books and the rise of a so-called salon culture – people from all walks of life who remain interested in reading and ideas, despite the prevailing media obsession with movies, television and the Internet.” – National Post (Canada)