Rare Book Cafe 3.0: Author Lee Irby, and the California autograph law and how the ABAA is trying to change it

Welcome to the fourth in the series of Rare Book Cafe 3.0, which was streamed live on Facebook on Saturday, May 27, 2017. We had writer Lee Irby, author of the new mystery novel, Unreliable, returning as a guest. We also welcomed Brad Johnson, a California bookseller, who spoke about the ABAA effort to negotiate a new law to replace the state's controversial signed memorabilia law that has ensnared antiquarian book dealers.

Guest co-host Kara Accettola of Little Sages Books, ABAA in the Fort Lauderdale area, joined us as well. Co-host Thorne Donnelley was back from Boston after the graduation of his daughter from Harvard Business College. Co-host Lin Thompson interviewed Brad Johnson.

We also tried out our tweaked format for the show, with a little less formal opening and closing. We want to create the effect of an ongoing conversation that might take place if the Rare Book Cafe were an actual bricks and mortar cafe where book lovers gather. Through the miracle of modern technology, we're able to have such a gathering over the Internet. We want you to be part of it. As soon as it is technically feasible, we may add sound effects that will enhance the cafe idea. In the meantime, what you see is what you get.

We're working constantly to improve what we send out to you streaming live. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't but we hope we're getting better and better. We're booksellers not broadcasters so we'll never be 60 Minutes but we hope we'll provide some useful information for people who love books a much as we do.

We do love comments and questions, so please leave us your in the Comments section below, including your thoughts about how we go about presenting our show. We also love thumbs up, so leave us yours. And finally, subscribe to our channel and share with your friends. We'll see you LIVE every Saturday at 2:30 p.m. Eastern Time.

Rare Book Cafe originated on Blab.im in 2015 but the platform shut down in August 2016. The program was on hiatus for several weeks and in the fall broadcast the first episode of Rare Book Cafe 2.0 on YouTube (streaming live on Google Hangouts on the Air).

Now the program has moved to the BeLive.tv platform. The program is live streamed on the Rare Book Cafe page on Facebook and is recorded and posted on YouTube and the Florida Antiquarian Book Fair blog on Blogspot.com

Rare Book Cafe is the first regularly scheduled live streaming Internet program devoted to antiquarian books and related subjects.