Boston Book Festival 2012

Suddenly, in the midst of the great flat prairie, unpeopled and mysterious, there came into his mind the image of a Boston street, crowded with carriages and walking men who toiled sluggishly beneath the arches of evenly spaced elms that had been made to grow, it seemed, out of the flat stone of sidewalk and roadway; there came into his mind the image of tall buildings, packed side by side, the ornately cut stone of which was grimed by smoke and city filth; there came into his mind the image of the river Charles winding among plotted fields and villages and towns, carrying the refuse of man and city out to the great bay.

—Harvard dropout Will Andrews remembers Boston fondly in John Williams’s Butcher’s Crossing.

We’re thinking fondly of Boston right now because we’re heading there this weekend for the Boston Book Festival. We’ll be giving away free issues of The New York Review of Books (1st come, 1st served), selling books from all our imprints at special show discounts (including hot-of-the-press titles), offering low, low priced subscriptions to the magazine, $5 tote bags, and other assorted fun stuff.