Appreciation …

… Ricky Jay, the Magician with an Edge. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)

… I was, am, and always will be grateful that among those rare occasions was the day I accompanied him—traveled in his wake, would be more like it—to the California International Antiquarian Book Fair. The experience was kind of a cross between walking into a Strip casino with Frank Sinatra in his heyday, touring violin shops in Cremona with Itzhak Perlman, making a circuit of the Tokyo fish market with Jiro Ono, and returning to the North Pole with Santa Claus after a long night’s around-the-world journey. With Ricky’s encyclopedic knowledge, critical eye, connoisseur’s enthusiasm, and some money in his wallet, he was every bookseller’s favorite and most fearsome customer.