“At least in a fig­u­ra­tive sense, this book…is a bibliophile’s dream. The 52 well-reproduced pho­tographs are paeans to the mate­ri­al­ity of book­ness, as imag­ined from every pos­si­ble tan­gent — books on shelves, books stacked in piles, book spines, book edges, book pages, open books, big books and small books. The notion of pho­tograph­ing books may sound ado­les­cent, but Abelardo Morell has made a career of tak­ing child­like ideas and ren­der­ing them in sophis­ti­cated, reflex­ive fash­ion. He doesn’t dis­ap­point here. Whether the image is sim­ple, like one that shows the spine of a book titled ‘Thought, 5, 1930–31,’ or com­plex, like ’ A Tale of Two Cities,’ in which Dick­ens’ famous begin­ning is blurred by type bleed­ing through from the reverse side of the page, Morell man­ages to make pic­tures seem sym­bol­i­cally rich as words. His pho­tographs of illus­trated books are espe­cially dense and sug­ges­tive; the cam­era stares into the fold of adja­cent pages, reflect­ing and refract­ing the printed pic­tures so that they become some­thing else: new pic­tures.” — Andy Grund­berg, The New York Times

“Abelardo Morell’s pho­tographs are liv­ing proof that books are much more than car­ri­ers of infor­ma­tion, that they are pre­cious arti­facts in their own right, with sto­ries quite apart from their texts to tell. A daz­zling per­for­mance, arriv­ing, as it hap­pens, in the nick of time. Nicely done.” — Nicholas A. Bas­banes, author of A Gen­tle Mad­ness and Patience & Fortitude

“In a superb dis­play of tal­ent, renowned pho­tog­ra­pher Morell pro­vides a mag­i­cal expe­ri­ence for the bib­lio­phile and sooth­ing engage­ment for pho­tog­ra­phy enthu­si­asts. Morell trans­forms every­day objects-book spines, pages, illus­tra­tions, type­face, and shelves-into mem­o­rable con­duits of our long con­nec­tion with read­ing and the book. This invig­o­rat­ing work reaf­firms the impor­tance of books and serves as a reminder of their frag­ile but endur­ing pres­ence in our his­tory and psy­che. Nichol­son Baker, author of the con­tro­ver­sial Dou­ble Fold: Libraries and the Assault on Paper, con­tributes a fit­ting pref­ace; an engag­ing and beau­ti­fully writ­ten piece, it reveals the writer’s sin­cere love for books. How­ever, the stars of the vol­ume are, unde­ni­ably, the books on which Morell focuses his cam­era. If they could talk, those books would thank him for redis­cov­er­ing them and adding, through his genius, such grace and sen­ti­ment to the essence of their exis­tence on the pages of yet another book” — Edward K. Owusu-Ansah, Library Journal

“Although we may have been taught not to judge a book by its cover, pho­tog­ra­pher Abelardo Morell reverses the old say­ing and delight­fully shows us how to rel­ish a book by its look. This inven­tive and clever pho­to­graphic ode to the printed word cap­tures all the pow­er­ful pos­si­bil­i­ties con­tained on the page. A Book of Books gives us images that range from for­mal stud­ies of shape and tex­ture to the joy­ously whim­si­cal. Most lumi­nous are the sculp­tural ren­di­tions, fluid pages curv­ing over their spines like majes­tic moun­tains in the dis­tance. The abstract pat­tern of a dic­tio­nary takes on the enig­matic char­ac­ter­is­tics of crop cir­cles, while a water-damaged book shows itself as a twisted organic form. An aging book slowly decays in a stark image of paper so frag­ile it has prac­ti­cally turned to dust. Library stacks seen from above become a labyrinth through Morell’s lens. Includes a lovely pref­ace by Nichol­son Baker. Per­fect for any book enthu­si­ast.” — J.P. Cohen, Amazon.com

A Book of Books review by Craig Stark