Brew and Browse

When veteran book dealers Fred Dorsett and Paul Hunt learned that some friends were opening a coffeehouse in Long Beach, a literary bulb went off in their heads.

Why not, they thought, supply the place with used books that patrons could browse through while sipping their double espressos. The books would provide an in-house reading trove and also be on sale at the coffeehouse, which was aptly christened the Library.

One day Ken Bencomo, who co-owns a coffeehouse in Pomona called the Haven, walked into the Library and got all excited at seeing all those books. Bencomo asked them to supply books to his coffeehouse.

One thing led to another . . . so now the duo supplies about five coffeehouses in Los Angeles County with books and is negotiating deals with several more. The booksellers put up the shelving, select the inventory and set prices, which range from $1.95 to $5.95 for authors as varied as Knut Hamsen, David Leavitt and Carrie Fisher. The profits are split between Dorsett, Hunt and the coffeehouse.

“Books and coffeehouses just seem to go together,” muses Dorsett, a drawling, 50-something Texan from Nacogdoches. “If they don’t handle books inside, there often will be a bookstore immediately adjacent to the coffeehouse.”

Consider the Novel, a used bookstore and coffeehouse in Santa Monica. Then there is Grassy Knoll, a coffeehouse next to the Book Depository in Silver Lake. If Dorsett and Hunt see a coffeehouse without a bookstore lurking nearby, they consider it fair game. They also scour “Caffeine,” the coffeehouse rag, for leads on newly opened coffeehouses that might want to branch out into books.

“There are certain areas (of books) that seem to move,” Dorsett reflects. “Art books, poetry, anything by Burroughs or Bukowski, sci-fi and metaphysics. Biographies. It’s a strange mix, with some modern avant- garde fiction from some of the minor presses. I hate to use the word intellectual , but thinking people’s books.”

The two booksellers know their stuff. Hunt owns five bookstores in Burbank. Dorsett formerly owned Fred Dorsett Books on Hollywood Boulevard but says he closed in 1980 because the neighborhood got too sleazy.

“I’ve fooled around with books all my life,” Dorsett says. “I used to crawl under the covers with a flashlight and read. I can’t think of a better world to live in than in books.”

Now he and Hunt sell books at a stall in Farmer’s Market and at flea markets. They also have a search service that locates hard-to-find books. Many of their coffeehouse clients say they they’ve always wanted to offer a wider selection of reading materials but didn’t know where to get a good mix of reasonably priced books.

That’s where Dorsett and Hunt step in. Dorsett stores thousands of books in a Burbank warehouse and hauls boxes of them around in an old van to show prospective clients.

“It’s a lot of work, schlepping books around, but it gives me a little notice,” Dorsett says. “And it’s fun when I’m in a coffeehouse and someone who is looking at my books will strike pay dirt and get excited. That gives me a lift.”