Dragon Books' Press

Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â After decades of going without, the citizens of Bel Air just got their first neighborhood bookstore â€“ Dragon Books.Â Stocked with used and antiquarian volumes, the shop at the crest of Beverly Glen feels more like a private library, what with its 18^th-century French mantelpiece, leather club chairs, Doric columns supportingÂ an upstairs readersâ€™ gallery, and books rising halfway to the 26-foot-high-ceiling.

Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Dragon Books is the brainchild of Jay Penske.Â (Yes, heâ€™s one of the automotive Penskes, though heâ€™s ventured out on his own, armed with a Wharton diploma and a wealth of ideas.)Â A founder of VSI, a thriving interactive-media-and-technology company, and Firefly Mobile, developers of an ingenious cellular phone for children, Penske says Dragon Books fulfills a dream thatâ€™s been recurring since childhood, when he read John Gardnerâ€™s â€œDragon Dragon.â€ While a serial prep-school expellee, he became a serious reader of 19^th-century novels. Soon he began collecting, starting with works by Kierkegaard and Mencken. When moving to Los Angeles in 2002, he discovered he had 28,000 volumes, half of which heâ€™s now selling to sustain his passion for new acquisitions.Â He shelved each book himself, and he often mans the cash register.

Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Two hundred patrons flocked to Dragon Books opening day, and gratifying moments for the owner continue-especially when parents come in with their children.Â â€œThey start in the juvenile section but find themselves drawn to the rare books,â€ Penske observes, â€œand I can see it in a kidâ€™s eyes-that sense of wonder, the awakening of a new book-lover.â€Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â - A. Scott Berg

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