Reminder: If you’ve got a book you’d like signed for yourself or someone else, I’ll be hanging out at the Old Gold tonight starting at 6:30 p.m. It’s casual, not remotely a “book signing.” I’ve been calling it office hours, but really the Old Gold is one of my favorite bars in town and it’s a good excuse to go hang out there. There’s a chance Peter Ames Carlin will be joining. He wrote the forward, and, you know, Bruce.

Can’t make it tonight? I’ll be at Bar Bar on Sunday afternoon starting at 12:30 p.m.

Reviews: Jay Lustig has been writing about music in New Jersey for a long time. He was at the Star-Ledger, and now he’s built NJArts.net. Obviously he knows of Bruce. And so I was thrilled that he dug the book as much as he dug the book.

White had a mountain of material to draw from — decades of interviews and photos — but picks and chooses well, weaving everything together into a cohesive narrative. He’s got a long, long career to summarize, so he’s got to describe things quickly and clearly, and he does so.

Lustig also calls the book “well written, even-handed and obsessively detailed.” I’ll take that and run. [‘A Springsteen book fit for a fanatic’s coffee table‘: NJArts.net]

Across the Atlantic (or just down the street via the Internet), Helen Brown tells Telegraph readers:

In the glut of big, visually beguiling music books published this year I’ve been most impressed by Ryan White’s atmospheric Springsteen: Album by Album …

I’ll take that and run, too. And now my arms are full. A lot of other really good books mentioned in Brown’s piece. [Christmas Books 2014: best music books to read‘: Telegraph]

Ryan White & Associates: There’s a newsletter! People seem to enjoy it. It’s links, and essays, and a scratch pad of the mind. I’ve really enjoyed writing it. Feel free to subscribe.