A Friendship Forged in a Love of Books

Les Standiford, left, and Mitchell Kaplan (Photo: Gerry Barker)

By GERRY BARKER
Aqua South Florida
June, 2025

Miami in the early Eighties has been characterized as "a modern day Casablanca," with its cultural mix of immigrants, Cuban refugees and drugs. All the elements for a good, hard-boiled detective story.

It was against this backdrop that Mitchell Kaplan, owner of the Florida book chain, Books & Books, and co-founder of the Miami Book Fair, and Les Standiford, a New York Times best-selling author of 25 books a and professor at Florida International University, first met.

Kaplan and Standiford were both recently aboard Sea Cloud Spirit, a German sailing yacht, to deliver a series of lectures, and made some time to reflect on their careers.

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