Hello, it is I, your manic socks-with-clogs pixie dream girl shop-squirrel and this is the next update live from the bookshop.
First, a big thanks to any remote customers who have shopped with us online this week via Bookshop.Org - I can see some beautiful books on our recent orders list, now winging their way to wherever. Small businesses like ours rely on these additional boosts while our town continues to decline in footfall, so we really appreciate these sales. Happy reading, folks.
These posts will remain free, with comments open so you can send me queries like ‘What’s your favourite comic series for young readers?’1 and ‘Are those Birkenstocks true to size?’2
First customer in today has already spent long enough browsing the poetry shelf that my faith in humanity has been restored before I’ve even finished my first coffee.
I don’t even care if they buy a book, I just love to have it reaffirmed to me that there is still a place for a poetry shelf in a mostly empty bookshop in our knackered town.
*update* They did not buy a poetry book. I said I wouldn’t care, but that was only half-true. If I were browsing this poetry shelf, I’d want this one.
Don’t the books look lovely?
*continues walking*
A short thriller
The bookseller felt the slight grumble of her stomach. It wasn’t that it was too early for lunch, not really, if the hours since breakfast were counted, the hours until dinner, if lunch was something that came in the middle. But if lunch happened, and then nothing else did, the afternoon might last forever.
A little something, then. A small sweetness from the barrel with the lid, to break up these slow moments. Then lunch could stay in the distance for a while longer and it wouldn’t matter as much, if there were no customers to attend to, because there would still, eventually, be lunch.
But then, a twist. The biscuit barrel was empty. The bookseller’s stomach was empty. The bookshop was empty, and so there was no one to stop her tearing into the lunch that would not be there later. No one to say Consider the consequences of your actions! Consider 3pm! The bookseller would not.
A gentleman comes in to purchase a few books to gift to a local school library. Faith in humanity peaks for the day before I hear a charged exchange outside that I can’t repeat. But here’s the gist. Someone did something. Someone has had enough. Someone is going to get got. Yikes!
A customer notes that of all the puppets in the shop, the puffin is the most sensible.
I’ve been sent a reading copy of Strangers At The Port by Lauren Aimee Curtis. Curtis was included in Granta’s Best of Young British Novelists list this year alongside writers like Eliza Clark and Sophie Mackintosh. This book comes with endorsements from other writers I’ve really enjoyed - Julia Armfield, Amina Cain and Megan Hunter.
It’s a slim hardback and the chapters are short so yes, everything considered, I’d be delighted to take this one home and read as soon as possible. Looking forward to it!
Delivery! This one is mostly customer orders and re-stocks of titles sold in the last few days, rather than a bunch of brand new stock. I unpack the box, tick them off the packing list and then shelve them either on the customer order shelf or out in the main shop. I’ll ring the customers to let them know their orders are ready for collection or send them deliberately ominous text messages that say things like ‘The Gruffalo is here’ or ‘John Buchan is ready for you’. Then I flatten and re-fold the packing paper for the next seventeen hourzzzz.3
In the order I’ve just unpacked is one of my favourite picture books of all time. It’s perfection in its simplicity. It’s by Lucy Cousins and it’s called I’m The Best.
Dog is a show-off. He’s rude to all of his friends, who feel pretty rubbish because of his relentless competitive nature. But then they realise he’s a fluffy saboteur, skewing every interaction to play to his strengths and their weaknesses. Honestly, he’s a menace and then…they call him out on his behaviour! And he accepts he’s been awful! And apologises to his pals! And then, just when you believe he’s learned this important lesson about life, he brags about his gorgeous ears and claims that makes him the best anyway and honestly, Dog; agreed.
Lucy Cousins is the genius behind girl power icon and picture book legend, Maisy - (surely, the most industrious mouse in the world) and many more picture books in her inimitable style. I love her work, and for me, it doesn’t get better than I’m The Best.
By the way, if you are a fellow picture book enthusiast, you may be interested to know that
hosts an online picture book book club. It’s a zoom chat on a specific picture book chosen in advance. There’s only been two meeting so far (Where the Wild Things Are, and The Tiger Who Came to Tea) so it’s a great time to join if that sounds like your jam. August’s book hasn’t been decided yet but when it has I’ll share the info again.3pm. Ffs. Absolutely starving.
Dog in the shop! He is called Cooper and he is very sweet even though he looks quite tough and his owner bought this perfect book! Ideal transaction. Five stars.
That is such a cute bookshop.
*continues walking*
A lady comes into order a book. She has the wrong title, and the wrong author.
I find it anyway.
Someone bought Claire Keegan’s Small Things Like These and I have still not read Claire Keegan’s Small Things Like These. When will I learn!?
Found a little snack in my bag I had forgotten about! A happy ending. Ten minutes until closing. Thanks for stopping by. See you subs later in the week for my long-read.
You can support my bricks and mortar bookshop by buying your books via this link, and you can support me as a writer by taking out a paid sub to this Substack. Thanks.
I really like Susie Yi’s Cat & Cat series, and Mark Bradley’s Bumble & Snug
Yeah, dude. Just get some already.
nine minutes
I have Claire Keegan on my bookshelf -- not the *actual* Claire Keegan, of course. I’ve been threatening to read it too...
Great post. I’m so envious of your bookshop days x
When I saw the coloured squares on the bossy dog illustration, I knew I'd seen that pattern somewhere before. I wondered if it was Elmer but when you said Maisie, it all came back to me, from my daughter's childhood reading books. I love taking these trips around your bookshop!