RECEIPTS FROM THE BOOKSHOP

A bookseller’s diary.

Clapham, co-owner, with her mother (aka Business Mum), of a small, independent bookshop in the English town of Lytham St Annes, shares a lighthearted chronicle of one year—their 14th—in the precarious business of bookselling. She begins in January, typically a slow month, when nippy days require several cups of tea and her only visitors might be her grandmother (Retirement Gran) and daughter (Bookwormlet). Many entries recount the weather, which is usually awful: chilly, damp, rainy (from torrential to drizzle), with rare spells of sunshine. Books, puppets, bookmarks, postcards—the shop offers many delights, and yet so many people pass by. With the shop door open no matter what the weather, Clapham overhears some comments. “It’s…a bookshop,” one passerby remarks, aghast. “Oh, no!” “I just really do love bookshops,” another announces, but, Clapham notes, isn’t even tempted to come in. Trying to make a living selling books seems foolhardy: “[T]here’s no real reason why we shouldn’t be flooded with customers today,” she writes, “other than the death of the high street, the devaluation of books, the cost-of-living crisis and the town’s general ennui.” She hopes that the opening of Starbucks down the street will increase foot traffic, and, in August, when a fancy patisserie opens, she looks forward to collecting “some crumbs from the flocks of customers that will surely come.” Clapham creates warm, funny cameos of buyers and browsers: some with children, some with dogs, some with specific requests. One wants a book on how to use a smartphone; one has the wrong title and the wrong author. “I find it anyway,” she boasts. Despite the challenges, she loves selling books, each one “a promise of an experience.”

Tender portraits make for an engaging read.