The Diary of a Bookseller

THURSDAY, 28 AUGUST

Online orders: 5

Books found: 5

Katie was in today.

To my enormous irritation, Nicky’s bike sold. Her Facebook update read:

Sorry people, the bike has sold!

In its place though is a bespoke wooden table with a lift-up

lid! How cool is that! Yours for £20.

An elderly woman came to the counter with a book: ‘I’ll take this book, thank you. It’s for my son, you see. He’s a primary school teacher and he’s teaching the children about dinosaurs. I don’t know anything about them, and neither does he, so I have bought him this book. I’m seeing him next week and I’ll give it to him then. It’s his auntie Florence’s seventieth birthday. Do you know, she doesn’t look a day over sixty …’ And so it continued for a further ten minutes.

AbeBooks emailed to tell me that our account has been suspended because we have dropped below their order fulfilment minimum of 85 per cent for a month. I replied and asked how we could be reinstated.

An old man with a walking stick accosted Nicky as she was rifling through a box of books that was destined for Cash for Clothes – ‘I’m looking for a book, but I don’t know what it’s called. I know what it looks like, though. It’s a very old book.’

Sandy the tattooed pagan turned up with some more sticks. Sold one straight away.

Till total £388.03

39 customers