The Diary of a Bookseller

TUESDAY, 1 APRIL

Online orders: 2

Books found: 2

Norrie came in and replaced the strip lights with chandeliers, plunging the Scottish room into darkness for the entire morning. They look infinitely better than the hideous strip lights, which lent the place the atmosphere of a hospital corridor. Over the years I’ve been replacing them and only have four left to do out of the twenty-two that were here when I took over in 2001.

Andrew (the volunteer with Asperger’s) came in at 11 a.m. and worked until noon. He’s made it as far as the Cs in the crime section now but became very flustered when someone asked him where the railway books were, and had to have a sit down.

This morning I received an email from my mother, who had to borrow my father’s iPad to send it because hers is ‘constipated’ – could I come down and fix it some time soon? I replied that I’d get round to it as soon as I could.

At 3 p.m. I drove to the bank in Newton Stewart, returning just before closing to discover that Cash for Clothes had been and collected the boxes of books, and paid me £25 for them. They pay by weight and took away half a ton of books.

In today’s post was a letter from Mrs Phillips (‘ninety-three and blind’) addressed simply to ‘Shaun Bythell, Book Dealer in Wigtown, Scotland’, which by virtue of Galloway being so unpopulated found its way here. As always, it was a request for a book for one of her great-grandchildren: this time Kidnapped, by Robert Louis Stevenson.

Till total £71

10 customers