Books About Bookshops

In which I tell you about my sordid past working in a bookstore

I’m going to tell you a secret. I once worked in a bookshop. The reason it’s a secret is because that was the only job I was ever fired from. That’s right, a bookstore was involved in one of the biggest humiliations of my life.

I was in my early twenties and, despite the fact that I had a bachelor’s degree in Comparative Literature, I was working as an accounting clerk. In a fit of an identity crisis, I decided I needed to quit my high paying job and get into the world of books. Afterall, I had planned to be a literary agent at one time and still wanted to work in publishing or anything that had to do with books.

So, I marched off to Pasadena, California, where a very big bookstore chain (who shall remain nameless) was putting in a huge store and hiring. I was hired on the spot.

The job was a nightmare from the beginning. The manager and I didn’t click. In hindsight, I was likely a little too enthusiastic, maybe even a little too full of myself-I was after all twenty-three years old. (Weren’t we all too smug back then?) In the business world, this aggressive, career-driven attitude was praised. In a retail situation, I scared the sh*t out of the manager. I think he saw me as someone who was gunning for his job rather than someone he could harness and use to make himself look good. But this isn’t a story about management styles, so moving on. (See? Even now I’m bossy.)

After three miserable months of helping to stock and open the store, then working through the Christmas rush, I was laid-off (fired) just a few days before the new year. I was horrified. I prided myself on my work ethic and I worked hard. Within two weeks, I was back in my old accounting job and I stayed in the business world for the next twelve years, rising to the top of my industry, until I had my daughter and left.

I can’t help but wonder what might have happened if I hadn’t been sidelined from my dreams of working with books, but there is nothing I can do about that now and so, here I am, writing and reading and dreaming about books as a career again.

Considering my sordid history with bookstores, you would think I wouldn’t like to read about them, but I do. Maybe it’s that I feel I can live my bookstore clerk/owner dreams through novels and that has gotten me through some tough days. Here are a few of my favorites. Some of them aren’t great literature, but as long there’s a good description of a cozy bookshop and quirky, book-loving main character, I’m in.

The Bookshop on the Corner by Jenny Colgan

“Because every day with a book is slightly better than one without, and I wish you nothing but the happiest of days.’-Jenny Colgan

The first thing you will notice about this book is that it is not a book about a bookstore on a corner but rather a bookstore in a van. I have no idea why it was so poorly named. I read that it was named such only for the American version, so something must gotten lost in the translation? Which is weird because the author is British, so it shouldn’t have been too hard to translate the title. The main character leaves her London life and miserable ex-boyfriend to start life in a small Scottish town, driving around a mobile bookshop. It is rainy, there are descriptions of delicious foods and a rented apartment that is in a barn of a handsome farmer’s land. It’s absolutely a favorite that I read whenever I need something that doesn’t take too much brainpower. I can read it a sitting or two as long as I have tea and some cookies and a warm blanket with me.

I also recommend these books by Jenny Colgan (also about bookshops): The Bookshop on the Shore (Yes! This one really is on the shore! Of a Scottish Lock no less!) and The Christmas Bookshop (Which makes me want to get on a plane to Edinburgh in time for Christmas.)

The Little Paris Bookshop by Nina George

“Perdu reflected that it was a common misconception that booksellers looked after books. They look after people.” -Nina George

Again, with the misleading title! What is with this genre? This bookshop is on a canal boat, floating on the Seine. Yet, its time docking in Paris is short. Anyway. It’s another sweet book. The owner of the book boat is Monsieur Perdu and he has a knack for fixing broken hearts by recommending just the book a person needs to move on. Of course, this only works for others and he seems unable to mend his own broken heart, so he pulls up anchor and heads down the canals of France, searching for a way to find inner peace. This is a melancholy book at times, but it stuck with me enough that, when we were in France this summer, and we would drive over the canals in the countryside, I would think of Monsieur Perdu.

The Bookshop by Penelope Fitzgerald

“A good book is the precious life-blood of a master-spirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life, and as such it must surely be a necessary commodity.” -Penelope Fitzgerald

This is probably the most highbrow on today’s list of books about bookshops. It was a short-listed for the Booker Prize-if that makes a difference to you. A middle-aged widow opens a bookstore in a small beachside village in England. The only trouble? It’s damp (not great for books), haunted, and a wealthy villager wants the building to open an art center.

The book was written in the late 1970s but still has a modern feel. I love all the quirky village inhabitants and the writing is lovely. If you don’t feel like reading it, you can watch a very good adaptation of it in a 2017 film of the same name.

Now it’s your turn! Tell me your favorite books about bookshops.