The Diary of a Bookseller Synopsis
Shaun Bythell owns The Bookshop, Wigtown - Scotland's largest second-hand bookshop. It contains 100,000 books, spread over a mile of shelving, with twisting corridors and roaring fires, and all set in a beautiful, rural town by the edge of the sea. A book-lover's paradise? Well, almost ... In these wry and hilarious diaries, Shaun provides an inside look at the trials and tribulations of life in the book trade, from struggles with eccentric customers to wrangles with his own staff, who include the ski-suit-wearing, bin-foraging Nicky. He takes us with him on buying trips to old estates and auction houses, recommends books (both lost classics and new discoveries), introduces us to the thrill of the unexpected find, and evokes the rhythms and charms of small-town life, always with a sharp and sympathetic eye.
About This Edition
| ISBN: |
9781781258637 |
| Publication date: |
25th July 2018 |
| Author: |
Shaun Bythell |
| Publisher: |
Profile Books Ltd |
| Format: |
Paperback |
| Pagination: |
310 pages |
| Primary Genre |
Biographies & Autobiographies
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| Other Genres: |
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| Recommendations: |
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Shaun Bythell Press Reviews
Warm, witty and laugh-out-loud funny, this gently meandering tale of British eccentricity will stay long in the memory. - Daily Mail
Funny and fascinating in equal measure - a must for all those of us who haunt the sepulchres where old books are laid to rest. - Anthony McGowan
The Diary Of A Bookseller is warm (unlike Bythell's freezing-cold shop) and funny, and deserves to become one of those bestsellers that irritate him so much. -- Jon Dennis - Mail on Sunday
Peopled with fascinating characters ... a sarcastic reminder of the struggles of small business ownership, the importance of community and the frustration of dealing with customers ... occasionally laugh-out-loud funny. - Herald
Wonderfully entertaining. - Observer
Tempted to follow your dream and open a second-hand bookshop? Don't do anything before you read Shaun Bythell ... second-hand bookshops are alive because of people like him. - The National
Utterly compelling and Bythell has a Bennett-like eye for the amusing eccentricities of ordinary people ... I urge you to buy this book and please, even at the risk of being insulted or moaned at, buy it from a real live bookseller. -- Charlotte Heathcote - Sunday Express
I tore through the pages, but I was also rather sad when it finished - I could have read much, much more. Any bibliophiles should race to get a copy. - Shiny New Books
A book and bookshop lover's delight. - Red magazine
Laconic, droll, opinionated and unconvincingly misanthropic ... Wigtown's Pepys. -- Alan Taylor - Times Literary Supplement
