Bookshop baloney

This Christmas seems particularly GRRsome to me. Not sure why, perhaps it always does. At work on Saturday my irritation felt like a nagging toothache. I don't think it showed though - at least, not to the customers. 


I work on the first floor and am often puzzled by how many people are surprised to hear the book they want is on a different floor above.
"You have another floor?"
"Yes, we have five floors in all."
"That's ridiculous!"
Ridiculous? Really? 
Or
"On the next floor?"
"Yes."
"How do I get there?"
"We have stairs," I gesture with a sweep of my arm. "Or a lift just here."
"For god's sakes."


So many people so cross that there are more floors. The coffee shop on the third floor? Tsk. Reference on fourth? Tut. How do they cope in department stores?


Then there are the people who ask "Where can I find so and so?" I look it up on the computer and confirm that we have a copy, or several.
"On the next floor up, on the left. You can ask the assistant at the counter and they will show you."
"Right. Thanks."
And I watch them head down the stairs and out of the shop.


A man handed his book to me to scan and it set off our alarm. Deactivating the tag requires me to rub the book over the desktop where the machine beneath does its duty. 
"Don't rub my book."
"I'm sorry ..."
I sympathised, I like my books pristine too. The book doesn't get damaged though. He paid the £9.99 with a £10 Waterstone's gift card. I told him he had one penny left on the card and handed it to him.
"Where's my penny?"
I repeated that it was on his card.
"Don't you dare try to cheat me out of my penny. I know my rights. Where's my one pence? I DEMAND my money."
Sigh.


A regular customer comes in. I haven't seen him for a while. He travels for over an hour on the bus to visit us but he's ill, and his illness has worsened. He's not sure he'll be able to keep  coming. Then another man tells me about the disease that is killing him. 


My colleague took a phone call from a woman wanting a poetry book that she thought might have a blue cover. Yup, that's totally not a bookshop myth, it's a thing that happens regularly.


A guy asked me for a Kindle Voucher. Erm… nope, not gone be selling one of them.
"That's like asking for a Starbucks Gingerbread Latte in a Costa Coffee," said another customer. 

Then she said...

A woman came into the bookshop a year or so ago. She spoke really fast.
"You got that book about Madeleine McCann? That one about Madeleine McCann? You know, the book about the little girl, Madeleine McCann?"
We told her that Madeleine by Kate McCann was due to be published in May 2011. She returned the following week.
"You got that book about Madeleine McCann?"
The woman continued to return intermittently, always repeating the same questions, always getting the same answer. Eventually the book was published. A few months passed until the customer came in and made her usual request. Triumphantly a bookseller fetched the book and placed it in the customer's hands. She barely glanced at it.
"No, I don't think that's what I'm after."

A self-published author asked if we had her book. I was pleased to say yes and take her over to the shelf where her book is a face out with a local author sign highlighting it. She was unhappy. She said she wanted her book in the window. I tried to explain that we have many, many books. I could not have been more patient. She flung an arm out and one of her nails left a long scratch on my arm.
"I am old," she said. "You should put my book in your window. Now what are you going to do about it?"

A woman approached the counter with a book from our 3 for 2 offer.
"Have you got a copy of this book without a sticker on?"
"I can just take the sticker off?"
"I would like one without a sticker on."
I peeled the sticker off.

Five bits of blether

1) I subbed a few bits and bobs last week; the first time I have done so in what seems like an age. I got my first acceptance of the year today. It's for a tiny bit o' word play, nothing big or clever, but I am pleased. It's a start.


2) This week there were less people coming into the bookshop and brandishing out of print books that they claim to have received as unwanted Christmas presents. The whole exchange/refund thing becomes an awkward business in January. Sometimes you get people coming in with a big glossy hardback that they assume was bought at full price. Without a receipt we will offer an exchange for the price we sold the book at during December. Telling someone that their sister or whoever actually only paid £8 not £16 always makes me squirm. And the person trying to exchange an out of print book? Did someone buy them a gift from a bargain bookshop or are they just trying their luck with an unwanted book they had on their own shelves? Either way it makes me feel a little uncomfortable.


3) I apologise to the man who asked for the erotica section. I really didn't hear you. I didn't mean to make you shout "I want erotica" that loudly.


4) I apologise to the man buying the butt fucking anthology. The price on the back was in dollars and I had to type the isbn into my computer to get the price in sterling.


5) Radio 3's The Verb is running a short story competition judged by Janice Galloway. The winning entry will be read out on a future show. No bucks, no trophy, but plenty of kudos, no?

This month is the 150th anniversary of the birth of Anton Chekhov, doctor, playwright - and master of the short story. He wrote hundreds of them, often very quickly, and many have become enduring and influential classics: The Lady with the Dog, Kashtanka, and The Kiss to name but a few.

As part of Radio 3's Chekhov season, The Verb would like you to send us an original short story of 1000 words, using one of the following Chekhov titles:

1. The Lady with the Dog
2. Difficult People
3. The Lottery Ticket

Please don’t call your story Difficult Dogs, or The Lady with the Ticket! These will not be considered. You don’t have to use the same characters, or setting – you don’t even have to have read the original story - but we will be awarding points for a certain Chekhovian spirit. Please check our terms and conditions, below, before sending your entry to:

theverb@bbc.co.uk

or:

The Verb,
Room 7045,
Broadcasting House,
Portland Place,
London W1A 1AA

The closing date of the competition is 5th February.

Person comes into the bookshop and says...

1) Person comes into the bookshop and says "I have written a book. Who do I get to publish it please?"


2) Person comes into the bookshop and says "I am an author and I am prepared to do an event here."


3) Person comes into bookshop and says "I was in here a few weeks ago and saw a book on that table over there. It was browny red I think. What was it?"


4) Person comes into the bookshop and says "Three for two? Oh that's typical, it's the cheapest one that's free. Tut."

And the bad...

If last Saturday was traditionally the busiest, this Saturday was the grumpiest. What the fuck was wrong with everyone? In they came in their hoards, searching out bargains, spending their chrismas gift cards, grim faced and utterly pissed off. I don't get it. Nobody forced them to go shopping, presumably they have had a couple of days off work, and unlike me were still off. They had money to spend, and there were (still are) some ace bargains to buy.

Nothing was good enough. If a book was half price it still wasn't a bargain. If it was hardback they wanted paperback, if it was paperback they wanted hardback. A man furiously jiggled a baby in a sling whilst firing questions at me, as soon as I tried to find the answer on the computer he would hiss "I have to go, I have a baby", and then ask another question.

A stereotypical dirty old man mumbled that he wanted something I couldn't hear, and finally spelled out E R O T I C. I took him to the erotic fiction shelf and left him moaning to himself. All this time a christian (yes, he told me he was) man circled my counter for over an hour, pausing occasionaly to tell me how much he appreciated the help I gave him. His breath was foul, and I recoiled each time he puffed more thanks my way.

My utter twunt of the day award goes to the woman who came in and asked to exchange a book. She had no receipt but it was a book we stocked she said, and she wanted to swap it for another by the same author. No problem. She told me I probably wouldn't know the author, as she has quite unusual taste. Righto.

It was Murakami.

Murakami!

I know who he is, I told her. Which book did you want?
She said she didn't know the title but that it was something running.
Oh, I said, that's going to be on the third floor in sports.
No, she replied, it's fiction. FICTION.
She ennunciated each letter.
No, it's about running. I said. I felt myself get hot and red and pissed off. It's called "What I talk about when I talk about running." Running is a passion of his.
He is a FICTION writer she insisted.
Yes he is, but he has also written this non-fiction book, so we don't keep it in the fiction section.
I have read lots of Murakami, he is a fiction writer.
Yes, and I sell fiction books, I work in a bookshop, and I know what I am doing! The book is in the running section in Sports.
Oh, well, I don't want it then.
And she left.
No apology, no embarrassment.

Still, at least no-one soiled themselves this week!

Two bookshop conversations (a tiny glimpse into the world of a bookseller.)

Grey haired, tall, loud, brusque man "Where do you keep your essays?"
Me "What were you looking for?"
"You know, not made up stuff."
"Hmmm. What subject? History? Politics? Literary criticism? Biography...?"
"It's for my son. He's 15 and doesn't like made up stuff. I want essays."
"Well, on the 4th floor we have xyz, on 3rd we have xyz, on second we have xyz..."
"Oh just forget it."
"Righto."


Mid 30's woman examining Sony reader ~ "You know what would be good?"
Me ~ "Nope."
"If they invented something that could say the words of the story aloud."
"Erm, like a talking book?"
"Yes."
"We-e-ell, we do sell cd's of books. They are just here." Gestures towards audio books.
"No. NO. With pictures too. For children."
"Oh, right. How old? We sell books with cd's for children on the next floor up."
"No. Not books, The pictures are too flat. Moving pictures, and a story."
I think, hmmm, call me crazy, but doesn't that sound like a television?