WHY THE NOVICE BOOKSELLER?

As retail jobs go, bookselling is a rare one. There is a unique joy and magic to the job. Once, an investment banker at a dinner party starting gushing when I revealed I was a bookseller. "I've always wanted to work at a bookstore!", goes the common refrain. Books bring people together in an intimate and immediate way like nothing else can. Bookselling lets you share the reads that have expanded your world to fellow readers who trust you. You contribute to the dialogue around books, why some feel necessary and others are mere noise . You serendipitously come across titles, you swap recommendations with your colleagues. Through simple osmosis, the world broadens. With each conversation, you participate in the spread of ideas and stories that show you a different facet of life. In a small way, you get to pass that magic on.

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This is inevitable when we consider what we look to books for. In non-fiction, we look for ideas, information, new ways of making sense of the world around us. Through novels, we seek out new worlds, we glean truths about our human condition, we find solace in stories that remind us we are not alone. To (badly) paraphrase Rilke, books teach us how to tease out the poetry of life, to call forth its glories.

I first had the idea of 'The Novice Bookseller' blog when I started bookselling at a cluster of independent bookstores in London. I found myself working with career booksellers, those rare beasts who have forged a profession from a dwindling art. I felt extremely green yet boundlessly excited for all I could learn from my colleagues. Through The Novice Bookseller, I wanted to record all the things I was to learn, all the conversations I was yet to have, and the people I was to meet. 

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So, this blog is an attempt to capture the essence of bookselling. That is, to simply share book thoughts and contribute in the same small but exciting way to the wider conversation. These are the opinions and reflections of a bookseller and fellow book lover; someone who is still seeking to learn new ways of looking at and engaging with books. Hopefully, it can recreate a glimmer of what is always found between the shelves of a good bookshop: wonder, comfort, and the allure of the about-to-be known. I hope you find something new you can get lost in. I hope in some quiet way it can make us all feel less alone.