The Diary of a Bookseller

Shaun Bythell's psycho charm is funny at first, but it soon becomes annoying. It's almost like there's a division between bookseller and reader (in my case, someone who spends a third of his income on books). And that division is Money.

This was recommended to me by a friend about 6 months ago, and I picked up a copy relatively cheaply the other day, and I am glad I did.This is a very easy read, and an entertaining one too. It is diarised (as you might expect from the title), with each daily entry ranging from a paragraph to a page or two at most. Each day we are told how many online orders are received, and how many of those can be fulfilled (eg books found to fill the order - not always all of the orders!). We then get the explanation of the events of the day, and finally the till total, and number of customers served.So the body of the text is the days events. These will include amusing, foolish or just interesting customer conversations, issues with the staff, Shaun's book buying expeditions, and Shaun's day in general. Each month begins with a quotation from [a:George Orwell 3706 George Orwell https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1450573063p2/3706.jpg]'s [b:Bookshop Memories 20681099 Bookshop Memories George Orwell https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1444423787s/20681099.jpg 39979312], which will now be a book I will look out for.There are of course numerous literary references, the book Shaun is reading is mentioned, there is some coverage of rare or expensive books, and a good deal of explanation about the Amazon behemoth and AbeBooks. Online sales are a large part of the business for a second hand book shop nowdays, and that was probably the most interesting thing I gained understanding from with this book.Other reviewers have not found this book funny, and have accused the author of being sarcastic and rude. I enjoyed his sarcastic rudeness, and it is hard to feel the behavior or ignorance of those on the receiving end didn't provide some justification, so I was fine with it. There is of course, repetition, but this a diary and like most peoples lives, days are often the same. It takes real skill to omit the mundane repetition but leave enough events to frame the day, and there is perhaps a little room for improvement here. I wasn't overly troubled by it.So, an entertaining two day read, for me 4 stars.