5 New Books About Bookstores

The Bookshop: A History of the American Bookstore

In 1993, there were 13,499 bookstores in America; in 2021, there were 5,591. Yet historian Friss (On Bicycles) offers an upbeat and immersive take on bookselling’s much ballyhooed demise; “bookstores have never felt more alive,” he asserts (he also cites a famous quip made by a bookseller in 1961 that books have “been a dying business for 5,000 years”). Friss’s jampacked account spans from early America to the present day, beginning with precursors to the modern bookstore like Benjamin Franklin’s Philadelphia printshop (where the first novel was printed in America—Samuel Richardson’s Pamela) and Boston literary hangout The Old Corner (where Nathaniel Hawthorne liked to loiter), and ending with chapters on Amazon Books and Ann Patchett’s Parnassus in Nashville, Tenn. (Friss gleefully notes that, while Amazon closed all of its 24 brick-and-mortar stores by 2022, Parnassus has experienced double-digit growth since it 2011 founding). Along the way, he chronicles the history of over a dozen notable bookstores (many of them now-defunct New York greats, like the Midtown modernist stronghold Gotham Book Mart and the Greenwich Village paragon of gay rights activism Oscar Wilde), interspersing these chapters with ruminations on the role of the buyer, the importance of the UPS driver, and other bits of bookstore arcana that refreshingly focus on the behind-the-scenes experience of bookselling. It’s an entrancing deep dive into the book industry, reports of whose death have been greatly exaggerated. (Aug.)

The British Booksellers

In this memorable blend of romance and WWII history, Cambron (The Paris Dressmaker) chronicles the devastation of the Coventry blitz and its impact on two budding couples. Widowed Lady Charlotte Terrington-Holt and Amos Darby own rival bookshops in 1940 Coventry, England, but put their competing interests aside to offer tea to residents recovering from nights spent in air raid shelters. As they work together, Amos’s feelings for Charlotte reignite: he had once hoped to marry her, but then the Earl of Harcourt swept in. Meanwhile, the arrival of Detroit lawyer Jacob Cole adds to the chaos. He’s in England to prevent Charlotte’s grown daughter, Eden, from claiming a mysterious inheritance left to her in his father’s will—but he finds himself taken with the young lady and soon joins the efforts to keep the Holt estate operating while the farm hands are off at war. Both couples hope for futures together—if they can survive the bombing. Cambron brings a great deal of authenticity to her rendering of Coventry’s “Forgotten Blitz” (which took place almost 100 miles from London), as the tumult and trauma of wartime make class disparity and past misunderstandings wash away, leaving only authentic emotion. Readers won’t be able to turn the pages fast enough. Agent: Rachelle Gardner, Rachelle Gardner Literary. (Apr.)

The Secret Lives of Booksellers and Librarians: True Stories of the Magic of Reading

Bestseller Patterson and his frequent coauthor Eversmann follow up 2023’s Walk the Blue Line with a lighthearted compendium of first-person reflections from librarians and booksellers about their work and passion for literature. Most entries consist of easygoing odes to reading, as when one Texas Barnes & Noble inventory specialist discusses how she loves to get young children interested in books by reading aloud to them during story time. Alexis Sky, owner of two Albany-area bookstores, describes the satisfaction she derives from getting to know customers’ tastes, even going so far as to put aside new titles she thinks a regular might like until their next visit. A few more substantial entries tackle how a hostile political climate has made librarians’ jobs more difficult. For instance, Texas library consultant Carolyn Foote recounts how she organized a social media campaign to push back against Texas legislators’ attempts to remove books about racial diversity and gender from library shelves. However, such stories are the exception in a frothy volume largely focused on earnest if banal paeans to the written word (“Handing someone a book with the power to change their lives is magical because, oftentimes, it does,” opines a Florida reference librarian). Pleasant if somewhat trite, this will be comfort food for bookworms. Agent: Robert Barnett, Williams & Connolly. (Apr.)

The Untold Story of Books: A Writer’s History of Book Publishing

Health science writer Castleman (Sizzling Sex for Life) presents a sweeping 600-year chronicle of the book business, which he contends has gone through “three distinct epochs with three different economic strategies.” The first began with Johannes Gutenberg’s invention of the printing press in 1450, which made it possible to mass produce books even as low literacy rates meant that few sold (Gutenberg went bankrupt after failing to sell enough bibles to repay his creditor). Authors contracted directly with printers until the introduction of industrial machinery in the late 19th century made book production more efficient yet more expensive, which incentivized authors to sign with newly established publishing companies who could handle the higher costs. The third epoch covers such 21st-century developments as the return of self-publishing and the shift of power from publishers to Amazon, which demands wholesale discounts and “promotional fees” from publishers in exchange for increasing the visibility of titles on its platform. Fascinating detours explore the establishment of copyright protections in the 16th century and the seedy origins of book reviewing in the early 19th century (reviewers usually took bribes from publishers and threatened pans if not advanced payment), and Castleman provides a rousing account of how independent bookstores have bounced back over the past decade by “embracing the three C’s: community, curation, and convening.” Bibliophiles will be enthralled. (July)

Village Voices: A Memoir of the Village Voice Bookshop

This rich collection of interviews with and profiles of authors who gave readings at Hellier’s English-language bookshop, which she operated in Paris’s sixth arrondissement from 1981 to 2012, presents a stimulating portrait of the Parisian literary scene replete with transporting photographs and gentle gossip. The life of Hellier’s store dovetailed with the “Third Wave” of American expats in Paris, which brought countercultural figures including Kathy Acker, along with writers including David Sedaris and James Ellroy. Hellier fastidiously catalogs each author’s activities at the shop, compiling snippets of q&as she conducted from the ’80s through the early aughts, many of which portend contemporary conversations about identity (Sherman Alexie recalls being “amazed” after reading poems by Native authors for the first time) and political correctness, which Jay McInerney says he hates. An earnest and modest host (almost to a fault, as she hardly shares anything about her personal life), Hellier lets her generosity shine through, as when she expresses gratitude for being able to send Samuel Beckett an Oxford English Dictionary at his retirement home. While the sheer number of names and titles on offer can be dizzying, it’s all but impossible to finish this compendium without adding, excitedly, to one’s own reading list. For literature lovers, it’s a feast. Photos. (Sept.)

Correction: An earlier version of this review misspelled the author’s last name.