Shelf Life

Doesn't it just fry your bacon when someone writes the book that you had intended to write but just never got around to? I spent 17 years managing stores for the big chains, had my own bookstore for a while and still occasionally drop a little something on eBay. Droll stories and anecdotes? I got 'em. So, Ms. Shea waltzes into her neighborhood independent bookstore, fiddles around for a year part time, and voila! A book. Jealous? Who, me? Of course I am!

Suzanne Shea is an author who has spent quite a bit of time doing author tours, in and out of hundred of bookstore. A bout of breast cancer knocked her world out from underneath her feet. She landed wobbly, but on her feet. Exhausted, depressed and suffering form writers block, she was sort of drafted into working in her neighborhood bookstore. Up the escalator "...into a small, family owned independent bookstore in a half-dark, half-closed urban mall..." Ms. Shea describes a year in the life of the bookstore from holiday display to holiday display. You find out along the way how the book business works and that reports of the demise of the independent bookseller have been greatly exaggerated. But you also learn the importance and impact of books in Ms. Shea's life and the life of the customers in the bookstore. The author is familiar with the territory of books as a writer and books as a reader, but books as a business is uncharted waters that she sails courageously into. This is a thoughtful well-written and entertaining book . Much to my relief, Ms. Shea didn't tell all the good stories about the book business. She left me a few good ones for my own venture into writing and publishing.