Description

Love, Nina meets Black Books: a wry and hilarious account of life in Scotland’s biggest second-hand bookshop and the band of eccentrics and book-obsessives who work there

‘The Diary Of A Bookseller is warm (unlike Bythell’s freezing-cold shop) and funny, and deserves to become one of those bestsellers that irritate him so much.’ (Mail on Sunday)

‘Utterly compelling and Bythell has a Bennett-like eye for the amusing eccentricities of ordinary people … I urge you to buy this book and please, even at the risk of being insulted or moaned at, buy it from a real live bookseller.’ (Charlotte Heathcote Sunday Express)
Shaun Bythell owns The Bookshop, Wigtown – Scotland’s largest second-hand bookshop. It contains 100,000 books, spread over a mile of shelving, with twisting corridors and roaring fires, and all set in a beautiful, rural town by the edge of the sea. A book-lover’s paradise? Well, almost …

In these wry and hilarious diaries, Shaun provides an inside look at the trials and tribulations of life in the book trade, from struggles with eccentric customers to wrangles with his own staff, who include the ski-suit-wearing, bin-foraging Nicky. He takes us with him on buying trips to old estates and auction houses, recommends books (both lost classics and new discoveries), introduces us to the thrill of the unexpected find, and evokes the rhythms and charms of small-town life, always with a sharp and sympathetic eye.

Publisher Review

Warm, witty and laugh-out-loud funny, this gently meandering tale of British eccentricity will stay long in the memory. * Daily Mail * Funny and fascinating in equal measure - a must for all those of us who haunt the sepulchres where old books are laid to rest. * Anthony McGowan * The Diary Of A Bookseller is warm (unlike Bythell's freezing-cold shop) and funny, and deserves to become one of those bestsellers that irritate him so much. -- Jon Dennis * Mail on Sunday * Peopled with fascinating characters ... a sarcastic reminder of the struggles of small business ownership, the importance of community and the frustration of dealing with customers ... occasionally laugh-out-loud funny. * Herald * Wonderfully entertaining. * Observer * Tempted to follow your dream and open a second-hand bookshop? Don't do anything before you read Shaun Bythell ... second-hand bookshops are alive because of people like him. * The National * Utterly compelling and Bythell has a Bennett-like eye for the amusing eccentricities of ordinary people ... I urge you to buy this book and please, even at the risk of being insulted or moaned at, buy it from a real live bookseller. -- Charlotte Heathcote * Sunday Express * I tore through the pages, but I was also rather sad when it finished - I could have read much, much more. Any bibliophiles should race to get a copy. * Shiny New Books * A book and bookshop lover's delight. * Red magazine * Laconic, droll, opinionated and unconvincingly misanthropic ... Wigtown's Pepys. -- Alan Taylor * Times Literary Supplement *