olympia
Waiting forever for punters
This year's Olympia Book Fair, were you there? My mission was to spot Jeremy Paxman (who sentimentally wrote in the event pamphlet that secondhand bookshops provide accidental delights in comparison to Internet book orders), and treat myself with one of those delicious blueberry muffins offered last year. Paxman was no where to be seen (SR saw him on Thursday), but the muffin was just as yummy. We shared a stand with a bookseller who deals with books about the North and South Pole, yet nothing in between. Can't think of anything particularly interesting or annoying, except a middle-aged man who wore red sneakers sat in my chair, took a book from our shelf, and started looking at it from page 1 till the index, and after making himself comfortable in our 'reference library', he started from the introduction again. Did he generously take out his cheque book? Of course not. I often wonder why booksellers bother sitting hours at the fair selling a few books and finally packing and carrying more heavy tomes back to the shop again? One bookseller, however, had a much easier life. Specialising in writers' autographs and letters, he simply had to take the thin pieces of paper down the shelf and put them safely in his briefcase, and off he went in style.