That’s me. I heard it spoken as people walked past the bookshop this morning. They walk so quickly I don’t get to see them. I just see what they think.
He said, ‘Nice little bookshop. Amazing that it’s still going.’
And somebody answered, ‘True!’
I think, well, maybe not so amazing.
Back to Mark Twain. Somebody wants his autobiography – the University of California Press edition in three volumes. As if I could find that and then let it go to someone else!
A group of four sweep past the window. They are all talking hard.
A lady says, ‘Is that sexist?’
He answers, ‘I think so.’
Seven teenagers in a row, loud and clattery. Bent underneath school bags. They are all talking too loud for me to hear it, but I do hear:
‘Uluru. It’s Uluru.’
Then they are gone.
Back to Georgette Heyer and Harry Potter. Back to The Hitchhiker’s Guide. Back to Marcel Proust, Alice Munro, and Irene Nemirovsk.
The door opens and a man leans in and looks at me, retreats abruptly, closes the door. Ok.
Back to Patricia Cornwell. Back to The Odyssey.
A lady I know comes in. ‘How are you, my dear?’ I’m not coming in. I just want to know how you are.’
A man tells me all about The Barossa Valley.
Another man wants to know all about Clayton.
Back to A Gentleman in Moscow, which I have stolen from my own shelves.
Painting by Carol Marine
