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Get Breaking News on your cellLegacy Books -- and is working at a book store all that?
6:05 AM Thu, Apr 17, 2008 | Permalink
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April 2008
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I suppose this could be a sign of hard times for English majors. Or it could be a sign of the Dallas area's hunger for a new bookstore. But a spokeswoman for Legacy Books' Teri Tanner tells me that Teri had 600 e-mails, plus phone calls, some to her home, after plans for the store were unveiled last week. And many of them were from people seeking jobs. We'll have more on the store -- and some developments at the non-independent but still enjoyable local chain stores -- in months to come. But that number leads me to ask any current or former booksellers out there: Should we tell these folks what they're in for? As my many fans (hi Mom!) will recall, I did my duty behind the counter at a B. Dalton back in the day. And my two favorite questions were always, "I'm looking for a book. A green one. It was right here three months ago. Do you still have it?" And I swear I was asked, "Do you have Shakespeare in English?" On the plus side, as the junior member of the team, it was my duty to destroy unsold copies of certain "genre" books. Which I felt guilty about at first. But after a few months of shelving, and resorting, and removing, and reshelving, what appeared to be the same three books, it came to be an enjoyable task. Bookselling veterans -- can you add your own tales, for better or worse? |
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Comments
Posted by Betsy Simnacher @ 12:44 PM Thu, Apr 17, 2008
I'm so glad we are joining Denver ("Tattered Cover") and Austin ("Book People"), just to name a couple fairly nearby that I like to visit, with a mega-independent bookstore. And just after I gave up and got Amazon Prime. What's a book lover to do?
Posted by Christopher Soden @ 1:37 AM Fri, Apr 18, 2008
I cannot tell you how many times some customer raved enviously about the "privilege" of working at a bookstore and we all just rolled our eyes. I worked at Taylors and Borders for 14 + years and it's great if you don't mind daily doses of : condescension, aggression, hysteria, arrogance, idiocy and boorishness. From customers and management.
Posted by Michael Merschel @ 10:35 AM Fri, Apr 18, 2008
Most of the customers I dealt with were merely amusing. With a couple of exceptions.
There was a man I will call "Mr. Slur," who liked to have a drink or three, then come to the store and hold forth for an hour or two, then special order obscure books, which he never paid for.
There was an oddly militaristic fellow with bad teeth and a worse haircut who was always buying Garfield books. And maybe some Victorian porn as well.
And there was the angry man who insisted that we should accept his "How to Learn English" LPs as a return -- even though we did not carry records, and he had used Wite Out to cover up the initials of the person he had taken the record from.
The managers and co-workers I can't fault either. They hired me as a teenager. They have had enough punishment.
Posted by Don Ahlgren @ 7:18 PM Mon, Apr 21, 2008
I have worked in the book business in Dallas for over 30 years (still do). I have been cursed, spat on, had a Bible thrown at me, and been beaten with an umbrella by a grandmotherly type and I wouldn't trade a day of it for any other profession. Working with books and the great regular customers I have had over the years have made it all worth while.