INDIE CEMETERY

I've just completed marketing the latest Plaister Press book to UK independent bookshops. This year I thought I should phone before mailing anything off, just to check who was still there and who wasn't. Booksellers were happy to talk about their shops:
'Yes, we're still here -just' - many said.
A few said 'Things are improving,' but others were reducing their opening hours or just there until Christmas before retiring or looking for someone else to take over. The worst call was hearing the automated voice tell me ‘this number is no longer in service.’ Fearing the worst, I would then google the bookshop before adding it to the indie cemetery. Below are three of the casualties.

And here are some of the very sad headstones:

‘End of an era for…’

‘Final chapter ends for…’

‘Family bookshop to close…’

‘A family bookshop is being liquidated after 30 years…’

‘Book lovers have been stunned by the news that the landmark bookshop will shut its doors for the last time…’

‘…closes after 112 years in town.’

‘Owner blames internet and supermarket competition…’

This image in sepia makes the high street independent bookshop look very much a thing of the past.

‘If you don’t use it, you’ll lose it’ someone said about another closure -Horatio's bookshop.
And that sums up the problem.