Your Crazy Caring Bookseller
As someone who has dedicated my life to working in bookstores for over 13 years, you'd think it would be easy to espouse the virtues of why, exactly, they are so important.
It is, but they are numerous.
So let me start with an admission of sorts. I WENT INTO BOOKSELLING BECAUSE I WAS SELFISH!
I know. I know. I'm the manager of a bookstore that is part of a non-profit organization that promotes reading. Reading as an important life skill. Reading as essential to survival and success in our society and as a path to a fulfilling cultural experience and lifelong curiosity. Those are the reasons I choose to work where I work. But let's, for a second, look at my selfish reasons for working in books.
Strip it down, and it comes down to this. I love ideas. I love discovering new ways of looking at things. I love having my beliefs challenged and my rote routines broken and shattered by the next amazing book I read. And I love telling people about the books I love.Â
It wasn't until I worked in independent bookstores for a while that I learned it wasn't all about me. Here's the thing. Here's the dirty little secret. Booksellers, as a symptom of their passion for books, tend to be a little inside of themselves sometimes. Many of us are awkward. We're overrun by the multiple lives in the books we've read that continue to live in our heads. By all accounts, we are a little bit crazy! In fact, most bookstores are staffed with delightfully crazy people sharing their passionate internal lives with each other for 8-hours a day and unleashing that highly explosive concoction on the unassuming public in sporadic bursts.
And that's just one of the reasons you should visit your local independent bookstore.
Sure, there are booksellers out there who only see units and dollar signs and worry endlessly about profit margins. Let's not delude ourselves. It is called the book industry for a reason. This is a business, but contrary to popular trends, this is not a business built on the lowest prices, the fastest delivery and the most automated customer service recordings. Instead, it is a business built on all of the things that many business books make sound silly. Bookselling is built on passion and care and love for the importance of books.Â
At its core, this industry is about people. The people who write the books. The people who read the books. The people who curate the stock of books. And the people who discuss, recommend, and rave excitedly about these books.
Sometimes it gets a bit muddy, but step into any of the nine independent bookstores participating in Chicago Independent Bookstore Day this year, and I guarantee the distinct personality of the space, store, and selection will help you see those things in a genuine light.
Here's another secret. Most of us booksellers? We're trying very very hard to earn your trust. We both selflessly want you to be happy and selfishly want you to fall in love with the books we hold dear. That takes work. A lot of hard work. While some of us are prone to pushing our most beloved and favorite esoteric novel on you sometimes, we also want you to walk away with a book you will glean something from, whether that is a challenge, an enjoyment, a new way of looking at the world, or a simple story that helps you rest at night. Despite our strongly held opinions on certain books (And boy, do we have them! Spend some time talking to us and you will hear all about it!), we will go the distance to earn your trust.Â
I've known several of the booksellers here in Chicago to do such things as inquire as to the intricate reading history and progression of a customer in order to fit the perfect book to them, run breathlessly down the street to return a forgotten wallet or phone, draw up lists and maps of the best local eateries, hail taxis while soaking wet in the rain while a customer uses their umbrella, and even purchase a book for a customer using the minimal funds in their own pocket because they believed wholeheartedly that it would change their life.
Even when it all seems hopeless, I've made the best out of a failed recommendation. I once knew a customer who would regularly come into the store and ask me which books IÂ disliked and purchase them immediately. I earned his trust through my honest opinions. None of which he shared. Judge all you want. We made it work.
Believe it or not, bookselling isn't for slumps. Neither are indie bookshops. Yes, some of us did end up in this world haphazardly like Rob and his record store in High Fidelity, but our experience working with the literature we love and enriching the reading lives of others has provided many of us with a fine mix of humility and pride that anyone would be lucky to experience in their job.
Independent bookstores are for passionate, engaged, and caring members of society with curiosity and opinions about the written word.  They are for people who view both their own growth as people and relaxing escapism as valuable. They are for people who want a meeting place for ideas and opinions. They are for people who are curious and engaged. They are for people, like you and me, who want to be connected to an important discovery or an old favorite we might have forgotten in the busy day to day. They are for those who want to be connected. Period.Â
I'm speaking first hand when I say that the bookselling community in Chicago is small but mighty, and filled with remarkably unique individuals that can make your life (reading or otherwise) a better one. I'm lucky to be a part of it. Most of all, I'm lucky that our customers see the value of keeping Independent bookstores a part of their community.Â
Yes. It's about books. Books, however, have always been about people.
I hope you will celebrate with me on July 12th by visiting any or all of the stores participating in Chicago Independent Bookstore Day.Â
Say hello to the person behind the counter. They're good people.Â
