The Diary of a Bookseller

Love, Nina meets Black Books: a wry and hilarious account of life in Scotland’s biggest second-hand bookshop and the band of eccentrics and book-obsessives who work there

‘The Diary Of A Bookseller is warm (unlike Bythell’s freezing-cold shop) and funny, and deserves to become one of those bestsellers that irritate him so much.’ (Mail on Sunday)

‘Utterly compelling and Bythell has a Bennett-like eye for the amusing eccentricities of ordinary people … I urge you to buy this book and please, even at the risk of being insulted or moaned at, buy it from a real live bookseller.’ (Charlotte Heathcote Sunday Express)
Shaun Bythell owns The Bookshop, Wigtown – Scotland’s largest second-hand bookshop. It contains 100,000 books, spread over a mile of shelving, with twisting corridors and roaring fires, and all set in a beautiful, rural town by the edge of the sea. A book-lover’s paradise? Well, almost …

In these wry and hilarious diaries, Shaun provides an inside look at the trials and tribulations of life in the book trade, from struggles with eccentric customers to wrangles with his own staff, who include the ski-suit-wearing, bin-foraging Nicky. He takes us with him on buying trips to old estates and auction houses, recommends books (both lost classics and new discoveries), introduces us to the thrill of the unexpected find, and evokes the rhythms and charms of small-town life, always with a sharp and sympathetic eye.