A Novel Bookstore by Laurence Cossé

Author:Laurence Cossé
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Europa

By the end of the third week, the bookstore had already found its clientele. From the first to the last day of autumn, it was never empty.

Right from the beginning of September, encouraging articles appeared in the newspapers, but the opening of a bookstore is not exactly headline news, and however laudable an undertaking it may be, and however risky, it is usually described in economic rather than lyrical terms.

What was decisive, something that neither Doultremont’s experts, nor the advertising agency, nor the quivering press attachés had foreseen, was how much was discussed on the Internet. Right from the opening on Monday, and never letting up thereafter, a powder trail led from blog to Web site and from chat room to forum, presenting The Good Novel in terms so passionate that readers were bound to be taken by an irrepressible desire to go and see for themselves. It’s marvelous, Go check it out right away, The secret we are burning to reveal: the panegyrics bordered on literary criticism in their form, accumulating the most conventional clichés in their own way. Basically, they all shared the same idea: At last! At last a bookstore where only superb novels are to be found. At last a real choice. At last you can be sure you won’t be disappointed.

By then—mid-September—the press was treating this development like a news event. Radio stations broadcast their reports, and then, always last, television channels ran images that showed strictly nothing, and Ivan’s sentences were amputated of their beginning and their end, not to mention every nuance, so they no longer meant a thing.

Nevertheless, the effect was positive. Sales continued to in­crease. The accompanying advertising that Francesca had plan­ned turned out to be unnecessary. Oscar was a virtuoso on the Web, and by the end of the month he had taken charge of online sales and orders. He became the champion of restocking—so quick and precise at recording orders and sales, so friendly with the couriers, who were an essential element of the circuit and well aware of it—and he used the space on the rue Dupuytren to such good effect, that very rarely were they out of anything. During these first weeks, Ivan recognized among their customers four of the Parisian members of their committee, who had come incognito to see the results of their contributions, to see what success, something they did not know, looked like. Ivan, who was usually so naturally friendly and cheerful, found himself face to face one day at the cash register with Larry de Winter, and he would not smile: after the fact he realized he’d been afraid he might give something away. But he could not restrain a fit of giggles when the older gentleman gave him a very amateurish wink, so exaggerated that his head and the top of his body jerked forward, as if someone were pushing him roughly from behind.

Many of the buyers became regulars. Oscar and Van noticed the ones who came several times a week. The member cards that Anis had inspired were printed up.

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