The sign on the door says open most days. That is accurate. Some afternoons the owner closes early to go swimming; some evenings she stays open past nine because a conversation is going well.
There is no computer at the till, only a notebook in which she writes down every book she sells and to whom. When you come back, she remembers what you bought last time and whether you liked it, and she will tell you, kindly but firmly, what to read next.
I have never left with the book I came in for. I have never regretted it.
A bookshop is not a shop that sells books. It is a person who reads them for you first.
