Speculation, Fact and Fiction

Well, there's a bit of optimism around despite, or indeed, possibly because of, the Waterstone's news on closures and cut backs. Nic Bottomley who intermittently blogs as an independent bookseller for The Guardian is seeing the glass as half-full, and is off to brush up his humanities section and capitalise on the customer service that supermarketised bookshops will not be able to match. Good for him.

(There are a few doubts in the comment thread, mind you, as to how well independents can compete with online discounting.)

He mentions a new independent bookshop opening in Bath, and thanks to desperance subscribing to the online version of The Bookseller, the fuller story on that runs thus:

Robert Topping is to open a second branch of his Ely-based indie bookshop Topping & Company in Bath in mid-April. Topping was the mutinous manager of Waterstone's Deangate, who was famously dismissed in 2000 for refusing to reduce the number of books and concentrate on bestsellers. He later managed the Pan Bookshop in London before opening Topping & Company in 2003.
Three of Topping's former colleagues will make up the core of the Bath team: Saber Khan, publicity manager of the Pan Bookshop, and Kathleen Smith and Robert Jones who both worked in Waterstone's Deansgate.
The 2,000 sq ft Bath city centre site appealed to Topping because he has "always been very taken with Bath". He said: "It has a great tradition of independent bookshops and perhaps the smallest percentage of chain stores in the country."
Topping added that the intention is not to create a bookshop chain. "We're not after head office roles," he said. "We're independent booksellers who still have faith in independent bookselling." A launch party with Sebastian Faulks is scheduled for 9th May.

I hope it goes with a swing!

I wonder if they'd be interested in a SF&Fantasy evening featuring writefantastic later in the year...