Kevin had arrived at journey’s end! He had flown hundreds of miles, and eaten thousands of biscuits. Now Max Minerva’s Marvellous Books in Bristol
was to be the final stop on his great bookshop tour. His best friend
Daisy joined him for the last leg of the journey, and when they swooped
down outside Max Minerva’s there was his other best friend Max waiting
in the doorway.
“Well done, Kevin!” shouted Max, as Kevin touched down. “You’ve visited fourteen whole bookshops! What have you learned?”
Kevin looked a bit blank. “Biscuits?” he said.
“Never mind,” laughed Max. “Come inside, and meet Jess, she’s one of the booksellers here.”
So
Kevin followed him in. He had no idea why he had been asking
booksellers all over the country the same list of questions, but it
usually seemed to end up with biscuits, so he thought he would give it
one more go. When Max introduced him to bookseller Jessica Paul, he clered his throat and put on his best interviewing voice.
Kevin: What is the best thing about being a bookseller?
Jess: Matching a book with a person and hearing all about how much they love their new find!
Kevin: What’s one way you’ve tackled a problem that your bookshop has faced during the pandemic?
Jess:
We realised how many people were searching for us online, so we
converted our website into a fully functioning e-commerce platform and
offered click and collect to save on those postage ££!
Kevin: What are three books you absolutely love hand-selling to customers?
Jess: A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles - never fails. Mortal Engines for those tricky 'tween boys. And To Kill a Mockingbird graphic novel, adapted from Harper Lee's text and ilustrated by Fred Fordham - for the literature buff that has everything.
Kevin: Who is your favourite children’s book illustrator? (Other than Sarah McIntyre, of course!)
Jess: Paula Bowles! She's Bristolian and such a supporter of indies. plus her work is so lovely.
Kevin: Do you have a bookshop pet?
Jess: Custard Creams
Kevin: What is your favourite biscuit?
Jess: His name is Buster and he's a 14 year old cavalier cross spaniel
Kevin: ….
Jess: ….
Kevin: ….
Jess: ….
Kevin: Do you think it’s possible you answered those questions the wrong way round?
Jess: Yes.
Kevin: Phew! Can I have a custard cream please?
Jess: Of course! Here, take 1,000 as they’re so small.
Kevin: This is my kind of bookshop.
(1,000 custard creams later)
Kevin: Buuuurp! What is the best way for people to buy books from you if they can’t visit the shop in person?
Jess: Online at maxminervas.co.uk!
You can follow Max Minerva's on Instagram - maxminervasbooks - and Twitter - @maxminervas.
Thanks
so much to everyone who followed Kevin on all fourteen stops of his big
Bookshop Tour! You can see all the shops he's visited on the hashtag #
'This is not a work which many adults will read through more than once,' claimed the historical novelist Alfred Duggan, reviewing The Lord of the Rings when it was published. But I've read it through LOADS of times and now I'm blogging my latest re-read, so what did he know? And so we come to Minas Tirith, Tower of Guard, citadel of Gondor, seven tiers of fancy white fortifications built against a buttress of Mount Mindolluin, with the Tower of Ecthelion rising a thousand feet above the plain. It seems to me the template on which a whole genre of knock-off fantasy cities has been based - I guess Robert E Howard and people wrote about such places before Tolkien, and perhaps there were cities of equal grandeur on Barsoom, but when concept art threads on Instagram throw up unlikely gold and marble castles built on mountaintops and over waterfalls they always look distinctly Minas Tirithy to me. I'm wondering now if London in Mortal Engines was subconsciously echoin
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