Scoring With Fish

I'm glad Minion1 has set up this blog - the Amazon shop should be up and running soon so we can start selling some of the more recent books on-line. Sam (the owner) has a huge selection of older books tucked away but they're not the sort of thing most people come in to browse for during their lunch hour. If I'm honest, he tends to be dismissive of paperbacks, even the good stuff we buy in from people, preferring his old, dusty books that really do deserve the word "tomes".

He has no interest in this new electronic side of things, though, so Minion1 and I can go about our business, making a bit more money for the grumbling old man.

One of our regular customers, Strange Brian, came in today. We don't call him that to his face, of course, but it doesn't stop him from being strange.

He nodded to me as he wandered in - Minion1 was stocktaking our crime section - and headed straight for the sci-fi/fantasy section and began working his way through it. Every third or fourth day he comes in and looks through the entire section, starting in the top left with the A's and working over the two cases down to the Z's. We don't exactly do a roaring trade in sci-fi so most of the stock is the same as what he's seen earlier in the week, but he does it every time.

This morning he found something, a battered old copy of Patrick Moore's Mission To Mars, and shuffled over to the desk.

"Hey, man," he said.

I've no idea how old he is - he has a big, bushy beard which makes him look like he's in his fifties, but his eyes aren't wrinkled at all behind his round glasses and his hands are smooth. With the woolen bobble hat he always wears (complete with tattered bobble dangling by a thread) that covers up his ears, it's only his cheeks, nose, eyes and hands that we've actually seen. The rest is always bundled up in a thick coat whatever the weather.

"Hey, Brian, how are you today?" I asked.

"Good, man, good. You see the match last weekend?"

I had no idea what match he was referring to but played along - he's strange, like I said, but he's a good guy. "Yeah, yeah, pretty good game, eh?"

"Yeah, totally. That guy with the fish, man . . . what was he thinking?"

"Guy with the fish?" I asked.

"Yeah, I didn't see that coming. No wonder he scored."

Brian stared out of the window into the street. I shrugged and took the book, jotting it down in the sales register. He gave me money, I gave him change and the book.

"Y'know, yellow's not your colour, man," Brian said.

I glanced down at my clothes automatically even though I knew I wasn't wearing anything even vaguely yellow. As I looked up, Strange Brian headed out the door.

Customers: one of the constant, weird delights of working in the Sam Haine bookshop.

Review of Sam Haine's Book Shop.

Sam Haine's Book Shop is a book shop of the old school. This invariably means that the opening hours are erratic and arbitrary, dependent solely on the owner's whims. The shop itself is a grand old building that has clearly seen better days if not better epochs. Legend has it that the building was originally designed by either John Hawksmoor or Nimrod of Babylon. Should you be fortunate enough to find the well hidden entrance in the impressive facade, and still more fortunate to find the door unbarred you may enter its labyrinthine by-ways.
The stacks are spread over several floors and organised by a system of Mr Haine's own devizing. It is said that those who are able to to discern and decipher this schema of Mr Haine will instantly understand the secret of life itself. Many poor and misguided souls have tried to grasp this greatest of mysteries and may be seen still roving the stacks, gibbering shades of their former selves.
Mr Haine retains two assistants who must learn the the place of every book relative to certain fixed points within the shop. This extraordinary feat of memory excuses the often pained and harrassed look these unfortunates wear daily. Let me say this of the stock.....

Here this unpublished review, recovered from the spontaneous fire which flared in the gardening section, finishes; the only other marks on the paper are some red brown stains which Mr Haine maintains are Raspberry Jam. Hartley's probably.
Welcome to the ditigal home of Sam Haine's Book Shop. We sell via Amazon.co.uk and a link to our store will be posted soon. Thank you for your kind patronage.