Bookstores Are Dead (If You Want Them To Be)

Are brick - and - mortar bookshop doomed ? masses have been predicting the precipitation of physical bookshop for quite some time , but with many stores vanishing and shelf selections getting much bad , the warnings have gotten more desperate recently .

Borders isshuttering182 of its smaller Waldenbooks outlets , while leaving 130 of them open . And Barnes & Noble is similarly closing downall but 50 of its B. Dalton stores . The move leaves the townsfolk of Laredo , TX as the res publica ’s largest township without a bookstall . Inan NPR piece on the closures , Clive Warner with Citria Publishing sounds a dreadful note :

DAVIES : The Liverpool aboriginal pass a small science fable publishing house . He says the forecast is grim for many brick - and - mortar bookstores .

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Mr. WARNER : Oh , they ’re finished . Everything ’s go online .

But it ’s not that dim-witted for a heap of multitude , points out science blogger Suzanne E. Franks , whose local Borders storehouse is also close down :

Everything ’s get going online . That ’s IF you have a melodic phrase to go on . No internet access ? Well , just go to your local library … oh , wait , I forgot . Our local governments are strapped for cash these days and we might just have to shut the libraries down . So sorry . But hey , if you ca n’t give wi - fi , what the Hades are you doing buying books anyway ? You should be borrowing them from the … ah , never mind .

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But say you still have a Borders or Barnes & Noble near your home plate . That still does n’t signify you ’re going to be able-bodied to get the smart , challenging scientific discipline - fable book you crave — because selections are getting bad and worse . Dave Nalle with Blogcritics recently wroteabout plump to his local Borders to search for the new Mike Resnick space opera , from Pyr Books , only to get hold it was n’t on the shelf because Borders was n’t carry it . He wait around , and realized the store ’s selection of science - fable books in general was grievous :

As I wander the stacks in alarm I noticed some changes at my local Borders . First off , there were far few literal books on the shelves . They ’ve elaborate the space for non - book products and reduce the space for factual al-Qur’an . Then there ’s a job with what ’s in reality on the shelves . Apparently there ’s no way for Flagship because the shelves are full - up with supernatural themed romance novels most of which verge on being pornographic , marketed not only under love affair but in every other incision of the bookstore , include taking up about half the shelf - space in the Science Fiction and Horror sections .

Of naturally , supernatural love story are dominating the shelves because they ’re popular . But also , midlist science - fiction author just are n’t bring the shelf space they used to , and diversity is being sacrificed . supply Nalle :

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understandably Internet shopping also plays a role in this . Publishers are n’t working quite as hard to sell second - tier writers to the bookstores when they sleep with they can sell to the establish fan base through online wall plug . Some publishing house like Tor and Baen have become really masterful at this , building online community of interests and essentially mentor new writers in the process .

Of naturally , some of us are still prosperous enough to have distinctiveness scientific discipline - fiction bookstore in our towns , like Pandemonium in Cambridge , MA , Mysterious Galaxy in San Diego , Borderlands here in San Francisco , or Uncle Hugo ’s in Minneapolis . And maybe the real take - away content of all this is , if the gargantuan chains are abandoning you or refusing to sprout the book you love , do n’t go to Amazon — support independent scientific discipline - fabrication bookstores instead . They ’ll help keep the writing style as a whole much healthier .

Images byPeter HiltonandNancy Baymon Flickr .

Lesdilley