On the shelf

I’m not exaggerating. There used to be a lovely big Books Etc on Victoria Street where you could lose yourself for an hour and find all sorts of unexpected treasures: while browsing in the sports section there I bought a copy of Seabiscuit by Laura Hillenbrand, which had me in tears after ten minutes.

But when I went to where Books Etc had once been the other day, I discovered that it had transmogrified into something called Oliver Bonas. This sounds like the sort of place that might sell dog treats but in reality it was not nearly so useful. It was, in fact, a modern day bazaar of overpriced knick-knacks that proposed to sell me, in no particular order, a mirror, a chest of drawers, a dress, a pair of sunglasses with lenses like hearts, an array of ‘humorous’ greeting cards, a picnic hamper and a keyring in the shape of a meerkat.