The sad demise of the brick-and-mortar bookstore

Today Borders announced it would close its bookstores and liquidate its stock, thus joining a long list of printed booksellers who have shuttered their doors. In Fort Walton Beach a single chain bookstore remains, the Books-A-Million on Mary Esther Cut-Off. Destin offers a Barnes & Noble across from Destin Commons, along with a Books-A-Million in Destin Commons.

That’s about it.

The disappearance of bookstores will not cause the earth to wobble on its axis, but it’s troubling nonetheless for reasons you may not have considered.

Nobody denies the logic of switching from printed books to e-readers. The economies are too vast to ignore. It’s easier, faster and cheaper to “print” a book to an e-reader. Printed books consume huge quantities of paper, ink, and fuel to transport. They chew up storage space. At some point they must be disposed of, taking up precious room in landfills. You can’t enlarge the print, and they offer zero opportunities for multimedia engagement.

But the loss of bookstores does present a downside – maybe several.

For starters, there’s the issue of jobs. Writers, editors, copy editors, jacket designers and agents will likely go about their business as usual. But the people who cut down the trees to make paper – they will take a hit. The people who brew the ink for printed books will suffer. The folks who transport the paper, ink, and books themselves will lose business. And, of course, the bookstore workers will no longer have a job. Collectively those numbers probably aren’t very high, but any loss of jobs in an employment-strapped economy is bad news. I suppose some of the loss will be offset by people who make, transport and sell e-readers, and people who man online retailer sites, but the gains will come nowhere near the losses.

What bugs me most about the disappearance of bookstores is the loss of a shared experience.

When you pick up a book you can feel its heft. You can smell the astringency of ink on paper. You flip through the pages and get a sense for the author’s voice: For me, too much dialogue means a writer can’t describe what the character is seeing and feeling. Too many short paragraphs means there’s not much in the way of subtext. When you buy a book you’re not just buying a story. You’re buying an artifact.

A bookstore (or a library) is, to my mind, a symbol of our most noble aspirations as a culture. It’s a place where knowledge and education are celebrated, and where people try to rise above their surroundings. Walk into a bookstore and you will notice fellow shoppers still speak in hushed voices. That’s because they implicitely recognize people in bookstores are thinking important thoughts, and that they should not be distracted by loud, vulgar prattle. That’s the problem with the Digital Age: It invades every aspect of our lives with loudness and vulgarity, which makes us uncouth, and dumb.

A bookstore offers a shared experience. It makes us part of a collective effort called civilization – all of which is reduced by an e-reader to a fleeting burst of light.

I don’t go to bookstores just to buy books. I go there to browse, be around people, and partake of the atmosphere. Maybe I’ll bump into an author signing his latest novel. Maybe I’ll meet somebody who likes the same crap I do. Heck, maybe I’ll just flop down on a couch, drink a cup of coffee and thumb through the pages of my next purchase, a pleasant thing to do on a rainy afternoon. It’s comforting to be out of the house and in a place surrounded by like-minded souls.

Try that with an e-reader.

I’m sure that one day I’ll read books on a tablet. But I’ll miss my neighborhood bookstore.

I already do.

About the author:

Del Stone Jr. is a professional fiction writer. He is known primarily for his work in the contemporary dark fiction field, but has also published science fiction and contemporary fantasy. Stone’s stories, poetry and scripts have appeared in publications such as Amazing Stories, Eldritch Tales, and Bantam-Spectra’s Full Spectrum. His short fiction has been published in The Year’s Best Horror Stories XXII; Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine; the Pocket Books anthology More Phobias; the Barnes & Noble anthologies 100 Wicked Little Witch Stories, Horrors! 365 Scary Stories, and 100 Astounding Little Alien Stories; the HWA anthology Psychos; and other short fiction venues, like Blood Muse, Live Without a Net, Zombiesque and Sex Macabre. Stone’s comic book debut was in the Clive Barker series of books, Hellraiser, published by Marvel/Epic and reprinted in The Best of Hellraiser anthology. He has also published stories in Penthouse Comix, and worked with artist Dave Dorman on many projects, including the illustrated novella “Roadkill,” a short story for the Andrew Vachss anthology Underground from Dark Horse, an ashcan titled “December” for Hero Illustrated, and several of Dorman’s Wasted Lands novellas and comics, such as Rail from Image and “The Uninvited.” Stone’s novel, Dead Heat, won the 1996 International Horror Guild’s award for best first novel and was a runner-up for the Bram Stoker Award. Stone has also been a finalist for the IHG award for short fiction, the British Fantasy Award for best novella, and a semifinalist for the Nebula and Writers of the Future awards. His stories have appeared in anthologies that have won the Bram Stoker Award and the World Fantasy Award. Two of his works were optioned for film, the novella “Black Tide” and short story “Crisis Line.”

Stone recently retired after a 41-year career in journalism. He won numerous awards for his work, and in 1986 was named Florida’s best columnist in his circulation division by the Florida Society of Newspaper Editors. In 2001 he received an honorable mention from the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association for his essay “When Freedom of Speech Ends” and in 2003 he was voted Best of the Best in the category of columnists by Emerald Coast Magazine. He participated in book signings and awareness campaigns, and was a guest on local television and radio programs.

As an addendum, Stone is single, kills tomatoes and morning glories with ruthless efficiency, once tied the stem of a cocktail cherry in a knot with his tongue, and carries a permanent scar on his chest after having been shot with a paintball gun. He’s in his 60s as of this writing but doesn’t look a day over 94.

Contact Del at [email protected]. He is also on Facebook, twitter, Pinterest, tumblr, TikTok, and Instagram. Visit his website at delstonejr.com .