On being a megalith

On being a megalith

Coming up at Backstory

Book of the month

Normal Women by Ainslie Hogarth

Part mystery, part darkly comic commentary on new motherhood, Normal Women is all about finding ‘a tribe’ (and actually liking them) and the value of the paid, and unpaid, work women are expected to do. Disclaimer: this is the opposite of a cosy winter read.

BUY NORMAL WOMEN

Take our reading challenge

Here’s a reminder of the categories for the Backstory 2024 reading challenge. Pop into the shop to pick up a challenge card or follow along on Instagram. The story template is saved to our story highlights: @backstory.london

HEARING THAT CHRISTMAS TRADING was pretty good, my friend Hannah was delighted. “You’re becoming…” — she paused, searching for the right word — “… a megalith!”

I’ve been called worse. But once we both stopped laughing, we agreed that she probably hadn’t meant to label me — however fondly — a big, old stone.

Still, I’d rather be a megalith than a monolith. The indie spirit that I hope we’ve fully embraced at Backstory — singing team members, occasionally hard-to-read hand-written recommendation scrawls, confessional newsletters and all — is certainly intended as an antidote to that big chain, hewn-from-the-same-rock mentality.

At length, she decided I wasn’t actually one type of rock or another after all, but a magnate. Which still sounds preposterous for someone with the dizzying responsibility of one bookshop. Even the word “proprietor” seems ridiculously grand. (I hate “founder”, too, which makes me sound as if I should shortly be put on display in the Backstory museum.)

Even so, I do sometimes find it helpful to separate out the hats I wear. Broadly speaking, I think I have three jobs: as host, as bookseller and as boss. The first is the only one I’m even remotely qualified for. The most transferable skill from a decade on Fleet Street is being able to natter on to pretty much anyone about pretty much anything and feel relatively relaxed about the whole thing. Chairing the non-fiction book club or events with visiting authors is different from my old job — it’s live, there’s an audience — but it’s not that different.

When people think of me at Backstory, it’s usually the second hat that they picture: bookseller. That’s a pretty accurate snapshot as it’s probably the mode I spend most time in, at least during the busier months of the year. Though I never read on shift (too busy wearing the third hat), I read at least twice as many books as I used to, and with far more variety. Like an eager sommelier, I sample as many proofs as possible when they pass under my nose, waiting to be grabbed by a juicy story or some irresistible writing.

I love the first two hats. And, unlike nearly ever hat I’ve ever worn, from Panama to baseball cap, I think they fit me pretty well. But perhaps it’s the third hat — Magnate, Megalith, call it what you will — that I’m most taken with. This has come as a total surprise. If you’d asked me a couple of years ago, I certainly wouldn’t have told you I had any great yearning to run my own business. But it turns out it is really fun.

I love being on the shopfloor, interacting with customers and joshing with the team. But in some ways I prefer being in the engine room downstairs, tinkering with the machines. I love crunching the numbers with Denise and Rory, trying to work out whether, if we move this or that dial just a fraction, the whole thing will hum just that bit better.

Megalith or not, it is the small jobs that come with this role that are the most satisfying: moving a book selection on the website and seeing it perform much better; championing a colleague’s idea and seeing it fly (take a bow for the reading challenge, Megan!); chipping a few pence off every book we buy from a big publisher.

So though I’m thrilled that Backstory is ticking along well (in no small part thanks to you), and of course it’s fun to grow, I can’t imagine ever wanting to preside over an empire. You’d be too far from the levers to get to push and pull them. And where’s the fun in that? Monoliths’ scale may impress, but for beauty and wonder in a size small enough to hold and to appreciate, give me a pebble.

Tom