Books have the unique ability to transport you through time to worlds that exist only in your imagination.
Undisputedly, for thousands of years, millions of people were locked out of the sensual indulgence of reading. That feeling of picking up a physical book, smelling the pages, and – for a while at least – being alone, opening a book and disappearing privately into somebody else's world for hours is indescribable.
Even better; if the book is second-hand, it brings with it a richness of history that sensually emanates from the page. The smell of paper, the thickness of pages in older books, the inscription from someone's mom, daughter, husband, son, other relative, or friend. The hope that, whoever they are, they enjoyed the book enough to want to put it back into circulation so that someone else can also enjoy it.
As the owner of a small bookstore that specialises in rare finds, I love when books cycle through people’s hands, creating the possibility of an amazing find. A first edition with illustrations by Thomas Pringle, a signed copy of a book written by Anne Frank, a very old edition of the dictionary for the Afrikaans language.
I've had all these come through my door, and more such as a first edition Angela's Ashes. Happiness is when they go back out of the door in the arms of someone who has exclaimed great delight when they spotted them.
