Act of Faith

Perhaps I'm being over-sensitive, but in general I avoid telling people that I write a blog. When I have told anyone, I feel very uncomfortable, as if I've just announced an interest in Dungeons and Dragons, or a penchant for Genesis.

Most people I tell assume that I'm a frustrated writer, but nothing could be further from the truth. I have occasionally harboured musical ambitions but never literary ones, thanks to two decades of bookselling.

When I joined the original Waterstone's (which was still run by Tim Waterstone) as a lowly bookseller, one of my jobs involved sitting in a dark cupboard, tearing up books. Most of these books were unsold first novels, which the publisher had deemed worthless. Rather than pay for the whole book to be returned, it was agreed that it would be more cost effective to just tear off the front covers and return them in a jiffy bag.

I remember sitting on a kickstool, with a black bin liner between my legs, throwing away novels that had often taken years to write. Some of them looked very good, but for some indefinable reason - a lack of reviews, poor marketing or an off-putting blurb - the books hadn't sold.

There was one particular new novel that I really liked. I had read a proof copy and expected the book to attract a lot of broadsheet reviews, but it was published almost by stealth and I don't remember selling a single copy. A few months later, the author committed suicide.

Whenever I have a fleeting urge to start writing a book, I think of that dark cupboard and the thousands of unsold books I've returned to publishers over the years.

I was reminded of this when, last week, we received a consignment of discontinued stock from Belfast's public libraries. Most of the books were popular novels published between the 1950s and 70s. It was like looking at a collection of books from a parallel universe. I didn't recognise a single name.

Do any of these authors ring a bell?

Vian Smith
Dave Wallis
John Verney
Kathleen Sully
George Shipway
Robin White
Doreen Wallace
Frederic Wakeman
Dal Stivens
Herbert Simmons
Jayne Viney
Joyce Porter
Gerda Rhoads
Malissa Redhead
Marshall Pugh
Clare Simon
John Pollock
Simon Waldron
Katharine Sim
Grace Phipps

I haven't come across modern editions of works by any of these writers and over half of them have no Wikipedia entries. It's as if they never existed.

Seeing so many forgotten books could have been a depressing experience, but does every novel have to be written for posterity? In their time, these authors were rated highly enough to be published and enjoyed a wide readership, which is all any aspiring writer can hope for.

Very few women read 'The Women's Room' these days and I doubt whether many will read 'Bridget Jones's Diary' in 20 years, but that doesn't diminish the impact these books had in their day.

By the time I'd finished wading through box after box of obscure novels, I felt amazed, but also grateful, that people wrote and published books at all. It seemed an act of faith that flew in the face of reason, and we are all better for it.