The Fatal Attraction of The Abbey Bookshop

The Abbey Bookshop was a serendipitous discovery. We had been looking for a place to eat after wandering around Notre Dame Cathedral and headed to the Latin Quarter. It was the Canadian flag, flapping in the damp, chilly breeze (Paris in July!?), that we noticed first.

     

We approached the near-toppling towers of books hesitantly, but with more interest when I saw the English names on the book spines, and the narrow stone steps which seemed to lead underground. Signs indicating different genres hung from the ceiling or were pasted onto the front of bookshelves which formed a narrow maze of aisles. I’m not exaggerating when I say that we had to sidle sideways down the aisle if a new customer came in.

This was dangerous territory ... and I don’t mean the books threatening to fall down and bury us if we made a wrong move. I’m notorious for returning from trips, suitcase laden with books that I simply had to buy because I wouldn’t be able to get them at home. I spied a hardcover, which looked like a children’s picture book, but, on closer inspection, revealed the words of a Leonard Cohen song, illustrated with paintings by Henri Matisse. “This will be a good memento of our visit,” I said to my daughter, determined to stay strong.

She, however, had been lured down another aisle after crime fiction titles. So, what could I do, but ask the assistant where the travel books were? “Down the next aisle, behind the ladder,” she pointed.  And there they were…Colin Thubron, Pico Iyer, Jan Morris, Paul Theroux…Egypt, China, Japan, Turkey and Venice. Above that, names that had been thrown about in our writing class – Raymond Carver, Italo Calvinho…I felt like I had died and gone to literature heaven!

My daughter meanwhile was being instructed to move shelves to find what she wanted…shelves that slid along tracks to reveal more shelves behind them. We didn’t stand a chance.* We finally made it to the till, me trying to keep my eyes averted from the book on Cuba I couldn’t possibly have found at home.

“Time to find lunch and pore over our purchases,” I said to my daughter. The assistant, with a deft sideways manoeuvre, pulled out a leaflet from under her desk (probably the only place she could keep them) and asked, “Would you like some recommendations for something French?” So, we did find what we were looking for after all. 

*we really didn’t stand a chance; the bookshop was celebrating 25 years and 40 000 books!