Karen´s Books

“No no. As I said, it’s colourful.” 

“I really am gonna need a bit more information than that from ya sir.”

“Yes, yes of course. I’m playing your game. What else… it concerns fragility and how should I describe it…”

“We only ‘ave a small selection ‘ere...”

“SHAPELESSNESS!” 

“Maybe you could take a look in anovver branch?” 

“Hah! We both know you stock all of the number one best sellers here. Yes yes! Do wave your manager over! Hello ma’am, a very tight ship you keep!”

“Hello Mr Mosely, we haven’t seen you in a while? Did SeaRock keep the item you were looking for.”

“You’ll be pleased to know they gave nothing away. No, no. Today I’m looking for another, more recent, publication. The most recent. As I have just been explaining to your very sweet assistant, Linda is it? I became aware of another publication.”

“I’ve looked in the directory and online boss, I’m still a bit new to the system. The gentleman says that it’ll be listed in the nebulous repository?”

“As I said, I became aware of the new publication reading the latest Dybookk Review. Extremely well written, the piece.”

“Title?”

“Well Karen of Karen’s Books! You don’t mind me calling you Karen do you after all these years? It seems once again the Title escapes me. But hardly surprising given the nature of what I am searching, don't you think!”

“You’re right Mr Mosely. Perhaps it’s been published too recently in that case.”

“Perhaps.”

“I really am sorry. If it is not in the directory we simply don’t have it. We do have a number of others in the Crime/Mystery genre that might interest you? Linda could you please show Mr Mosely to the collection?”

“Right over ‘ere sir, come this way.”

“And swiftly the gatekeeper clicks her key! Okay then. Thank you Karen. Yes Linda, I shall follow.”

“Mind ya step now sir! All these stools jus’ get in my way. I'm tellin’ ya! Okay, now ya can come through… So what was that ya said? Summit from a novel?”

“Locks keep out only the honest! Do you enjoy reading Linda? Do you mind me calling you Linda?”

“Everyone calls me Lin. And I guess I do enjoy readin’. Always preferred writing to reading though. I’m Dyslexic see, so I use a dictaphone. Write short stories mainly and the occasional poem.”

“Marvelous! Although, I must warn you. And I do so because you are a pleasant girl and clearly intelligent. Writing has its joys, but in this age, none of it will be yours!”

“In wot way?”

“You´re intelligent. I’m sure you have worked out what this game is all about.”

“Actually, I’m probably not as intelligent as ya fink sir. I 'aven’t been understandin' all this talk of games.”

“None of that female deference please! You know what you think, you must trust your instincts!”

“Sir?”

“Others in the Crime/Mystery genre?”

“Still not getting it sir.”

“Karen said, ‘there are others in the Crime/mystery genre’, that would interest me, no? How should she know that the one I was looking for was in that genre? Given that I hadn’t in fact told her which book I was looking for?”

“I don’t know sir. Maybe the name of that review ya mentioned? Maybe that’s the kind of publications it discusses?”

“Very good! You see you are most intelligent!”

“Wot about this one sir? I’ve ’eard many punters big it up - Fallen Castle?”

“Most astute you are, but in this case that was not the reason. The Dybookk Review in fact is a multi-genre review.”

“All o´ these actually are top sellers.”

“Listen here, I will not be buying another book. I will be collecting the book that is in the Nebulous repository. And… Wait! Before you tell me… I will explain everything to you. But first I need your commitment to help me.” 

“S’what I’m here for sir. But sir, I do gotta say, if the manager can’t find it then I most

certainly can’t. And I’m due for a lunch break in ten.”

“Ha! You say you're a writer and yet you don't have the slightest curiosity as to why this 40 something aristocrat, plump and eccentric, is in this tiny bookstore

in norwich, dressed as a Navy Seal and asking YOU for help?”

“When you put it like that.”

“You heard of the cloud? Google Docs?”

“I´m 19 sir, and work in a bookstore.”

“Okay. Well, the book I´m after… What if I told you that the reason you´ve been told to keep it from me is because it has been published without the author's knowledge or consent! Plucked it from their personal writings in the cloud!”

“I´d say you ought to be a writer yourself!”

“But that´s just it Linda. Writers don´t exist anymore. An artist is but a silk-worm in today's world.”

“You sayin´ they´re stealing people's manuscripts?”

“Publishers don’t trouble themselves to read manuscripts anymore, not even the ones sent by esteemed authors. Oh No! Not when they can just tap into the cloud!”

“Seems a bit roundabout.”

“On the contrary. They just run everything through algorithms and then pluck the ones algorithmically designated “profitable acquisitions”. Pay off google of course to gain access and Bob's your uncle!”

“Why not just pay the Author?”

“Why is a string long? It’s a moot point. As I said, the Author doesn’t exist! Why should he? Or - I’m awfully sorry - or she, why should he or she? We're all superfluous.”

“Sir? Are you alright?”

“Not even seen as work is it? Art? But most people can't work without music can they? - Oh no! - They say - Can’t work without music... Without art! - And therein lies that perverse hypocrisy of it all. You ever wonder how you get it all for free? The music? The literature online? What happens to its workers?”

“I really haven't been told to keep anything from you.”

“Yes, well! A very tight ship she keeps then!”

“It’s my break now, sir.”

“Then we're all doomed.”