More Weird Things Customers Say in Bookshops (3 page)

CUSTOMER:
I’m looking for this picture book for my daughter. I read about it in a review somewhere. I think it’s by someone called E. L. James.

BOOKSELLER:
Erm, I don’t think it was by that person; that’s who wrote
Fifty Shades of Grey
.

CUSTOMER
(going bright red and clutching her handbag, as though hiding something inside it)
: Oh! I don’t know how that name cropped into my head, then. I’ve certainly never read any of those books! Never!

CUSTOMER:
Did they make a film edition of the Bible when
The Passion of the Christ
came out? You know, the text of the Bible, but with Mel Gibson on the front cover?

CUSTOMER:
My Kindle’s broken. Do you know how to fix it?

BOOKSELLER:
I’m afraid Kindles aren’t really my speciality.

CUSTOMER
(pulls her Kindle out of her bag)
: Look at it! I dropped it in the bath!

BOOKSELLER:
If you did that with a book, you could just put it on the radiator and then flatten it out between two heavier books.

CUSTOMER
(seriously)
: Do you think that would work for this, too?

CUSTOMER:
Do you have a copy of this book but with the title in red, instead of green? And maybe with a different background image, too?

BOOKSELLER:
... No.

CUSTOMER
(holding up a book)
: What’s this?
The Secret Garden
? Well, it’s not so secret now, is it, since they bloody well wrote a book about it!

CUSTOMER:
Do you have a book on how to found countries? I want to know if it’s possible to claim my back garden as a separate nation.

CUSTOMER:
Do you have books on how to look after horses?

BOOKSELLER:
Yep, they’ll be in our nature section.

CUSTOMER:
Great. I need to do research on how to look after unicorns, and they’re basically the same thing.

BOOKSELLER:
...

(A customer is reading a book about the nativity)

CUSTOMER
(to her friend)
: Don’t you ever get the feeling that Baby Jesus is somehow related to Herod? I always freak out, thinking that he’s going to go: ‘JESUS. I AM YOUR FATHER!’

CUSTOMER
(to her friend)
: You know the book
War Horse
?

CUSTOMER’S FRIEND:
Yeah.

CUSTOMER:
It’s about horses during a war, right?

CUSTOMER’S FRIEND:
Yeah, I think so.

CUSTOMER:
But, like, how did they interview the horses to find out what it was like during the war?

CUSTOMER’S FRIEND:
Dunno.

CUSTOMER
(clicks her fingers)
: Got it. Did they use a horse whisperer or something?

CUSTOMER’S FRIEND:
I guess they must have done.

CUSTOMER:
That’s, like, so cool.

CUSTOMER:
I’d love to write a book.

BOOKSELLER:
Then you should write one.

CUSTOMER:
I really don’t have the time.

BOOKSELLER:
I’m sure you could make time.

CUSTOMER:
No, you don’t get it; I really don’t have the time. I had my fortune read on Monday, and the fortune teller lady said that I’m going to get knocked down by a bus next week. She said that it’ll probably kill me.

BOOKSELLER:
... Oh. Well, er, that doesn’t sound very nice.