Kibworth Books
Kibworth Books, our July Bookshop of the Month is an multi award-winning shop that caters to booklovers of all ages and tastes. We chat to the owner Debbie to find out why she loves bookselling, her picks for this year's summer reading and what’s to come in the future.
1. What made you want to go into bookselling, and what is your favourite part about it?
I have always loved being surrounded by books. Being in such an environment calms me. A book-filled room feels like a magical portal, a kind of liminal anything-is-possible space. So, I decided it was time to create such a space in which to spend all day at work and that equals: a bookshop! My favourite part about it is discovery: of new ideas and of the beautiful artefacts (i.e. the books themselves) in which they are bound.
2. What sort of books do you find your customers are most interested in? Have you noticed any recent trends?
Our bestselling sections in the main room of the shop are Hardback Fiction (which I am surprised to establish, but the spreadsheet does not lie), Crime & Thrillers and Biography. In the Children’s Room, it’s 9+ Fiction, followed by Picture Books and Activity Books. We’ve created a Romance Fiction bay, separate from General Fiction where it was previously housed and newer categories include Manga, Climate Change and Gender Studies, all growing areas of interest.
3. Which fiction and non-fiction summer read would you recommend to your customers this year, and why?
For fiction, I would recommend The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley. It’s Ghosts meets Slow Horses with additional time travel, set on Earth in the not-too-distant future. I’m fully into genre fiction right now, my two other favourite novels of the year so far having been The Other Valley and The Last Murder at the End of the World. My non-fiction must-read is Will You Read This, Please? It’s a brilliantly-executed idea of Joanna Cannon’s to tell the stories of individuals who have undergone a traumatic experience due to a specific neurodiverse condition, as told to and written up by talented and empathetic professional writers (such as Tracy Chevalier and Clare Mackintosh). It’s a work of real genius. I think it’s essential, as is the motivation behind it: for these lived experiences to be heard.
4. You have an impressive list of book subscriptions for all ages – how do you go about picking the titles that get sent?
Each month I choose a brand new hardback and paperback novel to be our Books of the Month and my colleague Kirsty, our Children’s Book Specialist, chooses the children’s picks. Then our youngest colleague Izzy chooses the YA book. We do this according to books we have loved ourselves and also with a mind on variety and diversity: we want to promote books we’ve enjoyed that we have discovered through smaller, independent publishers.
5. And finally, do you have any exciting plans for the shop in the coming months you’d like to share with us?
After 12 years in a small Victorian semi-detached, we moved the bookshop into a barn four times the size of the old building two-and-a-half years ago and so there is still a lot I want to do in this relatively new space, including the installation of a gallery wall at the entrance. I’ve got a shed being built this month too, for the storage of our (40) event chairs, piles of proofs and other miscellaneous bookshop paraphernalia and I believe this will change my life! Happily, we’ve also just had plans passed to have an accessible ramp built at our courtyard entrance, so this will feel great: to say that our bookshop really is a space for everyone.