A few days after the Borders bookstore chain sent a press release from its deathbed, we headed for the Corner Bookstore downtown, in search of a parable. We found a tale without a neat ending instead.
Zachary Steele runs the shop in the CNN Center, dispensing mostly paperbacks and magazines, usually to businessmen and women in town for conferences or people who want something to flip through on their lunch breaks.
Thrashers fans were great for business, by the way. Professional wrestling fans are, too. Hawks fans, not so much. Concertgoers are a toss-up.
"As long as it's not Justin [Bieber] or Britney [Spears] or New Kids on the Block, you can make some sales," he said. Perhaps because bookstores have long stocked merchandise other than reading material (the going-out-of-business Borders near us has been unloading princess costumes in its final days), Steele's customers come to him in search of just about anything.
“Where are the goggles?” one woman asked. Others want to buy cigarettes, dog toys, mascara, lottery tickets, flip-flops, whistles, baby oil or matches. One guy asked if the shop performed eye exams. (The name “Corner Bookstore,” apparently, is not as self-explanatory as it would seem.)
We wanted Steele’s thoughts on Borders because two years ago, he was in a similar predicament and closed Wordsmiths, the shop he had owned in downtown Decatur. When the holiday burst he’d been praying for at the end of 2008 never materialized, he pulled the shade down on his dreams and went to work as the manager of someone else’s bookstore. “It was awful,” he said.
We thought he might shake his fist at Borders, the predator who became prey, the conquering warrior ultimately vanquished. No. Steele doesn’t blame big-box stores for the demise of his little one. “I feel sad for the people who lost their jobs,” he said.
He’s about to lose his, too. Voluntarily.
Steele, the author of “Anointed” (Mercury Retrograde Press, $16.95), craftily displayed by the cash register, has a new title, “Flutter,” coming out later this month. He’s decided to quit his day job to write full time.
“I will miss it, but I don’t want to do this at the expense of what I really want to do,” he said.
At the end of August, Borders employees, there may be a job opening for one of you.
Celebrity birthdays
Actor-comedian Richard Belzer is 67. Football Hall-of-Famer John Riggins is 62. Former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales is 56. Actor-screenwriter Billy Bob Thornton is 56. Actress Kym Karath ("The Sound of Music") is 53. Track star Mary Decker Slaney is 53. Actress Lauren Tom is 52. Retired pitcher Roger Clemens is 49. Actress Crystal Chappell is 46. Author Dennis Lehane is 46. Rock musician Rob Cieka (Boo Radleys) is 43. Actor Daniel Dae Kim is 43. Actor Michael DeLuise is 42. Actor Ron Lester is 41. Race car driver Jeff Gordon is 40.
Contributing: news services
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