Sears has another chance to avoid closing down

Re:Sears has another chance to avoid closing down by ghaff on Tuesday January 08, 2019 @03:30PM (#18859346)

In a way, I miss the serendipity of browsing bookstores. There was a time when it was a circa monthly ritual to go into Harvard Square on a weekend (I think stores were mostly open on Sunday by then) and make my way through all the new and used bookstores as well as run other errands. But, really, although I still like going into a good bookstore now and then, having this vast collection of (however imperfectly) reviewed books that can be in my hands within a few days--or immediately via digital--is pretty magical.

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Re:Sears has another chance to avoid closing down by kelnos on Tuesday January 08, 2019 @04:15PM (#18859773)

I do wonder how typical your experience is, though. I personally never found much by doing that (partly I was paralyzed by choice without a good algorithm for narrowing things down), and consequently stopped the random browsing in bookstores long before the bookstores themselves mostly disappeared.

When I was much younger (pre-teens and teens), I was a voracious reader and would spend a lot of time at the library. But even there, I would mostly stick to the long-running series that I knew well, or prolific authors that I knew I liked.

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Re:Sears has another chance to avoid closing down by mattkrause on Tuesday January 08, 2019 @05:56PM (#18860600)

For me, it depends on the store.

Some places feel "well-curated": they may not have a ton of books, but it seems like the books they do have were carefully chosen. Maybe there are "theme" collections (local authors, ghost stories for grownups, Russian authors", etc) or well-read staff members making recommendations. I love browsing these places.

Other places seem to go with the "pile of books" approach. There's a lot of them, roughly organised ('fiction') and many of them are obvious tat ('Lose Weight the Dr. Oz Way' or something. I find it easy to leave these places without buying anything.

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