London — The cheery news from the publishing world is that sales of books — actual hardcover books — were way up during 2020. The cheerless news from the retail world is that sales in physical bookstores plummeted.
I’ll mourn if the stores die, for we’ll lose the excitement of browsing and the unexpected stumble upon a new and exciting volume. But the steadiness of hardcover sales, even if buyers seem to be flocking to the familiar rather than searching for the new, is an important marker for the proposition that all is not lost. ..
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