Thank you for taking the time to read this. I hope you enjoy my ramblings & recommendations.
If you ever want to message me, I am more than happy to chat about all things books. I do other
things, sometimes !! But books bring me such joy and comfort. Happy reading,
Hi there,
I hope as you are reading this that you are well. A little bit about me. I am a semi-eccentric book
addict and collector. I spend my days reading, talking, buying and writing about books.
My name is Kirsty (sometimes Sebastian)
I have been a book lover from a very early age. I used to go to the library in my home town every Saturday morning and I remember being so very excited about all the colours and all the books. I have a couple of favourites from when I was very young. I remember Ant and Bee and the small Thomas the Tank Engine books. The small format was and has remained appealing to me. I will mention this later in one of my blogs.
When I was a little older, I had the joy of going into Nottingham City Centre or 'downtown' with my Mum who took me shopping, which always included a trip to the bookstore, as my Dad stayed at home with my 3 brothers to watch football. Not much has changed, I still read a lot and they still watch a lot of football. It is within the shelves of this bookstore that I discovered the delights of Enid Blyton's Malory Towers & Secret Seven and Roald Dahl's Danny the Champion of the World. During my time at junior school, showing my age there, I do not have a clue what year or what they call that now, I was about 9-11, I was very proud to be made a school librarian.
Onto secondary school and my inspiration here came from a wonderful teacher called Miss Milner, an absolute legend, who introduced me to George Eliot - Silas Marner, Arthur Miller - The Crucible & William Shakespeare's - Romeo and Juliet to name but a few. I could be found many days and lunch hours in the library.
When I was 17 I manage to secure my dream job, as a bookseller for Dillons the Bookstore (sadly, no longer around). After failed A'Levels (oops), I then became a full time bookseller and worked my way into management and worked as a bookstore branch manager with Waterstones up and down the country, for the next 23 years but after all this time due to personal reasons, I sadly had to leave.
I have always loved books and since leaving the bookstore, I have had various jobs and searched for something that would bring me the same pleasure as being surrounded by books, alas nothing gave me the same fulfilment. During the lockdown, reading was my saviour, more than usual, I know many reading this will be able to relate to that. After covid, I rarely ventured out, not for any particular reason but I had nowhere to go and had gotten comfortable with that. In 2024 I saw an advertisement from a café manager looking for someone to host a Book Club. It was a new year, so I thought why not apply, time to make a change . It turns out it is the best thing I could have done. In February 2024, I started a monthly afternoon and evening book club. I had a really good turn out, and soon they became weekly meet - ups. Having outgrown two venues, we are still going strong. We now have three FREE Book Clubs, a Silent Reading Chapter, two Creative Writing Chapters, and I am hoping many more to come. I have made many friends who have shown me so much love and support. It has been amazing, and it is with their help that I know I am doing the right thing.
Shortly after realising that the book clubs made me so happy, I created a charity called THE BOOK PLACE. The main aim of this was to raise money to buy books for children and adults, that may not be able to afford their own. I did this from a market stall in Beeston, with the help of members of my Book Club friends. This brought me such joy, and I hope within the next 6 months to have created a community hub, for all things books. A home for all of the chapters, a base for the book festival next year, and a collection point for donations. Then in the next five years, I am hoping to open a larger community bookshop. Doing all of the above on a larger scale. So please follow my journey.