Waxman - The Bookish Life of Nina Hill: The bookish read you need this summer!

Copyright 2019 Abbi Waxman

The right of Abbi Waxman to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

Apart from any use permitted under UK copyright law, this publication may only be reproduced, stored, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, with prior permission in writing of the publishers or, in the case of reprographic production, in accordance with the terms of licenses issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency.

First published as an ebook by

Headline Publishing Group in 2019

All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Cataloguing in Publication Data is available from the British Library

Cover design and illustration by Vikki Chu

eISBN: 9781472266200

HEADLINE PUBLISHING GROUP

An Hachette UK Company

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www.hachette.co.uk

Author photograph Leanna Creel

ABBI WAXMAN is a chocolate-loving, dog-loving woman, who lives in Los Angeles and lies down as much as possible. She worked in advertising for many years, which is how she learned to write fiction. She has three daughters, three dogs, two cats, and one very patient husband.

The Bookish Life of Nina Hill is Abbis third novel. Her previous books are The Garden of Small Beginnings and Other Peoples Houses.

You can keep in touch with Abbi through her website www.abbiwaxman.com, or via @amplecat on Twitter, @abbiwaxman on Instagram or abbi.waxman on Facebook.

For my stepfather, John, who came late to the party,
but stayed to clean up. I love and respect you with all my heart.

And for all the booksellers and librarians, who care about writers
and readers in equal measure, and put them together every day.
The world would be so much lonelier without you.

Solitude is independence.

HERMANN HESSE

Independence is happiness.

SUSAN B. ANTHONY

Happiness is having your own library card.

SALLY BROWN, PEANUTS

In which we meet our heroine
and witness a crime of thoughtlessness.

Imagine youre a bird. You can be any kind of bird, but those of you whove chosen ostrich or chicken are going to struggle to keep up. Now, imagine youre coasting through the skies above Los Angeles, coughing occasionally in the smog. Shiny ribbons of traffic spangle below you, and in the distance you see an impossibly verdant patch, like a green darn in a gray sock. As you get closer, the patch resolves into a cross-hatching of old houses and streets, and you have reached Larchmont. Congratulations, youve discovered a secret not even all Angelenos know. Its a neighborhood like any other, but it boasts a forest of trees, planted generously along semiwinding streets that look like they were lifted wholesale from a Capra movie, and were actually all planted at once in the 1920s.

The houses are big but not showy, set back with front gardens that make the streets seem even wider than they are. Even today, most of the houses look the way they always have, thanks to historical preservation and a general consensus that the whole thing is hella cute. The trees have grown into truly beautiful examples of their kind; magnolias drift the streets with perfume, cedars strew them with russet needle carpets, and oaks make street cleaning and alternate side parking a necessity.

Larchmont Boulevard is the linear heart of Larchmont Village, populated by cafs, restaurants, boutiques, artisanal stores of many kinds, and one of the few remaining independent bookstores in Los Angeles. Thats where Nina Lee Hill works; spinster of this parish and heroine of both her own life and the book youre holding in your lovely hand.

Knights has been in business since 1940, and though its fortunes have risen and fallen over time, a genuine love of books and a thorough knowledge of its customers have kept it in business. It is like all good independent bookstores should be, owned and staffed by people who love books, read them, think about them, and sell them to other people who feel the same way. There is reading hour for little kids. There are visiting authors. There are free bookmarks. Its really a paradise on earth, if paradise for you smells of paper and paste. It does for Nina, but as our story opens, she would happily go back to the part where we were all being birds and poop on the head of the woman in front of her.

The woman was staring at Nina in what can only be described as a truculent fashion, jangling her extensive, culturally appropriative turquoise jewelry.

I want my money back. Its a very boring book; all they do is sit around and talk. She took a breath and delivered the coup de grce. I dont know why the manager told me it was a classic.

Nina looked around for Liz Quinn, the guilty party. She could hear the distant rustling of washable silk as Liz went to ground in the young adult section. Snipe. Nina breathed in hate and breathed out love. She smiled at the customer. Did you read it all the way through?

The woman didnt smile back. Of course. Not a quitter, just a whiner.

Well, then we cant refund your money. Nina curled her toes inside their fluffy socks. The customer couldnt see that, of course, and Nina sincerely hoped she looked calm and resolute.

Why not? The customer was short, but she managed to draw herself up a couple of inches. All that Pilates finally paying off.

Nina was firm. Because we sold you a book and you read it. Thats pretty much the whole life cycle of bookstores right there. If you didnt enjoy it, Im very sorry, but we cant do anything about it. She looked down at the book on the counter. You really didnt like it? Its generally considered one of the greatest novels of all time. Nina resisted the impulse to pull out her imaginary blaster and blow the womans head off, and got a microflash of the bit in Terminator 2 where his silvery head splits in the middle and waves about. Liz was always telling her to be warmer toward the customers, and to remember they could go online and buy any book on the planet faster than Knights could order it. Nina needed to make it a friendly and personal experience, so they liked her enough to give the store a) more money and b) more time than they had to give That Other Place. Independent booksellers called it the River, so as to avoid saying it out loud. But as Nina often thought, denial aint just a river in South America.

The woman made a face. I dont know why; the heroine sits around and gazes out of the window. If I spent all my time sitting on my butt pondering life, I assure you I wouldnt be as successful as I am. She shook back her long blond hair, with its carefully casual beachy waves, and had another thought. If I dont like the food at a restaurant I can send it back and get a refund.