Marie Carmen Ferrer She first came to the Troa chain bookstore when she was just a teenager, “by pure coincidence,” she says, but she never left it there again. That was 43 years ago, in “a lifetime”, she explains why she is so famous in the field. “I started out as a working girl and have become CEO A company that is now 70 years old, has 18 bookstores all over Spain, a Change radicalized over the years and at a time when I have grown as a person”, she says, and of which she has also been president. Booksellers Guild of Catalonia, The position from which he is now retiring after four years of struggle: “Youth has to come.”

He has an unusual story, one that no longer happens. When he was in high school he went to a literary gathering organized by a bookstore troa kingdom Girona, his city. “It was special teen The fool who kept saying ‘I have already read that’. So later when he needed someone, he remembered me and called me to work with him. I started because I wanted to have a little money they didn’t give me at home, and I haven’t given up yet. Afterwards, without leaving the bookstore, I studied BUP, COU and even my degree (specialization in Philosophy and Letters, History),” he recalls with a laugh, adding that he had to take that decision. Never regretted. Adult and i’ve been better person Thanks for the fact that I’ve been trained a bookcase, because I am able to read a lot and knowing makes you free, gives you the ability to choose. You are partly what you read, and I have been very lucky.”

And she says it emphatically, because being a bookseller has given her the opportunity to know For many people, “professionals both in the field and in clients”, he explains. “They are more than those who come to buy, you share A lot,” he says, because that’s what he loves most about his job.to recommend a book” and there small band, “Being he trust book In the end you get so involved that they become friends. there is one Relation So strong and vital that it shakes me too”.

Over these four decades, Mari Carmen has seen how region, And it hasn’t diminished. what time is it? Is it true that we don’t study in Spain?, we ask him. “We are fine Epidemic it means a Change Very important, because when we were limited we basically did three things: watching series, playing games and reading. We have become more readers; Now we have 67% of those who read, while 33% of people do not read anything. When it was not possible, we live by reading other lifeWe have traveled to other countries, we have laughed, we have cried… we have done everything that we cannot do to others. and we continue reading, because we have understood and is appreciated pleasure to do Of course you’ll miss something, but we won’t let you do that,” he says, “because right now they’re publishing Books very Interesting, We all have a strong desire to go to the bookstore to see what happens.”

bookcase that’s another story

And besides, he points out, these places are the first to change. Now “things happen in bookstores. We have activities, reading clubs, storytelling, presentations, conversations with authors, even if they haven’t published a book… Going to a bookstore is one Experience awesome, we are the center cultural and social.” And it is the closeness of literature to the reader that makes the work of the bookseller important, who sometimes also becomes the confidante, especially in the case of women. “In the world Literature There are many women who need To share, they are always in majority in presentations and gatherings. Women like it, men don’t. They need a book to give something and they read everything: romance, yes, but no pastries; Historical…, any genre. sometimes they pigeon nestIt is believed that they only want passion, and no, they also want Thinking“, Understand.

so they are the main buyers Number of books, although it is always easier to sell a man, “because they don’t look at the money so much and those who read do it a lot,” he says. “On the shelves you see men, but the world Literature of women, even when they have small children, they find time to read, this is Brilliant!“, he says.

And it is said by a person who had already read at the age of only 16 ‘the Odyssey’, I read again at 25.”Enid Belliton I became accustomed to reading with ‘The Adventures of the Five’ and ‘Mallory Towers’. from there Julio VerneI’ve always read classics, very powerful books that I’ve had a great time with”.

so don’t stop file“in small pieces”, because it does not claim that “hours Enough”; At eight o’clock he is already in his bookstore in Girona, the same place where he has spent his life. “I’m in the queue, I read; i wait for someone minutesI read…, I always keep a book with me pocket, At night I know I dedicate an hour or so to this, depending on what I feel… so I have these baggy eyes…” he jokes.

trend setters

Although sales Mari Carmen Ferrer revealed this fragility of the area. As the song warns, did the video kill the radio star?, we ask him. “No, the digital book isn’t important in this weakness, it’s more driven by the fact that many people are able to sell books, anywhere, even in one. supermarket…, but are professional booksellers, we are real the prescriber of trends. Fortunately, we are feeling.”

What book is on your nightstand now?

Some streets are still unpublished. and ‘Mrs March’ by Virginia Feito. What a complicated woman, what a difficult life…, that’s enough to start a reading club, in my mind.

Reading for a lifetime, what are some books that have left a mark on you?

Many. If I suddenly had to choose, I’d take Len Tolstoy’s ‘Anna Karenina’. I read it when I was 27 and I still remember it until I finished it. And I was also impressed by Marguerite Yoursenaar’s The Memoirs of Adriano, which is already over 30, but which marked me a lot.

Which books would you recommend to us now?

Oops, so many… For example Franz Werfel’s ‘A Pale Blue Feminine Handwriting’, a delightful book, and Paul Gallico’s ‘Flowers for Mrs. Harris’. There was a book during imprisonment that marked me as well: ‘My mother had green eyes in the summer’, by Tatiana Tubulek, although it is not for everyone. And of course, ‘The Gratitude’ by Delphine de Wigan.

How do we encourage children to start reading?

You have to take them to bookstores and libraries, and let them find what they want. It’s not that a child doesn’t like to read, it’s that he hasn’t found the book that interests him yet. It is a fundamental job of a bookseller to help you do this. And it doesn’t matter if he reads something for a young age, you don’t have to tell him. Reading should always be a reward: “You’ve done so well today, you can read in bed.”

And if you had to encourage someone to come to a book fair, what would you say was undeniable?

Personal contact with authors is something extraordinary, that they can advise you on their books, that’s wonderful. Also, walking there is an experience, due to the number of booths, books… It is the meeting place between friends. But you don’t have to go to book fairs only, you have to go to bookstores too, because we don’t have to buy books only once in a year.

The copies she directs—some of them closer to 200,000—accumulate a whole legacy on the shelves, “there’s a lot of money, it has to be like that”, she explains. The top sales are undeniable,’hamne‘, by Maggie O’Farrell, and also best-selling author: Julia Navarromara OruaVirginia Fetoisabelle Allendeali Smith You Anne Jacobs.

In her passion for reading, Mari Carmen can’t imagine she doesn’t have a book she likes. so is your home too minilibrera, “I have a room full of books, from top to bottom, all the walls.” It is part of his treasure and the magic that the bookstore he runs has distributed over 70 years. because as the author says Tony Gretex, At the Troa booth signing in Retiro Park on June 10, many of the great books she read are “unexpected, about what the bookseller tells you and you buy based on their word. That’s why Joe Books” The shop survives on time”. Time may try to turn its back on the paper.

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