There is a very famous quotation, which unfortunately I neither properly remember it nor recall who said it, that a place in London, the steps of St Paul’s maybe, or London Bridge, was so thronged with people, that if you stood there long enough you would see everyone you know pass by… or maybe it was Rome, and if you stood by the Trevi Fountain… the point is, there are some places and no matter when you visit or what time you go, you bump into someone and usually more than one person you know.
Waterstones in Weston-super-Mare, known as Westonstones, is a little like that; I don’t mean that I will meet every one of the thousands of people I must have met and known in my lifetime, but I know without doubt that whenever I go in, there will be someone to say hello to. I went in today and there was Pat from my Saxish Circle group wandering round looking for a gift for sa nice.
Yesterday I went in to pick up my copy of ‘Go Set a Watchman’ which I’d ordered, the latest novel to be published by Harper Lee; we had read ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ which was originally published in 1960 in our reading group a couple of weeks ago. Mockingbird was actually a prequel to ‘Go Set a Watchman’, but was originally written as part of ‘Watchman’ as a series of flashbacks to explain the characters’ motivation. When we read ‘Mockingbird’ I was amazed at how much I still enjoyed it, and how familiar it was to me. Certainly I had a different point of view reading it now, especially in the light of recent tragic events in the USA, but it was still a book I admired and liked.
So… ‘Go Set a Watchman’; it was the first draft of what became ‘Mockingbird’ and was recently discovered and has now been published to great controversy. Already the papers and media are full of reviews, but I have resisted reading them, wanting to come to it with an open mind, but I must admit I feel a little nervous since I know that many of the reviews have not been favourable.
So, the story of Westonstones being the place to meet people I know;yesterday I had already spotted Francesca from my French group, and was standing at the counter while my new book was being found, standing next to someone else who was buying it too. Lo and behold, my fellow customer was my reading group friend Jim! Definitely Westonstones is the place to go to meet friends unexpectedly!
Lois Elsden 