Bookshops in Sydney. How's it going?

In the house by the ocean where we’re currently staying there’s a copy of Annie Dillard’s collection of essays, For the Time Being. In the inside back cover there’s a label from the store where it was purchased: Norton Street Books in Leichhardt, Sydney. That book shop has long since closed, so long ago that I’ve never personally heard anyone mention its existence. But then this year when Berkelouw Books, also on Norton Street in Leichhardt, announced they were shutting down I realised I’ve been living in Sydney for long enough now to have experienced the closure and opening of many bookstores over the years. A good decade before COVID, around 2010 there was a period when it felt as though there was a real culling of Sydney bookshops. This was around the time Dymocks closed several of their CBD branch stores to focus on just their flagship store on George Street. Each closure felt like the end of an era. Cumulatively it was seriously worrying. And then the turmoil grew worse.…