The Bookseller at the End of the World by Ruth Shaw

There’s something magical about a bookshop at the edge of the world. And Ruth Shaw runs two of them.

Nestled in the remote village of Manapouri in New Zealand’s Fiordland, Ruth’s Wee Bookshops are the heart of this rich, funny, and heartbreaking memoir. It’s the kind of book we’d press into your hands on a rainy afternoon, the sea churning just beyond the footbridge.

This is a life fully lived. Ruth has sailed the Pacific, been held up by pirates, worked among the drug addicts and prostitutes of Sydney’s Kings Cross, and campaigned tirelessly for the environment. Woven through it all: some very deep losses, a beautiful love story with her husband Lance, and a sense of humor that simply won’t quit.

The praise says it all. Shaun Bythell, author of The Diary of a Bookseller, calls it “An extraordinary story.” Jack Tame of Newstalk ZB simply says “Amazing!” And Booksellers’ Choice Australia promises it’s “utterly charming and filled with equal measures of heartbreak and humour.”

What we love most is how Ruth writes—straightforward, resilient, never sentimental. As the NZ Listener put it: “Battered and emotionally bruised, she marches on. In a word, dauntless.”

This one will make you weep. Make you laugh. Make you want to read more books. And maybe, just maybe, book a flight to the far side of the world for a cup of tea.

Come linger a while. This is a story worth discovering.

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