I read this book in a rather compulsive manner. I’m all up for quitting everything, selling my possessions and moving to Paris to live it rough and get inspired. I really am. I probably won’t do it, mainly because I would find it too hard to part with my record collection, but that’s what Jeremy Mercer did. And he wrote a book about it.

After getting into a bit of trouble with his job, Mercer left Canada and moved to Paris as an excuse to learn the language. After some time there, seeing how his money was dangerously close to disappearing, he happened to visit Shakespeare & Co. A few days later he moved in.

It’s really interesting to get an insight in the daily routine of the bookshop; how work is organised, what the owner is like, how they get by in such an expensive city with little money. Mix that with the history of such a fascinating place (despite this not being the original Shakespeare & Co.), the romantic idea of the poor writer in the city of lights and a story of personal development and finding yourself in unexpected places. What you get is some sort of “Down and Out in Paris and London” minus the London part made for book lovers. I loved it.