WH Smith sale could turn high street into ‘book desert’, authors say The retailer is in talks to sell its 500 high street stores, which could be a ‘nail in the coffin for British writers’.
Authors are concerned that the sale of WH Smith’s high street stores could create “book deserts”, reducing opportunities for young people to get into reading, while publishers hope that any new buyer will keep books a core part of the business.
Two major publishers, Hachette and Bloomsbury, both told the Guardian that they hoped a new buyer would continue to prioritise books as a core offer, while Pan Macmillan said that WH Smith high street stores “are an important part of the bookselling ecosystem”.
“As a child, I used to get WH Smith gift vouchers for Christmas to spend on books, so to hear the chain is selling its high street stores produces a very particular nostalgic twang,” said Victoria Selman, author of novels including Truly Darkly Deeply.
Though WH Smith is often “sneered at” because “it’s not highbrow enough”, it is “somewhere that introduced people to books”, said author Gareth Rubin, whose books include Holmes and Moriarty.
