Surrounded by books, Liz and I sit down to chat about her life as a book dealer. She says that if someone has to interview her, they need to be prepared to interview Island Books. And that’s because Liz Groves has become so integrated into the shop and it is hard to separate woman from book.
I ask her about how she came to live in Malta and become a book dealer. She tells me she was 27 when she came to Malta as a result of a rather interesting love twist 34 years ago. “At the time, I was living with David who was a senior policeman and we came down to Malta in 1960s, which is when I met my husband, Brian. I left David in a hotel, and came to Malta to marry Brian.”
For six months Liz worked as a secretary for the SPCA in Malta and following a Christmas fair, organised by the SPCA, discovered a large number of unsold books. She decided to take them home with her and sell them for a little extra “pocket-money.
“I was kicked out of the SPCA and six months later I opened Island Books. That was on the 1 May 1991. I did not originally intend to call the shop Island Books. It was during Mintoff’s time in office and he didn’t allow certain names for shops or papers even, so I chose Island Books and I bet that every island around the world has an Island bookshop.”
As everyone is attempting to prepare themselves for the upcoming conversion to the euro on 1 January, Liz is having to endure quite an ordeal to deal with the pressure of conversion. She laughs, “I can hardly wait. I am going crazy at the moment double-pricing all the books. I have done about 4,000 books to date. At this rate, I think I’ll be one of the few giving change on the 1 January.”
Although the general population is anticipating a rather hectic period during the conversion, Liz believes that the mental memory of Maltese money will disappear after a while. “The fiction I sell is more intelligent and generally not found in any of the other commercial bookshops,” she tells me when I ask her about the kind of books she sells. “Book retailers seem to know what the mainstream choice of books is so they tend to sell the same books. A large percentage of the books I sell are translated novels, although I do not tend to stock up on a large amount of fiction. I only have about 2,000 novels on the shelves at the moment.”
If she were to write a book, what would it be about?
“Funny you should ask that. I was planning to write a book a while ago and it was going to be entitled ‘Challenges of a baby boomer’. I was a part of the baby boomer generation around 1945-1949. I wanted it to be humorous and sociological. I was going to write it but I’m still facing the challenges of a baby boomer.”
Although it may sound really cliché, Liz admits, the choice of book truly is the mirror to the soul. She believes that being a book dealer means one has the opportunity to help people learn about themselves through their choice of books.
“One example of this is the gay book section. It is specifically aimed towards anyone who is interested in homosexuality in a technical way or who is homosexual and generally wants to read about it. I always buy books for everyone else, never for myself, to the best of my ability. It helps you see the irony in everything.”
The chat is interrupted by a phone call amongst numerous others to follow. She politely answers: “Hello. Island Books.” When the handset is put down, she turns to me and says: “The bloody thing never stops ringing.” To which I reply that she seemed very helpful to the caller who was a girl from Gozo searching for a book for university.
“I gained a lot of my experience by spending five years in Bentalls – a massive shopping complex in England. Working there helped me specialise in book dealing, amongst other things, and I have grown to believe that you have to be appreciative of what you are selling and know what you are selling. I also have to stress that I am a book dealer, not retailer. The difference is that I, most often than not, know what I am selling.”
Being an atheist since the age of 12, Liz does not celebrate Christmas and opens the shop for anyone who just wants someone to talk to, who want somewhere to go and get away from the hullabaloo. “I take after my mother in many respects so I think I am truly a wonderful person.”
I ask what her favourite books were when she was younger and after a while says Malory Towers by Enid Blyton but shakes her head soon after. “I should have said I read Nietzsche at four but we did not have him in the junior library at the time.”
Interestingly, if she were to have a superpower, she would choose the ability to speak to everyone in their own tongue because she believes “language is what divides us”. The first thing she would do with the power would be to talk to her Polish doctor and say something really “wonderful”.
She talks about her achievements in live and feels that one thing she’s proud of is the happy client base she has here, especially taking into consideration that she was an accidental book dealer. She adds that she has seen many generations come into the shop for books and although it feels aging, it is pleasing. “Another achievement is that I managed to survive the 1960s… and not many people can actually say that.”