SEX and Twilight stalkers were not subjects John and Ruth McIntyre concerned themselves with twenty years ago when The Children’s Bookshop opened.
However the couple are happy to talk straight to parents and kids about what they should be reading for their age.
“It’s nice to be a child for as long as possible since you’re going to be an adult for a lot longer and there’s plenty of time to read all of that later,” says Ruth.
John recalls being upset with one woman saying “my nine-year-old can read Twilight”.
“I said ‘did you know Edward Cullen is a stalker? He exhibits male abuse traits, watches her while she sleeps, tries fast to scare her’.”
John says parents do respond to those discussions. “When you start telling them that, they are all ‘O.K.’.”
They pride themselves on matching the right book to the right child and in turn enjoy little returns based on their recommendations.
Making sure children know if a book has sexual content, however tame is something the McIntyre’s don’t tip toe around.
They recall a mother coming into the shop and whispering she wanted to swap a book because she didn’t want her son to read it as it included sexual content.
John says he looked at the boy and said: “Your mother doesn’t want you to read it because it’s got sex in it.”
He says the boy screwed up his face and immediately wanted a new book.
Ruth says it is hard when a book has a cult following.
“When Harry Potter was first written she (J K Rowling) intended it for an 11-plus age group,” says Ruth.
“Of course as it became more popular and as the movies came out the younger the people who wanted to read it. So children ages six or seven wanted to read it.”
Ruth has also noticed many adult authors like Jodi Picoult taking to writing fiction for young people.
“Writing children’s books has become the thing to do,” says Ruth.
“It is a real skill. A lot of people think it’s easy to write a children’s book, that you can fob any old thing off on them but they are probably the most discerning audience and can spot a fake as quick as anything,” Ruth says.
Risk of doing something different produces 20 years of rewards
John and Ruth McIntyre made their dreams a reality to have a store dedicated entirely to children’s books in August 1992.
“I wanted to be something different and there wasn’t one in Wellington,” says John, a former primary school teacher.
John had previously taught in both New Zealand and Britain.
“So we just thought, ‘let’s give it a shot and see how it goes. Give it two years.’ We weren’t too sure it’d take. Big risk.”
“The dream became a reality and became a way of life,” says Ruth, a former journalist who spent 17 years with the New Zealand Press Association.
“It was completely from scratch. We had no stock and we had to work out what we wanted as well and to know which books we should have and that is a learning curve.”
A bit of Kiwi ingenuity was required when it came time to set up the store.
“We set up very cheaply and spent virtually no money on fittings,” says John.
“The old kitchen bench from home became the counter. We got cheap shelving and spent all the money on books.”
“When we started children’s books, there wasn’t a lot around, a few picture books, a few I and so on,” says John.
“Children’s books grew as we grew and then Harry Potter changed it all when it came out in 1999. But in those days no other bookshop really spent much space or time on children’s books.”
Ruth remembers a time before all the hype.
“Children’s books were always down the back and at the bottom, buried.”
Customers soon discovered with the store.
“We were lucky. They liked the idea of a shop devoted to children’s literature and we soon developed a loyal following and that’s stayed.”
The loyalty certainly has stayed.
The McIntyre’s have upgraded their store three times, each store growing in size.
Their first store in Kilbirnie Plaza was a quarter of the size of their current space.
“Size wise this is about right.”
The McIntyres say their staff are widely read and they keep on top of children’s literature.
Each staff member has areas and genres they like and trust each other’s judgement.
“We listen to our customers,” says John.
The changes in the way people are now getting their reading material have not impacted on their success.
While E books and digital readers have prompted a slump in hardcopy sales at bookshops,,
John and Ruth say this has yet to impact children’s books.
“E-books? Not on our radar. None of the E-book publishers have come to us asking if we want to sell E-books.”
The McIntyres have a theory why children’s books have not been affected.
“Particularly in children’s and picture books, there is a bonding that goes on when you read a physical book to your child.
“You can’t gift wrap an e book.”
John and Ruth’s expertise has been called on many times, to judge and convene the New Zealand Post Children’s Book Awards – John in the 1990s and Ruth in the past two years.
John is a regular commentator and children’s literature reviewer for Radio New Zealand, fortnightly on Nine To Noon with Kathryn Ryan.
