£29 Nook Simple Touches back in stock: limited time only

Our £29 Nook ereaders are back in stock. There are just a few, so come and get yours now. (This batch sold out.)


A lovely, clear display and plenty of eBooks, magazines and newspapers to choose from… and there's that amazing price.

At the risk of sounding like a market stall, once they're gone, they're gone. Come get!

4 days until #NewmanMcr: how to be a writer

In four days time, you'll get to see the fabulous Anneliese Mackintosh supporting Robert Newman. Anneliese is a writer. We learned this from YouTube. Look!

(Tweeting about the Rob Newman gig on June 4th? Use the hashtag #NewmanMcr!)

#NewmanMcr competition time! Win tickets to see @mrrobnewman

We've teamed up with the lovely bookfluffies at Manchester Wire to bring you a fabulous competition to win free tickets to our Robert Newman event on Tuesday.

We'll even roll out the red carpet for you.*

Click here to enter our Rob Newman competition.

Only five days to go. You can turn up on the night, but to ensure entry, buy yourself a ticket - or win this competition (winner announced on Sunday)!

* subject to Rob arriving with his own personal red carpet and suitable carpet-cleaning shampoo / upholstery brushes

6 days until #NewmanMcr: one for teenagers in Devon

There'll be a few people reading this that may have braved the outdoor stage at the Manchester Book Market. Here's a thoroughly seasoned performer taking on the stage with her poem I Want To Be A Teenager In Devon. Oh and she just happens to be one of our fabulous support acts for our massive Rob Newman book event in just six days time!

(We're selling tickets in the shop if you don't want to buy online. Find our shop via the power of Google.)

7 days until #NewmanMcr: one for people that read things

No video today. Because we are just one week away from our joint gig with Bad Language, here is something more wordy: this link to an interview with Robert Neman on The List.

"Cargo [Publishing] have booked me to do readings of The Trade Secret for the rest of my life."

Yeah, sorry about that, Rob.

This will be one of his biggest book events. Robert Newman, Rosie Garland, Anneliese Mackintosh, June 4 at Gorilla Manchester. Tickets are selling well, oh yes they are, so get yours now.

8 days until #NewmanMcr: one for radio listeners and Clive Anderson

"I've never been congratulated for my oddness before," says Robert Newman on this brief radio interview about a recent tour. From BBC4 to stand-up to novel-writing, this is one chap you will definitely want to see.

As a bonus, below that is a very, very old interview full of awkwardness from the 11th century or something.

Join our Facebook event for the Robert Newman Manchester gig on June 4 - and do share it with your friends.

9 days until #NewmanMcr: one for coffee drinkers

One thing that occurred to us when thinking about the coffee trading of Robert Newman's new book was the  documentary film Black Gold, which did the festivals circuit in the mid-noughties.

Join us on June 4th. Think stand-up meets book launch meets massive literary knees-up!

10 days until #NewmanMcr: one for the pigeon-fanciers

We are now only ten days off before a brilliant Manchester literary scene knees-up at Gorilla featuring comedian and author Robert Newman and amazing local writing talents Anneliese Mackintosh and Rosie Garland.

And so let's turn our attention today to the pigeons - referenced in the book - and the country's leading pigeon-fancier. Here's Jack Duckworth getting, er, jiggy with it. Don't look. DON'T LOOK.

[Buy Rob Newman Manchester tickets now.]

Why not follow our stars on Twitter? Robert Newman / Rosie Garland / Anneliese Mackintosh

#NewmanMcr countdown: a musical interlude for @mrrobnewman

We're just outside our final ten videos to promote our amazing gig with Robert Newman, Rosie Garland and Anneliese Mackintosh: with just 11 days left, tickets are now selling faster and you should get an advance one just in case.

Here is, then, a musical interlude. Here's Declan O'Rourke singing Galileo (Someone Like You), from his debut album. Rob likes it, so if you come to event and play it to him on a kazoo, I'm sure, er, he won't mind.

#NewmanMcr countdown: 12 days to go

We are delighted to be teaming up with Bad Language to promote our event on June 4. Here is a remarkable event they held last year at the Manchester Museum. Jenn Ashworth and Helen Mort read.

#NewmanMcr countdown: 13 days to go

Our gig a week on Tuesday (have we mentioned it yet) will be part literary knees-up and part stand-up. Rob will have plenty of time to entertain you in An Evening With Robert Newman And Guests. So it seems appropriate to turn back the clock to a 2001 comedy routine.

Buy £3 tickets for his June 4 event now at We Got Tickets, or from our shop. Join the Facebook event here.  And follow the #Newman hashtag on Twitter.

#NewmanMcr countdown: 14 days to go

Our countdown continues. Says Rob Newman:

" Even though this is fiction and not standup, I'm hoping that people who enjoyed History Of Oil will like The Trade Secret, too. Two reasons. #1, the novel tells the story of Oil, The Early Years. #2 as with History of Oil, The Trade Secret tells a secret history, forgotten facts from our past, e.g. long before she ever sailed to America, The Mayflower may well have transported Mediterranean slaves from port to port across the Ottoman Empire. She was a part time slave ship before she was famous."

The Otto-what? Let us enlighten you... from a Venetian point of view. Contains fish and moustaches.

#NewmanMcr countdown: 15 days to go

Young servant Nat Bramble comes a cropper in Robert Newman's The Trade Secret because he dabbles in rogue trading. It's a theme that has resonance across the centuries - even in this rather trite BBC television programme in which a presenter provokes a dodgy dealer without getting beaten up. Still... it's quite entertaining. We promise our event will be utterly professional, honest!

#NewmanMcr countdown: 16 days to go

Robert Newman's feeling down, but don't worry, it's happening in the 1990s. Contains the phrase "dodecahedrically paralysed".

#NewmanMcr countdown: 17 days to go

Robert Newman's book The Trade Secret mentions pigeons. There is absolutely, absolutely no other reason for posting this video other than it mentions something in a book that's being launched at our event. Sigh.

#NewmanMcr countdown: 18 days to go

Here is one of our amazing support acts for our June 4 event at Gorilla Manchester. Anneliese Mackintosh reads Like You.

#NewmanMcr countdown: 19 days to go

In 19 days time, it's Newman day! Here's another excerpt from his Oil show.

#NewmanMcr countdown: 20 days to go

In 20 days, as you may have gathered from this blog, we will launch Robert Newman's new novel The Trade Secret at Gorilla Manchester (7pm on June 4). Here is Rob being brilliant. Love Mark Thomas and Mark Steele? You need to be at our event in June!

#NewmanMcr countdown: only three weeks to go

With 21 days until our biggest event yet, here's another video which takes a theme of Robert Newman's book - the battle against corporate power. Did you know there was an occupation of St Pauls in the days of King James? Here are the voices of some more modern-day protesters.

#NewmanMcr countdo-- oh forget that, here's @socratesadams

We're meant to be counting down to our Rob Newman event with a series of connected videos, but we're so made-up with Socrates Adams' award success, here's a video which is nothing to do with the event but we don't care so shut up.

Here's Socrates Adams' hilarious 2012 promo for his book Everything's Fine. Watch out for his essential new book A Modern Family: launch news to come.

And the Young Bookseller of the Year is...

...Socrates Adams of Blackwell's Manchester!

Socrates began work with us as one of our temporary booksellers that help out during our busy September period. He's since risen up the ranks to manage our Business Centre, which works directly with university departments, the NHS and numerous other institutions and businesses.

In March, he was shortlisted for the Sue Butterworth Young Bookseller of the Year, sponsored by HarperCollins, facing competition from the likes of two London Waterstones, The Wallingford Bookshop and Mr B’s Emporium of Reading Delights. At a glittering black-tie ceremony tonight, he was announced as the winner.

We're obviously made up. It has been an incredible year here at Blackwell's. Over to his colleague Sue Chapman, one of our most experienced booksellers and a favourite with many customers:

Sue said: "Although I have only worked with Socrates for a relatively short time in his role as Business Centre Manager I have been impressed with his enthusiasm & knowledge. He is prepared to tackle anything... although he may sometimes have a dodgy taste in music Socrates is a pleasure to work alongside!"

Socrates recently declared an interest in the music of Cher. Nevertheless, we extend our congratulations.

#NewmanMcr countdown: 23 days to go

ApoCalypsoNow: a 54-minute history lesson from our approaching Manchester headliner Robert Newman. (NSFW.)

#NewmanMcr countdown: 24 days to go

Our countdown continues, like some inexorable nuclear clock. Except instead of armageddon, you get Blackwell's and Bad Language's biggest ever event for only £3. Pre-booking is advised - get your ticket today while you remember!

Rob's book The Trade Secret is based on the true story of the first Elizabethans to discover coffee. So let's have one of the greatest coffee scenes in cinematic history: Iggy Pop and Tom Waits in Jim Jarmusch's Coffee and Cigarettes.

#NewmanMcr countdown: 25 days to go

Our countdown continues. With 25 days until we host Robert Newman, here's what his new novel The Trade Secret could sound like. Here is, bookfluffies, a musical taste of Persia several hundred years ago. Coldplay be damned!

#NewmanMcr countdown: 26 days to go

Our countdown continues until our next book launch, and now it's time to focus on one of our wonderful support acts. Here's poet, writer and performance artist Rosie Garland reading a poem called Fortune Teller.

Rosie's debut novel, The Palace of Curiosities, came out in March. "Page after page, scene after scene, layer after layer of treats and surprises," says Sarah Waters.

#NewmanMcr countdown: 27 days to go

With 27 days until Rob Newman's event with us and Bad Language, here's a (NSFW) clip of his 2003 tour From Caliban to the Taliban. While watching please join and share our Facebook event.

#NewmanMcr countdown: 28 days to go

What happens when Elizabethan adventurers discover coffee? You'll find out in The Trade Secret, which gets its spotlight on the stage in 28 days. Our countdown continues. Here's an informational film on coffee production. Crikes, this is just like the Open University...

#NewmanMcr countdown: 29 days to go

With 29 days until Robert Newman, Rosie Garland and Anneliese Mackintosh take to the stage at Gorilla, here's a theme from the book: rogue trading. In The Trade Secret, a character loses a stack of silver as a rogue trader... nearly 400 years before this chap did the same!

#NewmanMcr countdown: 30 days to go

It is 30 days until Robert Newman's Manchester show, so here is a taster of his stand-up routine History of Oil. The theme is reflected in his new book The Trade Secret.

Warning: contains adult and controversial themes from the start.

Rob Newman's Manchester book launch, 4 June 2013

Come along and meet author and comedian Robert Newman reading from and discussing his stunning new novel The Trade Secret (Cargo Publishing).

Supporting will be brilliant and entertaining writing talents Rosie Garland and Anneliese Mackintosh.

It all happens at Gorilla on Whitworth Street West on Tuesday June 4 at 7pm. Your £3 ticket will get you £3 off off Rob's new book on the night. Buy your Robert Newman ticket now!

Hosted by leading Manchester literary lovelies Blackwell's and Bad Language.

£29 Nook Simple Touch

While other places sell out of the £29 Nook Simple Touch, we have stock and we're ready to dispatch straight to your lovely doormat.

All you need to do is ring us on (UK) 0161 274 3331 and ask for one to be sent. We'll charge you over the phone, pop one in the post and a brilliant bargain eReader is all yours!

We have all the accessories like covers and charges too.

Limited offer, limited stock. Get one now, bookfluffies!

Digital cake joy: book sales are rising

Book sales are on the up according to new figures from the Publishers Association.

After a rocky 2011, total book sales increased by 4% whether in print or paper format. Here's how the figures break down:

- Total book sales, digital and physical now at £3.3bn;
- Total digital sales have risen 66% to £411m, which includes a 149% increase in fiction digital sales.
- Total physical sales of fiction books are up too, rising 3% to £502m.
- Non-fiction physical sales are down 1%, partly because more academic books are being sold digitally.

The figures come from the Publishers Association Statistics Yearbook 2012 which is, yes, available in any format you want.

As a digital-friendly bookshop which trades in books constructed from both paper and data, we find these figures exciting and challenging.

Exciting because many bookfluffies out there still embrace real books alongside their eReader.

And challenging because we need keep up with our customers' habits, which means our shop has changed and will continue to change.

We've recently expanded our physical book selection and we continue to sell lots of digital product. It seems that readers are having their digital cake* and eating it.

* Cake is only available in physical format. Do not go to a cake shop and ask for a digital cake.