It is a late Wednesday afternoon, and the glittering eyes of a woman who has been here since 8 AM peek up from behind a mass of dark curls. Her name is Valorie Brown, and she is a woman with hundreds of thousands of worlds at her fingertips. A cascade of golden light floods the room in which she stands, only adding to the delicate majesty that already permeates the bookstore.
Located at 141 North Center Street in downtown Turlock, Brown and her husband Tim opened Lightly Used Books in 2010, a decision that she explains was impulsive.
“My husband had too many books and I had too many books and we both like business so we thought we’d try it,” Brown says. Since first opening their doors, the Browns have expanded their floor space to accommodate their ever growing supply of books.
A walk through the bookstore finds customers transported everywhere from the halcyon days of their youth, where they are rubbing elbows with Alice and the Mad Hatter at tea time, to complicated love triangles in modern day New York. Brown and her husband have been able to curate their collection of books over the years with the help of people who bring in their own.
“Some days we don’t get many books, some days I might get twenty boxes of books, but on average, I would say we get about seven boxes of books a day,” Brown says.
Twenty years worth of decor, mostly acquired from swap meets and antique stores, line the walls and bookshelves of Lightly Used Books. The books are nestled in bookshelves that the Brown family built themselves while Valorie is also responsible for staining one of the bookcases by hand, an impressive feat that she admits with astounding humility.
“It took a lot of time, but not as long as you’d think,” Brown says. “We worked hard, and we had help.” The care and time that has been invested is immediately apparent.
Brown places her copy of The Black Company by Glen Cook down on the counter in front of her as she ponders the future of her bookstore.
“Oh, I’d love to have more business and have more people come in. The longer we’re in business, the more I’m aware of what books people need. When you’re going through the boxes, there’s certain books you know you need to have, because everybody needs A Child Called It. I can spot those books a lot faster now, and I always try to get those whenever I can in order to meet the needs of people,” she says.
There is a young girl running her fingers along the books that are laden with sleep as the store approaches closing time, and there is such a fierce determination in her walk which inevitably evokes in me a sense of intrigue. What is she so intent on finding? I do not ask her, but I recall Brown telling me that although there is no pigeonhole for her customers, most of them are gentle, sensitive people. I say my goodbyes to Brown, thank her for her time, and leave, certain that whatever the young girl was looking for, she will find within the recesses of trembling spines and words immortalized with the knowledge that one day, someone would look for them.