Two's company
Guess who's back
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FIRST, A WORD OF WARNING. Never arrange too good a leaving present for a departing colleague: they might never leave.
That, at least, seems to be the moral of the tale of Denise Wallin. Denise was part of the original team of booksellers that I assembled shortly before opening Backstory. She started off working at the bookshop just a couple of days a week, but it quickly became apparent that she could offer a lot more to Backstory — and not just by her habit of buying enormous packs of Yorkshire Tea to feed our shared addiction.
With a specialism in events and entertainment marketing, including stints at UK TV and heading up marketing at Madame Tussauds, Denise quickly assumed responsibility for getting the word out about Backstory. Before long, Balham tube station was plastered with our ads and our reading guides were dropping on locals’ doormats.
More recently, she dreamed up a clever stunt to mark the publication of the Heated Rivalry ice-hockey romance series, arranging for players from the Streatham Redhawks to be pictured in full get-up at Backstory, glued to the book (and each other).
So it was a blow when, about this time last year, Denise decided it was time to move on.
We obviously needed to go all out to recognise her contribution to Backstory’s success. Her favourite author, Curtis Sittenfeld, gamely agreed to sign a complete collection of her books. Since Denise had once remarked that she would read anything by Sittenfeld — “even her shopping list” — we persuaded the bemused author to supply us with just that, too. We nervously tracked the FedEx parcel’s journey back across the Pond as the date for her leaving party approached.
All I can say is it must have gone down too well. A few months on, Denise and I went for a drink and, as is typical, it didn’t take us long to talk shop. Soon we were saying how much we missed working together.
Awake later that night, a thought struck me. I knew Denise was keen to run her own business. But what if that business was… Backstory?
Fast forward a few months and I’m delighted to say that Denise is now officially my business partner. She’s heading up our ever expanding line-up of events and our partnerships with publishers on signed and personalised editions of books.
More than that, she is back to being a wise sounding board for me on matters big and small, doubling down on some of our plans and offering a helpful occasional check on others. We share a gallows humour and, after each spending years working in big companies, a love of implementing ideas straight away, tinkering here and there and seeing what works.
For me, it’s a joy finding someone who cares about Backstory as much as I do, who is literally bought into its continued flourishing. I’m still really glad that I set out on this adventure on my own, and against (sensible and well-meaning) advice: it’s been great to test myself and to build something from the ground up, with more than a little help from all my colleagues and with the warm embrace of our community.
Now that the business is maturing, it’s lovely to have someone join me for the next steps of the journey — and to share the responsibility. Selling some of my shares was a milestone, too. Of course, I realised that we have created social value in Backstory: quite apart from lots of nice messages from many of you over the last few years, it’s hard to walk in to a packed bookshop on a Saturday afternoon, several different generations perched on every available bar stool and many more mooching about the tables of books, without clocking that.
But it was quite a moment to see in black and white that something that four years ago existed only in my head now has an economic value too: that what was an idea has become a business.
Mostly, though, I’m just glad to have Denise back. Apart from anything else, I’d missed the gossip, her hearty cackle about something or other announcing her imminent arrival from the shopfloor.
So please raise a glass to mark this new chapter for Denise and me. Actually, scratch that: it better be a good mug of Yorkshire.
Happy reading,
Tom
Upcoming events at Backstory
This Wednesday, 13 May — Katja Hoyer, Weimar: Life on the Edge of Catastrophe The historian tells the story of 1920s Germany’s brief, doomed dalliance with democracy and the rise of Hitler through the lives of the ordinary residents of a German city.
26 May — Francesco Mattana, Eat Like A Sardinian: Live to 100 The Italian chef is here to tempt you.
2 June — Jem Calder in conversation with Naomi May, I Want You To Be Happy One of The Observer’s debut novelists of 2026 joins us to talk about his buzzy story of precarious living in London.
9 June — Sarah O’Connor, We Are Not Machines This award-winning FT journalist discusses the AI revolution and “the fight for the future of work”
Well done to you both ! Hope you enjoy the tea & champagne to celebrate ☕️🥂
Love this!