i don't get it. how is amazon threatening the bookshops' livelihood when it was the traditional publishers who didn't pick up the book? shouldn't bookshop owners be upset that publishers aren't able to scale properly?
Which I find weird because they'd expect the author to handle shipment to the 3000+ bookshops all by himself ? I've heard some self-published authors do that, but this is madness.
If any traditional publisher wanted to offer an edition of this book – which is now award-nominated! – they could make the author an offer.
These bookshops thus have a sort of 'Stockholm Syndrome', identifying with the traditional publishers on whom they have become overly-dependent, and whose disinterest in this apparently-meritorious book has created the problem for the bookshops.
They are able. They just don't want to.
Which they lobbied for.
> France is highly supportive of its independent booksellers: it has fixed book prices, and caps discounts at 5%, passing a bill in 2013 to stop retailers such as Amazon from combining the 5% discount with free delivery.
> https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/oct/15/france-online-...
Personally I like physical books, but they cost quite a lot.