Read Online A Very Special Year by Thomas Montasser - Free Book Online

source of great comfort and relaxation after the strains that such travelling and nightly performances place on a sensitive artist’s heart and my permanently somewhat frail physique. Please put the books on my account and I shall pay my debtswhen I next visit your city. With my warmest regards and deep respect,
    Â 
    Yours
,
    Â 
    Â 
    Noé
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    P.S. Please try to find the most beautiful editions available. A book is so much more than the sum of its words!
    What couldn’t be found was a list of the books. There was nothing else with the letter. But another thought had crept into Valerie’s mind as Sven read out the letter: she’d seen the name of the famous actor on another list – several times in fact! On the list of unpaid bills…
    At this point, dear reader, we can’t help forcing our narrator to revise his pre-conceived ideas. Even the most witless business economist can, in certain circumstances, be placed in a position to steer his or her imagination in some other direction than towards currencies. This doesn’t mean that such circumstances will always obtain. In Sven’s case, we’re looking atsomeone whose imagination was clearly fired by monetary affairs, which is why – surrounded by countless fascinating stories – he quickly became bored in the small bookshop. ‘I can’t understand,’ he said sulkily one evening, ‘why you’re wasting your time in here. It’s all hopeless.’
    â€˜Sven… it’s what my aunt wanted. We don’t even know where she is. How she is…’
    â€˜Which means she abandoned all of this long ago, and it’s high time you followed her example.’ He blew some non-existent dust from a copy of
Man of Straw
and then stared morosely out into the street, where a crane was being delivered.
    â€˜What? Vanish into thin air? Great plan.’
    â€˜Don’t be silly,’ he carped. He wasn’t in the mood for jokes. ‘I mean you should abandon this.’
    â€˜Maybe she’ll come back. Hopefully…’
    â€˜Then she can do the job herself. This slump in turnover – was it your fault or hers?’
    â€˜Instead of being so mean about Aunt Charlotte, why don’t you help me?’ Valerie replied, suppressing the lump that was trying to rise in her throat.
    â€˜You want help? OK then!’ He turned around, went up the two steps to the office, grabbed a pen and paper and scribbled down some bullet points. Then, perched with one buttock on the edge of the desk, hepontificated, ‘The first thing you ought to do is a target group analysis. Who shops in this joint?’
    â€˜OK… well, at the moment I’d say it’s almost exclusively people who just pop in off the street. Far too few at any rate.’
    â€˜Look, if you know who you’re sitting here for and which sort of people you’re expecting,’ Sven continued impassively, ‘you’re on the way to sharpening your profile. Otherwise you’re missing out on at least half your ideal customers. Don’t waste any time on the minnows. If you’ve got three sorts of customers, concentrate on the two lucrative groups and let the third go.’
    â€˜Three sorts of customers would be great, Sven. The way things look at the moment I don’t even have…’
    â€˜Process optimization and profit maximization,’ the young man blurted out with a faint tremolo – his forehead was quivering. ‘These are measures you need to undertake. A business doesn’t work because you’ve tried to understand how others have got it wrong; it runs smoothly because you find out how you can make it work yourself.’
    Although at that moment Valerie hated Sven for his perspective on things and found his pathological diagnosis ridiculous, his insight was perhaps notaltogether wide of the mark. And yet, everything he’d said before that sounded so inane,