Play@YSDC

Skipper looks defensive, possibly even nettled. "I am familiar with the Discworld series, thank you. Audio books are a life necessity in the soup and gravy, for your info." He briefly mimes putting headphones on. "I just can't think of a good reason for Jordan to declare he is a troll. I assume he's concussed after being hit by a heavy cookbook?"

"Don't get the Errol thing though."

"As for trading with our friend, my extensive experience of dodgy deals in pubs is the first trade is the hard one. After that, you have ground rules."

He looks at Des. "The short cut. I like it but I'm wondering if the shop thing will think it's cheating."

"Mainly because I'm big and tough," says Jordan, "and none of the other characters fit. And I dodged that book. That's a brilliant idea about audiobooks, though. Dewey...or Errol...seems to like Meg and Mog. If there's no existing audiobook version of it, we can just make a recording of me reading it. Then we can set it up on a timer to play the recording at night when the store is closed and nobody is here. As long as the power stays on, it'll play."

”’zactly,” said Des. ”Got t’ be woth a try, unless you want t’ sit down der every night f’ de rest o’ yor life?”

Suitably bribed (in the best tradition of parenting) with the promise of some more stories, 'Errol' happily helps out with the tidying up (although some assistance is needed with the alphabetical sorting). After a couple of hours (minus Ernie's not-infrequent toilet breaks), the job is done.

The rest of the night is uneventful. Nightingale calls at 1 o'clock to see how things are going, and is happy to hear that you have a firm handle on the situation.

"A new genius loci - how fascinating! I will have to pay my respects and inform Mama Thames of the situation - better she finds out from me than anyone else, in case she decides to take an interest in it's upbringing. I doubt Stonewaters would appreciate a flooded basement."

He concurs with your idea of playing audiobooks to 'Errol' and indeed, as the weeks go by, an initially bemused Saffron reports that this seems to do the trick (although the genius loci seems to require twice-weekly audiobooks, whereas whenever someone reads a real book, it appears satisfied with a weekly occurrence).

Now and again, a junior member of the Folly is actioned to visit 'Errol' and read a book themselves, just to check up on the situation.

OOC:   And that, my friends, is The Bookshop - the introductory case file in the Rivers of London RPG rulebook. if you wish to continue (and I hope you do), please proceed to The Incident Room for a pot of tea and a slice of Molly's Battenburg cake. Oh, and 1 more Development Point each (I will detail how you can spend these over there.)