It is a truth universally acknowledged that a couple of writers of very little fortune (but a few too many books) must be in want of a bookshop.
Girl meets boy. Boy and girl fall in love. Problem: boy and girl live 9000 miles apart. 15-hour flights between Melbourne, Australia and Omaha, US. Plot point. Plot point. 3 years pass; will they ever be together? Drama. Drama. Tipping point: Visa! Boy moves to Australia. Boy and girl get married. Happily ever after.
So far, so tropey. Don’t worry, the second book in the series is much more interesting.
Boy and girl have long-held dream: second-hand bookshop. Problem: real estate expensive (“very little fortune”) and hard to come by.
Girl has idea: What about a book truck!? Boy thinks it’s just mad enough to work…
So we find ourselves where I usually like all stories to begin; about 20 seconds from the end. (Optimal for not boring people at parties.)
In June 2026, we (Carolyn and David) launched a bookshop built on the back of a kei truck. But the plot twists were plenty.
Bookneck is a business made almost entirely of workarounds. Fit-out, permits, insurance - there’s no form we could simply tick our way through. Few drop-down options applied. And so we exist in the margins.
At first, not having the “shop” part of a bookshop felt like a compromise. But two months in, we’ve come to realise that no walls means no limits. We get to bend genre rules and decide for ourselves what and where a bookshop can be.
Just as well, because we have way more ideas than could ever fit on the back of a kei truck. Literary gatherings. Venue and creative collaborations. Finding unusual ways to gather the Mornington Peninsula’s readers and writers around books. It’s all there but for the imagining.
In The Press.
On The Air.
RPP FM – Chaos Theory (12 August 2026)
We took Bookneck to the airwaves, joining Radio Chaos Theory’s Yasmin Bushby for a chat about Pippi, second-hand books, and what happens when your bookshop has no walls.
Acacia Conversations – Growing Well on the Peninsula
We spend a lot of time inviting people to gather around stories. It was a pleasure to be invited to share our own with Dennice Breeschoten on Acacia Conversations.