The last day at Librerío de la Plata: "Here you always felt special"

Sabadell"Can you give me one last recommendation? Don't tell me the title. My mother will take the book; that way, when I get home from training, I'll find a surprise," a young man says to Cecilia Picún, who is constantly giving hugs, recommending books, and taking pictures with all the customers who came to buy a book today. She knows everyone's name. The customers and their children. Today, Friday, Librerío de la Plata closes its doors. Picún announced more than a month ago that her lease would not be renewed. She wanted to continue until her retirement in 2027, but it wasn't possible.

In her farewell, she marks all the books with her seal. Navigare necesse este [We have to keep browsing]. "A lot of people have come in the last few weeks, and each one has a story, a memory. We've gone through the records to see what the first book they bought was," she explains while showing a card a customer made for her with a quote from one of these first purchases. Brujarellaby Iban Barrenetxea. Around her neck, Picún wears a pendant, another gift from some children. They assured her it filled her with positive energy. "It's a sad day, but we've created a community strong enough to somehow survive in the shop," says Picún. The book clubs, which have hosted dozens of writers, editors, and translators, will continue in spaces provided by the Sabadell City Council. "We had managed to create a space where human connections, not algorithms, were very important, and that gives us hope for the future," says the bookseller.

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This Friday the bookstore is full of people shuffling through books that bump into each other. In the back, the typewriter of Uruguayan journalist and writer Eduardo Hughes Galeano stands out. The author of The Open Veins of Latin AmericaThe man who fought so hard to rescue the memory of an often-neglected territory was a friend of Picún's, and his sister gave it to him. The shelves, now quite empty, always held many books by Latin American authors, because Picún was born and raised in Montevideo. Eire, who is 14, walks around carrying a stack of books. She had asked the bookseller for recommendations. Among them was the amusing Cluny Brownby Margery Sharp. Marta Tricuera has visited the bookstore many times with her 7-year-old daughter. Picún gave the girl her first book. "This place is like a refuge, far from the noise outside. You come in here and you feel special, because Cecilia makes you feel, she gives you peace, and there's a lot of work behind the scenes that we don't see. They always organized lots of activities and Cecilia was incredibly thoughtful," she explains.

Picún worked for 20 years in the pharmaceutical industry in Montevideo. She came to Sabadell for love and, together with her partner, lawyer Miguel Sánchez Laguna, opened the bookstore in 2013. "I've always been a big reader, I took the plunge and Sabadell welcomed me," she says. Her love of books even led her to take her daughter to read under a tree instead of going to school. She always has a recommendation for everyone. Some people come in and explain their mood or what they need at that moment, and she has the right book. "She gives good advice, she's always right, and you don't find that in other bookstores," says Toni, who has stayed. Black night by Chris Offutt. "The service is very special; every time I walk past, I feel like going in," he adds. The window display is anything but conventional; there's always a short story, a tale, a phrase, a statement. "In the bookstore, we've talked about many books, but above all, we've talked about life," says Picún shortly before closing its doors for good and opening a few bottles of cava. He's saying goodbye to a physical location, but not to many of the readers he'll continue to meet in book clubs.