Bookshop turning a last page

The "Romance Room" will be empty soon.

So will the shelves stacked with sci-fi, westerns, biographies, and mysteries.

And when the books are gone, a piece of local history will disappear as well: After 30 years on Haddon Avenue in Collingswood, the Book Trader is closing.

"It's time," owner Mary Alice Curley says. "I'm done."

A mother of six, grandmother of 14, and great-grandmother of two, Curley was 52 when she got into the used-book business.

She's 82 now; age, as well as rising rent and dwindling patronage, inspired her decision to shutter the store by the end of February.

She's selling - or in some instances, giving away - selections from a 7,000-book inventory, and the store's fixtures, too.

"Over the years a lot of customers have become friends," says Curley, a Westmont resident whose blue eyes are as lively as her personality. "I know everybody's story, and they know mine.

"People who read books," she adds, "are usually nice people."

Like a hostess, Curley greets and chats up customers from behind a desk at the front of the store.

It's an agreeably cluttered space, packed with paperbacks and decorated with snapshots of her Irish Catholic clan.

A recent photo shows Curley and her husband, Tom, 84, celebrating their 60th wedding anniversary with Msgr. Michael Doyle at Camden's Sacred Heart Church.

Another photo is of Tom, a retired Audubon athletic coach, with Stephen Flacco - the father of Baltimore Ravens quarterback Joe Flacco.

Explains Curley, "I wanted the store to be homey."

The Book Trader has been all that and more, says borough council member and Haddon Avenue businesswoman Joan Leonard.

"You can get a book, and have a conversation," she says. "Mary Alice is a lovely person who interacts with the community.

"I don't want to lose her," Leonard adds. "But retail is always changing and always challenging."

This has become particularly true of bookselling in recent years. "People are using those e-books. Young people are doing this," Curley says, imitating the use of a handheld device.

While many bookstores have added beverages, food, even live entertainment, the Book Trader is resolutely old-school. Hip, it isn't; there's no music, no coffee, no kale.

"I just wanted it to be a place where people are happy because they're buying books," Curley says.

"Books make people happy."

On the day I visit, longtime customer Sharon M. Renshaw is stocking up for the annual used-book sale of the American Association of University Women's Camden County chapter.

"It's always felt good to come in here, and talk to people, and see all kinds of books," says Renshaw, of Cherry Hill. "I've found books here I couldn't get at Barnes & Noble, or at the library."

Leonard says she would love to find a smaller, lower-cost, or perhaps shared space in downtown Collingswood where the Book Trader could continue.

But Curley - who appreciates Leonard's efforts - seems to have made up her mind.

"I mean, I'm 82," she says. "How much longer could I go?"

Her kids "are all happy" about the impending retirement; Curley is looking forward to sleeping a little later and perhaps some travel with her husband.

"I said to him this morning, 'I'm sad, but I'm tired,' " she says.

For now, there are customers to greet and business to be transacted.

"When do you close?" asks Lynne Clarke, 70.

"End of the month," Curley answers.

"I will miss it," says Clarke, a retired library employee in Haddon Heights.

"Thank you," Curley says and smiles. "Thank you for all the years."