Landmark Royal Oak Book Store To Close

ROYAL OAK (WWJ) - It's been a landmark near 12 Mile and Woodward for a quarter century, but Royal Oak Books will be closing its doors.

WWJ's Newsradio 950's Marie Osborne says you can tell the store's "the real deal" when you step through the door and are met by the smell of book

bindings and two plump cats.

At 80, Pat Jonas has kept Royal Oak Books open seven days a week for 25 years.  Today, the store is still stuffed with literary jewels.

"Someone who does estimating for a living ... he went through it and sort of poked and looked. He thinks [there are] around 60,000 [books]," Jonas said.

Unfortunately, the last few years, sales have been slumping.

"They're disappearing ... People have their, what are they? Tindles? Or Kindles? I don't know what they're called. And they read their books on that," she said.

Jonas said she'll miss her customers most, saying she's learned more from them than any books she's every read.

She'll sell off her inventory and close by late summer.