WHEN I was growing up it wasn’t unusual for my dad to disappear on family days out.

It wasn’t hard to find him - we would just head for the nearest bookshop. He could usually be found in the poetry or local history section, standing in a trance-like state, engrossed in a book.

It would take ages and a fair amount of nagging to prise him away, and he rarely left empty handed - he usually bought one or two books to add to his ever-increasing library at home.

For a while, the future of bookshops looked uncertain, if not bleak. The dependence upon online services like Amazon and the growth of electronic readers saw many bookshops, in particular independents, close and struggle to maintain their place on the high street.

For people like me, that came as unwelcome news. Like my dad, wherever I go I gravitate towards bookshops. In the same way as clothes shopping, I’m a ‘try before you buy’ person and can generally tell whether I will enjoy a book after having a quick skim of its pages. I’m rarely wrong, although sometimes - The Time Traveler’s Wife (dull and confusing); On Chesil Beach (what was all the fuss about - tedious in the extreme) - I have wasted my money.

Independent bookshops are not just about books. They are often cosy, quirky and atmospheric, particularly the secondhand variety, both my and my dad’s favourite.

In the best ones, you can browse for hours, without feeling conspicuous or hurried.

Shops aside, there’s nothing like a real book: feeling it in your hand, turning the pages, putting in your bookmark, selecting where to place it on your bookshelf after you have finished it.

I can understand why people would turn to the likes of Kindle to save space, and it certainly would do that in our home - we have far too many books and not enough shelves. But for me, the idea of reading a book on an electronic tablet just doesn’t appeal. You wouldn’t want to take a Kindle in the bath, for one thing.

But back to bookshops: the tide appears to be turning - after a 20-year decline, the number of independent sellers has grown for the fifth consecutive year in a row.

Amazingly, the surge in interest among young people is seen as the reason for the dramatic change.

Young people? Is there a catch? Not surprisingly there is - the online generation are suddenly flocking to bookshops for ‘Instagram-friendly’ backdrops.

For some reason, young people like to be seen in bookshops. The hashtag bookstagram has seen more than 70 million shares on Instagram, while millions more have posted photos with the hashtags independentbookshop and booklover.

But are they actually buying? The proof in the pudding would be a snap of their till receipt. I could saunter in to the lobby at The Savoy and grab a quick selfie but it doesn’t mean I am staying there.

Is browsing in a bookshop a way of seeming intellectual? Or maybe it’s connected to the obsession with bookshelves as a backdrop on TV Zoom interviews.

Bizarrely, bookshops now have become tourist attractions - with many influencers posing among books in shops across the UK. On TikTok - the platform favoured by those in their late teens and early 20s - more than 34 billion people have watched videos related to books.

Maybe I am being unduly harsh, but I think older generations are behind the boom in bookshops. A few young people taking selfies surely wouldn’t propel anyone to open a new one.

I visit independent bookshops regularly and, yes, you do see young people, and parents with children, but more often than not they are filled with middle-aged and older people. They are the ones buying books.

But, as always, because we oldies are not messing about making silly videos, we don’t get any credit.

Were I to start gyrating around in my local bookshop, it would be interesting to see how long it was before I was forcibly ejected. Just a thought.