Jim Munro, bookstore icon, dies at age 87

Thursday, December 8, 2016

Jim Munro, whose bookstore, Munro Books, has been celebrated as among the world’s best, passed away on November 21, 2016 at the age of 87.

The bookstore, which Munro started with his then wife Alice Munro (celebrated writer and Nobel Prize in Literature winner) back in 1963 is a Mecca for those who love handing out among the stocks or plopping down into an easy chair with a new book.

Weathering recessions, the arrival of the big-box bookstore and other ebbs-and-flows that strike any business, Munro retired from the store in 2014 and transferred ownership to four of its employees.

Upon the news, tributes poured in including on Facebook and Quill & Quire. 

This interview from 2013 with The Globe and Mail nicely encapsulates Munro’s contribution to Canadian literature.