News From Nowhere
Opened in 1974 by Bob Dent and Maggie Wellings, News from Nowhere is a wide-ranging and well-stocked radical and community bookshop run by a not-for-profit women workers’ co-operative.
Having held premises across Liverpool, News from Nowhere is currently based at 96 Bold Street and is seen as a centre of Liverpool’s cultural and political scene.
Named after William Morris’s Utopian novel, their stock focuses on feminism, LGBTQ+, Left politics, anti racism, environmental and social justice publications.
They have also provided space for organisations such as Liverpool Pride, a social centre called Next to Nowhere, culture magazine Nerve and Language House and used their displays to highlight the miners strike, abortion rights, Black Lives Matter, Liverpool Pride and World AIDS Day.
In the early 1980s News from Nowhere turned into a women workers’ co-operative.
Employee Mandy outlined some of the difficulties they faced. Without the presence of a man behind the counter, she noted an increase in direct abuse and intimidation including “a group of men walking in saying "Where are your dirty books?" (next time we'll offer them the feather duster), a man standing by the desk staring at us leeringly, another asking us for 'photos”.
The shop was also a target of numerous attacks with shutters and windows being smashed in 1983 and bookshelves and displays being torn down by a single attacker in 1985.
Despite these incidents, News for Nowhere has continued with their belief that "Books will always be a vital tool, for expanding our minds, for envisioning other worlds, for providing us with information and inspiration to overcome injustice and work for a better world, whilst sowing beauty and creativity."
News from Nowhere are members of the Alliance of Radical Booksellers.
Sources:
Radical Bookselling History Newsletter, Issue 5, November 2022, ISSN 2752-3977
Radical Bookselling History Newsletter, Issue 6, May 2023, ISSN 2752-3977
Secret Liverpool blog [https://secretliverpool.co/news-from-nowhere-bookshop/, accessed 24.06.2025]
Chris Bethell, 'News from Nowhere: Inside Liverpool's Iconic Radical Bookshop', 06.07.2022, Kerrang [https://www.kerrang.com/news-from-nowhere-inside-liverpools-iconic-radical-bookshop, accessed 24.06.2025]
Cate Simmons, 'Indie View: News from Nowhere Radical and Community Bookshop' 14.08.2023 [https://www.bookbrunch.co.uk/page/free-article/indie-view-news-from-nowhere-radical--community-bookshop/, accessed 24.06.2025]
The Radical Bookseller, No.16 Jul/Aug 1982; No 20. Jan/Feb 1983; No 42, October/November 1985
