Waterstone's has announced that it is to reduce its reliance on big celebrity titles and a narrow range of bestselling fiction, with a view to repositioning itself as more of a local bookshop. To show it means business, the chain has teamed up with Cork University Press to promote "local books" in its Cork branch. Which is nice. It would have been even nicer if it had done so before helping to put almost every other local independent bookshop out of business – by selling piles of discounted celebrity and bestselling fiction titles.