This is also very sad news for publishers like ourselves who have always found the QU Bookshop to be a really professional and energetic outfit. So sorry to hear about the job losses. It is a poor reflection on universities and their students that Google Books and Wikipedia can be thought a decent substitute for properly researched academic books. But as Tim says, this is perhaps just one more piece of an inevitable change in the market which we can do nothing to stop. Good luck to all of you in the future and thanks for your great support in the past. Richard Hart, Hart Publishing Ltd, Oxford

Sad news indeed - as a comprehensive, efficient, knowledgeable, unobtrusive service has been provided by the Queen's bookshop to generations of university students and staff, families and anyone fortunate enough to cross the threshold. They have rejoiced in promoting, befriending and celebrating local, national and international authors across the academic spectrum, hosted well-attended book launches and generally cared about books, their authors and their readers, relishing and benefiting from their independent status. Their wide-ranging and imaginative children's section has nurtutred a love of reading in their youngest customers and the the wonderful Tim Smyth and his dedicated staff will be keenly missed.

So sorry to hear of the closure. The Bookshop at Queens will be sorely missed. So is QUB going to be a Russell Group university without a bookshop? How strange and how sad!

This is devastating news. Over the past 40 years I have spent far more money than I could ever afford in this shop, simply because it carries such a tremendous range of interesting books. I am currently on an extended visit to my home city of Belfast for family reasons and was so pleased when I arrived a few months ago to find the University Bookshop, as I will always think of it, still as good as ever. It was in this shop that I had the sudden realisation that working in a bookshop would be the ideal first step in my own career - I ended up in Hatchards, rather than in Belfast, and went on to work as a rep and now as a journalist, but I am very grateful for that 'light bulb' moment and for the many hours I have spent in the shop and the books I have bought in it. Good luck to the staff and thanks so much.

Unbelievable news....The bookshop at Queens is just that! I recall my first few days at QUB and being informed to go to the bookshop to buy all my first year texts...it was like entering an magaical place, the smell of books, the mass of students milling around to get their first year text books, all in massive anticipation of what lay ahead and as time went one and here i am in 2010 studying for my LLM in law, where is the obvious place to go to search for unusal books to use in my work? The Booksshop at Queens of course. It is almost unforgivable that this has had to happen, how many people all over the World know and love this fantastic bookshop...damn the modern era with its computers. If your book was not there, no worries, it was ordered in and within a short time you had it in your sweaty palms. I truely am so so sorry to hear of this closure, a major part of learning history lost. Thank you to everyone over the years for all the help.

Very sad news, I always bought my books in the bookshop during my time at QUB and used to love browsing the whole shop, looking at books that didn't have anything to do with my degree and feeling generally inspired. The staff were always very helpful and friendly too. Good luck to you all in future ventures.