Back in the days before I lived in Ashland, I always enjoyed making trips here for shopping, work-related matters or whatever.

One of the reasons was because those sojourns provided me with the opportunity to visit the two bookstores that operated here for years — one in the Midtown Mall and one in the Ashland Mall. (Technically, the latter was in Russell, not Ashland, but you get the idea.)

Both stores are now long-gone, of course. I still miss them.

And, come the first of the year, the Ashland area will be completely bereft of general-interest book retailers.

Waldenbooks in the Ashland Town Center will be closing its doors at the first of the year as part of a downsizing effort by its parent company, Borders Group Inc. The Town Center location is one of some 200 stores overall and 130 mall locations targeted for closure.

Town Center Manager Merri Hurn told my colleague, Tim Preston, that the decision to close the store was by no means a reflection of low demand for reading material. In fact, she said mall patrons had been quite vocal about expressing their desire for an even larger bookstore than Waldenbooks.

I was saddened to hear of the store’s impending closure, mainly because I think a town of Ashland’s size needs and deserves to have at least one bookstore in its retail lineup.

Of course, we’ll still have religious book sellers, a used-paperback exchange and a newsstand after Waldenbooks closes. There’s also the Jesse Stuart Foundation, which operates its own bookstore.

Please don’t misunderstand. I intend no disrespect whatsoever to those establishments when I say that having them is just not the same as having a well-stocked, general-interest book retailer.

I suppose we should be thankful that we’ll still have a couple of book mega-stores within short driving distance — in downtown Huntington and the Huntington Mall, respectively.

Still, the idea of Ashlanders having to choose between driving to Huntington or settling for the book selections the local discount house deems worthy of stocking sticks in my craw a bit. I’ve talked to others who feel the same way.

Obviously, folks will still be able to purchase books from online retailers as well, but, again, it’s just not the same.

So is there any hope of Ashland landing another bookstore at some point in the future?

In my heart, I’d certainly like to think so, but my head tells me it’s probably not going to happen anytime soon, if at all.

The facts that the national economy remains in a state of torpor and that the publishing industry has seen much better days certainly don’t bode well.

And — let’s be honest — it’s kind of hard to see a national chain getting excited about putting a new bookstore in a market that has the track record of ours where such establishments are concerned.

Perhaps some local entrepreneur will step up to the plate and fill this gaping hole in our retail landscape.

Let’s hope something happens soon.

I’d hate to see Ashland become a town where the ability to purchase reading material is deemed less than fundamental.