WNDA No 8 The Old Bookshop in Downham Market introduces a very different type of blind date

Downham's favourite bookshop has introduced a creative new scheme that will leave readers lovestruck.

No 8 The Old Book Shop, run by the West Norfolk Deaf Association(WNDA) sits on the High Street opposite the Downham Nail Bar and the Smok Shop.

It looks quaint, and charmingly out of place next to the other stores surrounding it. Once inside, one enters a veritable hive of books, greeted by that glorious old book smell.

The book shop is a cosy nook at the heart of the market town, loved by residents on the hunt for classics, textbooks, and even some rare novels.

Last year, it celebrated it's fifth birthday and now helps thousands across the county with deaf and hearing support.

Manager Sarah Cox along with her staff of volunteers have come up with a new way to weave a new relationship between book and reader.

The manager said: "We wanted to do something different, and it creates a sense of mystery and excitement. People seem to really like it."

For £1.75 'Blind Date With a Book' is available at the shop, where novels are wrapped in brown paper with a few seductive hints on the front regarding the synopsis.

One customer had a blind date with a book that involved "family, Chinese history and life in 70's America", once unwrapped, it was revealed that the book was best-seller Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng.

The novel topped Amazon's Best Books of the Year list for 2014. The novel is about a mixed-race Chinese-American family whose middle daughter Lydia is found drowned in a nearby lake. Ng spent six years writing the novel, going through four different full drafts.

Needless to say, the customer will be coming back for a second date.