An espresso machine is on its way to a bookshop near you. But forget coffee - what this machine makes is instant books. Oxford bookseller Blackwell's is to install the UK's first on-demand printer to supply customers with titles not on the bookshop shelves - titles which would normally need ordering specially from the publisher.

Blackwell's head of marketing Phil Jameson said: "This exciting development combines the best of both worlds, online and paper. It's a clever amalgamation of the two. And it will mean that customers will no longer have to wait days for books they order."

Blackwell's has signed an agreement with US company On Demand Books for the Espresso Book Machine, which will be installed in one of its 60 stores - very possibly its flagship shop in Broad Street, Oxford - in September or October.

Mr Jameson explained that instant books, costing the same as their retail price on the shelf, could either be new titles or ones off publishers' backlists, in hardback or in paperback.

He added: "Some people are scared of this kind of development but we see it as real innovation. We see ourselves not only as booksellers but also as 'knowledge retailers'. And that means keeping up with all developments in the trade."

But might this be the beginning of the end of bookshops as we know them, all those lines of enticing spines, the smell of a new book when you open one? Ominously, some might say, pubishers have long been "digitising" their texts, having them typeset on computers in lower-wage countries such as India. Some are now wondering how to profit from the exercise.

Blackwell's' answer, the Espresso machine, was the brainchild of the former US editorial director of the publishing giant Random House.

Mr Jameson said: "The machine will not change the whole ambiance of the bookshop."

That is reassuring . . . but we all remember the demise of the vinyl record and the growth of the iPod in the music business. Might not the booktrade be heading the same way?

The Espresso machine, after all, will find itself in competition with such hand-held, book-size computer devices as the Kindle from Amazon, or the Book Reader from Sony, or the ILiad from the Dutch "electronic paper" manufacturer iRex - all of which allow owners to download books and read them anywhere: on the London Underground, for instance, or in an airport departure lounge.

The chief executive of Blackwell's, Vince Gunn, explained the hoped-for commercial advantages of the machine. He said: "The potential advantages for the retailer are obvious enough. Even allowing for the investment in this first-generation technology, we will be able to sell to demand. We cut the risk of buying 15 copies of a book and being left with 14."

But, as chief executive of an organisation that handles 250,000 physical books, he, too, was quick to counter any suggestion that this could be the deathknell of the bookshop as we know it.

He said: "There is a lot of cynicism about, but I definitely do not believe the book is dead. People who love books will continue to buy them, and bookshops will continue to look and feel the same.

"Some are worried about where all this is going - but I see it as an exciting opportunity. We are continually looking at ways of reinventing the economic model."

He added: "Books produced by the Espresso will definitely be books as you and I know them. They will not look like things produced on a photocopier."

He added that bookshops had to move with the times in the face of competition from Internet sales organisations such as Amazon. He said: "I take my hat off to Amazon. It is a very good, integrated operation. We cannot stand still."

Blackwell's' competitor, Waterstone's, is not standing still either. It will soon be selling the Sony Reader, while Borders has been selling the iLiad at £399 since May this year. The proud boast is that you can read it like a book even in the brightest sunshine - on the beach, for instance.

A quick quiz of colleagues at The Oxford Times revealed that most "enjoy the feel of the paper and the smell of the glue" that you get with a real book, and some said they looked at a screen all day and at work and therefore longed to read a proper book in the evening.

But back to the instant printed book. Oxford writer Angela Huth is among authors whose out-of-print books are being offered direct by literary agents PFD. The books, printed on demand, can be bought through Amazon or through PFD's website at between £10 and £15 a book.

Marcella Edwards, of PFD, said: "The plan is to use the sales figures we get for these books to re-present them to publishers a year on."

All in all, we are still in the middle of the biggest change in the trade since the scroll gave way to the book.