Is this the future bookstore?

And then there’s “Lurch,’’ a hulking jumble of machinery that is often groaning and shuddering in a corner behind the sales counter.

Officially known as the Espresso Book Machine, Lurch, as the employees call it, is a “print on demand’’ setup the size of a meat freezer that creates books for customers while they wait.

The publishing world is closely following the experiment at Northshire, the first independent bookstore in the United States to install the clattering book machine. If Northshire can make money printing books downloaded from massive online catalogs, it will show how small brick-and-mortar bookshops might be able to match the overwhelming variety of products offered by a giant online retailer like Amazon.com.

It could streamline the traditional book supply chain, with much less need for space in warehouses, inventory on hand, shipping expenses, or management of returns.

And no book ever has to go out of print.

Espresso’s print-on-demand technology could also change the dynamics of large bookstore chains. On Demand Books, the New York company that produces the book machine, has just launched a pilot program with a distributor, making 85,000 book titles from major publishers like Simon & Schuster and McGraw-Hill available to Espresso machines.

Espresso machines can also access thousands of titles that are in the public domain and available on the Internet.

To a publishing analyst like Brian F. O’Leary, a principal at Magellan Media Consulting Partners in New York, the deal between the machine’s makers and such big publishers “shows that the traditional book business is at least willing to test-drive the Espresso.’’

The next question is whether the big book retailers will adopt the machines.

“Chain stores have always been part of the business plan,’’ said Lauren Parker, a spokeswoman for On Demand Books, though she declined to name any chains. The company is “planning for dramatic growth in 2009,’’ she added.

Spokesmen for the giant chains Borders and Barnes & Nobles were aware of the Espresso, but declined to comment on whether they were considering placing the machine in any stores.

But Lurch already looks like a success at Northshire.

“This has added an entirely new element to the bookstore,’’ manager Chris Morrow said as the machine churned out a novel written by a local author.

When the machine is connected to an expanded online catalog of titles later this year, Morrow said, the bookstore will be able to offer customers an “ATM for books’’ that will provide access to millions of works.

“The idea is that soon we’ll be able to print out any book that’s ever been printed,’’ he said. “That could really change people’s image of the small bookstore.’’

The Espresso Book Machine comes with a publishing industry pedigree. Jason Epstein, who cofounded On Demand Books in 2003, is the former editorial director of Random House in New York. Epstein’s vision was a fully automatic, low-cost device that could be placed in a neighborhood bookshop, coffee shop, newsstand, library, hotel, even aboard a cruise ship or in airports.

Northshire took delivery of its unit last year. Other first-generation machines went to college bookstores, like the one at the University of Alberta, and libraries, including the Library of Alexandria in Egypt and the University of Michigan Library in Ann Arbor, Mich. The newest version of the Espresso, about half the size of the one in Northshire, costs between $79,000 and $95,000 and is available for lease for between $1,250 and $1,650 a month.

Northshire wanted the new machine to connect the store’s customers to millions of book titles. That part of the business has developed slowly, as On Demand Books works to develop partnerships with publishers. Morrow expects millions of books to be available by the end of the year.

Meanwhile, Northshire discovered that the machine’s ability to print original books in very small numbers was attracting a lively customer base of local authors. “Self-publishing was a plus we didn’t expect,’’ said Annette Rodefeld, Northshire’s print-on-demand coordinator.

In its first year, Northshire’s book machine printed dozens of original books by customers, including memoirs, autobiographies, poetry collections, and cookbooks, usually producing from 30 to 50 copies of each. The bookstore also published a young adult novel written by a local 12-year-old and a previously out-of-print guide to Manchester.

Self-publishers pay a $49 setup fee and a per-page rate that ranges from 5 to 9 cents, depending on the length. Northshire provides an a la carte menu of editorial and design services from a network of providers. Copy editing costs 1 cent per word; book design services, $40 an hour.

“Since it’s taken us longer than we expected to get publishers to share their catalog, the self-publishing businesses has taken up the slack,’’ said Dane Neller, chief executive at On Demand Books.

In September, Michael Cohen, a rabbi, printed 50 copies of his novella “Einstein’s Rabbi’’ at Northshire. Reaction was so good he revised the book and printed an additional 300.

“It’s been a wonderful experience,’’ he said. Cohen is now selling his book on Amazon.com and on Northshire’s website.

Rodefeld, a former graphic designer who works at a tiny desk next to the Espresso machine, produces up to 35 books a day. “It’s exciting to see an author’s face when I hand them the first book off the press,’’ she said. “To see the dream, the fantasy, become a reality - that really tickles me. I get to be Santa Claus all the time here.’’

The Espresso also comes just as electronic book readers, like Amazon.com’s Kindle, seem on the brink of mass market acceptance. But Morrow thinks that won’t be a serious challenge to the paper products of the Espresso.

“E-books are about 1 percent of the market right now,’’ he said. “Maybe they’ll get to 10 percent in the next few years. That still leaves 90 percent of the market in paper. And print-on-demand will give independent bookstores a bigger slice of that very big pie.’’

“The Kindle is hot,’’ agreed O’Leary, “but e-books will be a small segment of the publishing industry for the foreseeable future. Print-on-demand, on the other hand, is growing. Because of digitization by Google and others, more and more books are becoming available every day. A lot of those books are going to come back to life as print-on-demand.’’

Last month, Morrow was invited to give a talk on his print-on-demand experience at BookExpo America, the publishing industry’s annual conference in New York. There was great interest in the machine from other independent booksellers, he said, but “it all depends if the numbers can work out for an individual bookstore.’’

The numbers at Northshire Bookstore, Morrow said, are “on the cusp’’ of working out. The big payoff will come, he said, when the Espresso machine is seamlessly connected to the entire universe of books, allowing the store to fulfill any request in minutes.

“It’s been great for building community,’’ he said.

Asked if he foresees a day when every bookstore will have an Espresso machine, Morrow paused.

“Maybe not every bookstore,’’ he replied. “But every smart bookstore.’’

D.C. Denison can be reached at denison@globe.com.