Favourite Bookshops?

Favorite bookshops

My favorite bookshop is the public library--unless you're a collector

Pepperman said:

My favorite bookshop is the public library--unless you're a collector

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cough*threadcrap*cough

I have only visited it once (and in a rush because our parking time was running low) but Bookcase on Castle Street in Carlisle is wonderful. 4 floors packed full of used books.

I've lived in London for 13 years but haven't yet found a bookstore, used or new, that I really have fond feelings for.

In the US, Powells in Portland, Oregon is my favourite because they shelve the used and new books side by side -- the only bookstore I've ever been to that does that.

Amazon.

I'm not going to pay £7-8 for a book I can get for two-thirds of the price online.

I'll always have a soft spot for Foyles, but I loved Murder One, the mystery / crime bookshop on Charing Cross Road as well, not sure if it's still there. There used to be one I went to all the time on Holloway Road, inside the shopping centre there, but I don't know if it's still there either. I think it was called Titles. There were some great outlet / second hand bookshops up Charing Cross Road as well. Used to just walk up there after work going into shop after shop.

A new one opened in Glasgow near my old house that was quite good but very expensive, styled itself an 'antiquarian bookshop' rather than second hand, Young's Interesting Books on Skirving Street, but they did have some good stuff.

Here, my favourites are the Academia Bookshop and Neopalace Luxor on Wenceslas Square, Charles University bookshop, and a little English language one called 'Big Ben's' up the back of the Old Town Square. Neopalace has more stuff, I think, but Academia gives me 10% discount because I have an Opencard, and is a bit more dusty and, well, academic feeling!

scarletpeaches said:

Amazon.

I'm not going to pay £7-8 for a book I can get for two-thirds of the price online.

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I love Amazon but the postage is too high to the Czech Republic, so it doesn't work out any cheaper. Still treat myself to an order each month though.

I always tick the free postage box. (I'm in the UK.) Why? I'm a cheapskate!

To me, heaven is Powell's City of Books in Portland, Oregon.

Cellar Stories in downtown Providence -- biggest used and rare bookstore in the state, with a specialty in the New England history I'm researching right now. Which reminds me, I need to make a trip there this weekend!

Also, Books on the Square on the East Side of Prov, which is conveniently located directly across from a Starbucks.

In Albany, NY, I used to go to this tremendously ratty used bookstore with overcrammed shelves and towers of books on the floor and endless intriguing nooks (also overcrammed.) Browsers weren't allowed to talk loudly or (God forbid) laugh. If they did, the tremendously ratty old guy that owned the store would pull a Soup-Nazi and run them out onto the street.

My favorite fictional bookstore is Horrocke's in Arkham, Massachusetts, which figures in my Lovecraftian novels. It's like my Mary Sue of bookstores, with fireplace and comfy chairs in the new books section (and free coffee), arcane tomes in the secret rear room, where the immortal Mr. Horrocke sips his espresso.

Where I live, there's only one bookshop -- Waterstone's. I never shop there any more since I opened my account on Amazon, which is much cheaper.

There are no second-hand bookstores, either. Just a few charity shops here and there, with a few bookshelves if you're lucky.

Scotland isn't a nation of readers. It's no surprise that it's full of pubs, fast food joints and cheque-cashing/loan businesses and HP electrical goods stores.

Getting pissed, eating shit, then borrowing some money to buy a flatscreen are more important than reading.

Richard Booth's in Hay on Wye. And it does tasty cakes.

scarletpeaches said:

Where I live, there's only one bookshop -- Waterstone's. I never shop there any more since I opened my account on Amazon, which is much cheaper.

There are no second-hand bookstores, either. Just a few charity shops here and there, with a few bookshelves if you're lucky.

Scotland isn't a nation of readers. It's no surprise that it's full of pubs, fast food joints and cheque-cashing/loan businesses and HP electrical goods stores.

Getting pissed, eating shit, then borrowing some money to buy a flatscreen are more important than reading.

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You know, funnily enough when I was trying to think of shops in Glasgow, that was pretty much the same conclusion I came to. There's that one second hand on in Shawlands, couple of those outlet bookshop things, The Works or whatever they're called, that sell more toys and 'make your own beads' kits than books, and Waterstones. It's what I love about living over here now, there's a bookshop on practically every street and people don't look at you as weird because you're spending money on books and not booze.

I am so dying to go to Prague. Ack, need research budget! Need big advance!

I recently discovered this little shop not too far from my house that deals mostly in used books, but also sells new at a lower price than I can find them at B&N. It's awesome. It looks tiny when you first walk in, but there must be some sort of spell that makes it keep going and going and going. The aisles are tight, the shelves are high, and the books are sometimes stacked in messy piles. I heart that place so hard.

dolores haze said:

To me, heaven is Powell's City of Books in Portland, Oregon.

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Ah yes.... Once you've been there anything else is a diversion. How many hours and bucks have I spent there? They probably have more books on tea service or petting your dog than most stores have all titles.

Three GOOD sized multiple floored buidings in downtown Portland,
another on Hawthorne (Hippie country) and another at the airport. Of course they are on line (I use abebooks) too.

There is also a pretty good one in downtown Monterey California ( the name escapes me but it would be easy to find, on the city center square) that is espcieally good for language and culture books. Military language School (DLI) is there. It is small but different stuff than most shops you'll see and the prices are good.

Half Price Books. New book are just prohibitively expensive.

Then there's Bauman Rare Books in NYC. I look forward to their full page ads on the back of the NYT Book Review. This week they have such delicacies as a first edition/first issue Gatsby wth first issue book cover (a mere $180,000); Huckleberry Finn, first edition/rare blue-cloth binding (cheap at $24,000); a Birds of America first octavo edition ($95,000, I'll take two); and the piece de resistance, a first edition in contemporary sheep of The Federalist ($260,000, where's the ATM?)

Just picked up a brochure for a place called

BOOKS

in Harrisburg PA which claims to be the largest rare and used book store in the eastern US. Diagram shows three floors of books ... Let you know when I get there later this week

meanwhile .. anybody out there know anything about it?

For as busy as Northern VA is and as many options that we have for everything under the sun...that seems to exclude books.

We have Barnes and Noble and a used book store called McKays, which I love. But you can't find everything you want there all the time.

So I use online sources - Amazon and Literary Guild.

Kramerbooks . They have a restaurant and full bar, and are a first-run indie that has all the cozy and fun of a used bookstore.

I meet most of my first dates here. In my opinion, if a guy doesn't think drinks/dinner in a bookstore is a fabulous idea, he's not someone I want to date.

This thread is making me misty-eyed. A year ago, I would have unequivocally said Borders, because Borders was the only bookstore in my area (not that thirty minutes away should be considered 'in the area') where you could actually sit down and read the book. And they had a coffee store. And a decent selection of all kinds of reading material, and big areas for each genre.

I guess... Kinokuniya in Sydney QVB? I wish I could say my local bookstores, but they're so small and the selection is small. The one time I went to buy something, everything I looked for wasn't there.