- 5 October 2009
- 1:47pm
- Filed under
Shared Experiences, Thorn Tree, Traveller Tips, books
Where is paradise for book lovers?
venessapaechLonely Planet author
The Guardian recently announced its top ten places for book browsing around Britain, chosen by Anna Tims. Inspired, we want to know yours. And not just for Britain.
The Daryaganj Kitab Bazaar in Delhi makes Thorn Tree member shortlists for those who love to forage for reading on the road. Sozo in Vietnam gets the thumbs up.
If you’re in Frankfurt, our travellers say the Book Fair is worth the hype and have some tips to help you plan ahead. Wales bound? Surely you’ll swing through Hay-o-Wye, where books are indigenous wildlife?
Powell’s in Portland is a popular pick on the US branch of Thorn Tree, as are Green Apple Books in San Francisco and Moe’s in Berkeley.
My personal favourite is The Strand in New York City. I’m convinced there’s a black hole in its basement, for I’ve lost entire days in that place. I for one would mourn the passing of these paper sanctuaries.
If you feel like sampling the bookish delights of another realm with less mileage, check in with the regulars on our Women Travellers branch, and take part in their book swap. The forum is also a great place to organise or discover book exchanges on your travels. Here’s some suggestions for swapping in Laos and Beijing to get you started.
Where are your favourite places to browse, shop or stumble upon books around the world? What’s knocked your bibliophile socks off?
[Photo: Daryaganj Kitab Bazaar, Delhi/kkoshy, Hay-on-Wye/lilo_lil]
Dont buy your book. HUNT your book. The Book Crossing web site: where the planet is your bookshop.
When you are finished with a book, you leave it “in the wild” … leave it on a park bench, a coffee shop, at a hotel somewhere. Put it on a bookshelf at the gym — anywhere it might find a new reader! What happens next is up to fate, and we never know where our books might travel. Track the book’s journey around the world as it is passed on from person to person via the BookCrossing web site. You can hunt down your next book the same way. Go to the site and you’ll find caches like this: http://bit.ly/7G4G3 , where there are 18 books hidden.
Kathmandu is one brand of paradise – India’s good for English-language books but its shops and exchanges tend to recycle the same books so you’re faced with the same Rushdie-Mistry-Coehlo-Brown mix. Kathmandu’s bookshops are huge, varied and cheap. After a long stint in India it’s like being let loose in a sweet shop. Once I was locked in a bookshop while a bunch of protestors passed in the street. I was secretly thrilled at the prospect of spending the night there.
My favorite bookstore in the states is located in the French Quarters of New Orleans. Librairie Book Shop is at 823 Chartres St., French Quarter, New Orleans, LA, 70116. It’s a relatively small place that is filled (literally) to the ceiling with old and new books. I love the ambiance… It has that old book smell; like warm leather and water, paper and ink… Read More. It’s fairly dimly lit, as book stores go, and the people who work there are friendly, but will leave you to just wander around it soak up all that ‘old world’ ambiance on your own. Bonus? You can take your finds, grab a southern style sweet tea, walk a block and enjoy it all, while watching the steam boats from the banks of the Mississippi River.
‘Twice Sold Tales’ in the University District in Seattle is a must if you love books and hanging out in book shops! Twice Sold Tales/University District,
4501 University Way N.E., Seattle, WA 98105,United States. It’s a really cozy second hand book store. There are a few cats that live in the shop. Sometimes they just sleep on the shelves in between the books. In the back is a coffee machine and an old couch, where you can sit and leaf through what you’ve found. They have a good choice of books. The shop is not huge, but you’ll find almost anything you’re looking for!
Wonderfully quirky Globe Bookstore in Prague, run by charming American guy. http://www.globebookstore.cz/home.html
It’s a bookstore, coffee shop, cinema and bar shop all in one . Got great selection of books, excellent food and drinks. Have a glass of Bohemian champagne and join in the chat with locals and people from all over the world.
We were there for Obama’s Inauguration – could not have been in a better place IMHO!
My vote goes for NY’s The Strand too – largely for the phenomenal collection but more realistically for the fleet of gorgeous men who work there. Best looking book-boys in the biz. Happy browsing!
Been to the Strand so many times but can’t recall seeing any gorgeous guys there. I am over sixty years old any way.
I buy books online but always go out of my way to old bookshops for that old familiar feeling of books on bookshelves ready to be picked up and glimpsed or read then and there.
Wanderlust in Hong Kong used to be my favourite haunt whenever I passed by. Pity it was no more.
Too may book(shops), so little time.
Powells in Portland hands down!!!!!!!!!!
Archive Fine Books in Brisbane is one of my favourites, well over a million books well cramped in the small, tall store, with all subjects covered…
Selexyz Dominicanen in Maastricht, The Netherlands is one of the world’s most beautiful bookstores. It is located in an 800 year-old Dominican church just off the Vrijthof.
http://bp0.blogger.com/_fDGnCBMCBFg/R4d-XnFxraI/AAAAAAAACKk/_K-0VdhqVo4/s1600-h/Selex1.jpg
[...] united at the start of the week – debating over the world’s best bookshop. New York City’s Strand Bookstore is a favourite, but the bibliophiles are still slugging it [...]
My favourites –
1) Pavement bookshops at Flora Fountain Mumbai (picked up a 1875 edition of Pride and Prejudice here)
2) Pavement bookshops of Kings circle (Matunga – Mumbai) – get the latest bestsellers at a fractional cost
3) Chor Bazaar – Mumbai (literally “robbers market) – on any day. Excellent for old (ancient?) books (manuscripts?)
Agree about Kathmandu, Pokhora is also very good as far as Nepal is concerned, Varkala was ok but way too expensive although most of kerala and much of Tamil Nadu was very good, Fes was ok too. In fact the only truly crap place I’ve found for second hand book shops was, ironically, Plymouth in South West England, although even there the charity shops are still a good bet.
In Minneapolis, two specialty stores under one roof are my favorites — Uncle Hugo’s 2864 Chicago Avenue South, Minneapolis MN 55407 is the oldest independent science fiction bookstore in America. Founded in 1974. Uncle Edgar’s Mystery Bookstore shares the building.
Luxor in Egypt probably has the largest selection of English-language fiction books in the Middle East.
And for scholars the bookstores around Hussein Square in Cairo are one of the top adresses to pick up your edition of the Arabic-English dictionary by H. Wehr for a fraction of the price it is sold elsewhere and several other tomes on classic islamic scholarship in several languages ranging from Arabic, English, French, German and Urdu to Swahili.
Something different- Page 101 at the very foot of the Taipei 101 building is a great bookshop! Can browse for hours and sit and relax. Or buy and take the trip up the elevator of the world’s tallest building with your book and have a cuppa at the top!
The more affluent surburbs of London have at least 3-4 charity shops where you can buy as-new books for a fraction of the original price – and give money to a good cause.
[...] united at the start of the week – debating over the world’s best bookshop. New York City’s Strand Bookstore is a favourite, but the bibliophiles are still slugging it [...]
Powell’s Books in Portland, Oregon of course…. very easy to get lost and lose track of time in there…
thats a lot of books
Sign in or register to add your comment