Musing Mondays – Bookshops

monday-musing Musing Mondays is hosted by Rebecca from Just One More Page.

Today’s MUSING MONDAYS post is about book stores…
How do you choose what to buy from your local bookstore? Do you have a list, or just browse? What is the selection in your book store like? Do you find what you’re looking for? Do you feel pressured to buy the kind of books the store makes prominent?

There is only one independent bookshop near me, about 8 miles away. Waterstones and W H Smiths are nearer and I visit these more, mainly because they’re where I usually shop. The trouble with bookshops like Waterstones is that they’re usually the same wherever you go, with the same books on display. Waterstones has a branch very close to where I used to work and I used to go there most lunchtimes when I wasn’t in the library. Sometimes I went looking for a specific book and other times I just browsed.

Further afield in Oxford, I like to visit Borders and most of all Blackwells, my favourite bookshop of all. It’s book heaven.

I’m trying to resist buying any more books until I’ve made some inroads into my to-be-read piles and so I don’t often go in bookshops these days as it’s almost impossible to come out without a book once I’ve gone in. It’s not that I feel pressured by the displays but because there’s usually one or more books I want to buy whether they’re on display or not.

My son found this blog Great Bookshops, which is great if you live in Scotland (he does, I don’t) because most are in Scotland but some are south of the border. To quote them this blog is:

dedicated to the best independent book shops. Not those that are part of a large national chain, but those that are much more the one of a kind, kind; shops that offer readers enthusiastic and knowledgeable advice, ones that are run by people who are passionate about books, not product.

9 thoughts on “Musing Mondays – Bookshops”

I can’t go in bookshops and not buy anything either! I don’t have an independent bookshop any where near me that I know about so its waterstones only for me!

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Thanks for that link to the Great Bookshops blog. Whenever my husband and I are in the UK, we spend at least a week in Scotland. No matter where I am, I’m always searching for bookshops to visit!

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I know what you mean about the chain stores all looking the same. I try to shop in an independent store whenever I can.

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I joined a challenge (Read Your Own Books) just to start moving some of the titles off my TBR list!

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As you know, now I am trying to read books on my own pile. It sometimes gets difficult NOT to buy books! Or NOT ask for review copies.

Here are my musings

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I much prefer an independent shop to the chains as well. The atmosphere is so much nicer in a smaller, independent shop.

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I’m trying to refrain from bring home more books until I get my stacks read through–not working well.

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I didn’t realize you lived in the UK.

Musing Monday 25

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It is virtually impossible for me to go into a bookstore and now buy anything. However, right now I’m trying to be good and wittle down my tbr pile before going into the bookstore or ordering anything from Amazon. Trying is the operative word. My post is up now.

Happy Monday

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