Which, of course, you refused to purchase, since those are an abomination, spawned by the Devil, sold in contravention of the spirit of copyright, even if technically legal. Not to mention the fact that they are directly responsible for the stupid emu covers on the official BB edition that was put out immediately thereafter. :mad::eek:
Half-Price Books at NASA Parkway in Houston Texas has had a resident cat for a quite some It’s been a while since I was there, so I am not sure if he is still alive.
Just wanted to clue everyone in to John King Used and Rare Books in Detroit.
From the Wiki:
If you ever find yourself in Detroit, you owe it to yourself to check it out.
I spend a good part of daylight there one day, and only made it to 2 of the 4 floors.
mmm
Not really, I have shopped in some very un-aura-of-a-used-book-store (crazy owners and the constant smell of Lysol) book stores over the years. The appeal is saving money and finding odd and rare items.
In my case, Recycle Books has two locations within easy walking/light rail distance–both closer than Barnes and Nobel. They a better/more eclectic selection of the types of books I like (music, pop culture, travel, western history, etc) and the vibe, as mentioned by others, is just more laid back. The employees are cool and I like the resident cats that roam the aisles and always seem amenable to scritching.
Out of print books, cheap paperbacks in genres I like but titles or series I’ve never heard of, and sometimes interesting editions of older books (with illustrations, for example).
What about the Myopic Bookstore on North Milwaukee? Last time I was in there I bought nine books for about sixty bucks.
Most people don’t have a Half-Priced Books near them. They’re only located in seventeen states. Only seven states if you don’t count the states that have five or fewer stores.
Yes! I bought a 1929 edition of J.K. Huysmans’ A Rebours (a key novel in my Senior Thesis) with “naughty” illustrations at Publix Books in Cleveland, a marvelous and long-gone shop.
The other great used bookshop in Cleveland was Kay’s Books on Prospect Avenue, a positive dungeon with 30-foot high shelving JAMMED with books and a nasty little white-haired lady monster (Kay herself) behind the counter. Bought my first copy of Ginsberg’s “Howl” there when I was 14, when the City Lights edition was still fifty cents.
Used book stores tend to have a more esoteric selection of books, though I like new book stores too. Chapters (a good Canadian new book store now branching into lifestyle items you don’t really need) has okay coffee, friendly staff, a good selection of recent books, current magazines, friendly staff, generous refill policy (order a coffee for $2, refill with herbal tea if you want). Except for very popular authors, they only carry the 2-3 most recent works. I would say the selection is good, but not deep.
Some used book stores are much better than others. The best ones have a wide selection, a deep selection and lots of cool books you might not have heard of or even guessed at – though admittedly used stores may not have any specific book, especially if new or fairly popular. Prices are sometimes lower, though for me that is not the chief appeal. Often, prices aren’t even all that different with savings cards and promotions.
I like bookstores in general since I like to read. I often skim books or magazines to see if they are interesting in some way and worth purchasing. These days, lots of people don’t read much. Kindle is a poor substitute (great for vacations though); the Internet too unfocused for fiction or to cover some things in detail – maybe your Google Fu is better than mine. Is there snob appeal to reading? Probably not these days! Good books have never been easier to find, and used books are amazingly cheap since demand is often low. Maybe books were important and snobby in the distant past… Less so now. Too many other entertainment choices to compete with book clubs.
My pet theory is this is a sweet spot on history for buying books. If reading levels decline, buying books will become more difficult and expensive. Fifty years from now, maybe won’t be as easy to find good books.
Turns out there is one relatively near me. I’ll be honest and say that I never knew of HP books as a used book store and always assumed they were more of a cut bin, clearance “last chance” retailer for new books. Like those 80% off tables at Barnes & Noble except on a wider scale.
That’s a bit outside my normal ranging area from the western suburbs. Back in the day, there was The Bookzeller in Naperville as my go-to but they’re long since gone (Oct 2006? Wow, it’s been a while)
Recycling! Many of them operate on a two-for-one basis, and that’s cool. Lighten the load of paperbacks cluttering up the house, and still come home with a big armload of classics.
May the next reader of my old books get as much pleasure from them as I have!
Many of the responses clicked with me, the above two in particular.
Anyone here know East Lansing, Michigan? Been in Curious Books? I once saw a book printed around 1900, a book of household medical advice, written by a woman physician. I flipped through it and was impressed by the author’s style, very frank and practical, especially when dealing with “female issues” Menstrual cycles were not “the curse”, and there was sage advice for mothers to give their girls when puberty hits. It would hardly be out of place now.
I really like used bookstores. My all-time favorite is Wonder Books in Frederick, Maryland. I enjoy finding books I may have forgotten about but loved as a kid. Also, I like to buy (when I can find them) textbook anthologies I read in school, or even ones I didn’t.
Hey, Wollheim didn’t get any money from me from the sale. 
My favorite used bookstore is Lyrical Ballad in Saratoga Springs, NY. You go in and see a couple of rooms - a typical small store. Then you notice a door in the back. You see the vault (yes, a real old-fashioned bank vault) and turn left to find a maze of rooms that just keep on going. It’s magical.
Not for me. The contents are far more important than the atmosphere, which is enormously variable. Some of my best trips are to literal barns stuffed with books.
My greatest find were five books put out by Gnome Press, the seminal f&sf small publisher, for five dollars each. This was in 1981. Since then I’ve bought a couple more Gnome Press books a year until I amassed probably the best collection in the country, better than the dealer who boasts he has the best. I have all 86 books plus 43 of the 54 known variants. (That means two sets of The Foundation Trilogy.) And all the associational items. Enough so that I’m compiling a new bibliography to correct errors in the older ones. (See gnomepress.com. Yes, I have the URL, too.) A chance find turned into a lifelong hobby. How do you beat that?
I was killing time at a used bookstore in Pismo Beach and came across a book I absolutely loved growing up–The World We Live In. That book, with it’s wonderful photos and fold-out illustrations turned me on to dinosaurs (The Age Of Reptiles), outer space (planetscapes by Chesley Bonestell) and nature in general. I grabbed that book and took it up to the counter without even looking at the price.
(It was $7, but I would’ve paid $20 without a second thought!)
Exapno Mapcase @ 36: I’m impressed! I’ve heard great things about Gnome Press, but never had the luck to run across any inexpensive copies.
I started collecting Arkham House in the late 1980s, after buying my first two volumes for ten bucks apiece from Fred Dannay’s son at a rare book show in Greenwich Village (Fred Dannay was half of Ellery Queen). I’ve amassed a solid and serious collection but never been rich enough to afford the real prizes, like the early Lovecrafts and Clark Ashton Smiths.
The smell. New book shops have no smell other than polymers. Used book shops have the scent of the weight of years. Dusty yet pleasant. Sometimes you find manky 70s paperbacks that smell like egg farts or stale semen. But usually old books are imbued with the smell sof the past: old cottons, tin, lost perfumes. These are aggregated in a very quiet way in old book shops.
Hmm. Note: don’t go wine tasting with Typhoon.