All of them.
That’s why I’m going to travel to the Amazon. I hear they have the world’s largest bookstore there.
I know I have. It’s like there’s one single Bookstore Cat in the entire Universe, which, through the magic of feline quantum mechanics, is simultaneously in every good used bookstore at once. This is probably related to Pratchett’s L-space.
This describes the big overstock book stores that tend to pop up where I live. They’ll usually be in former Wal-Marts or supermarkets. I usually go in out of curiosity, in the hopes that I’ll find a gem or two in there, but their stock consists mostly of the aforementioned Harlequin paperbacks, political tomes (of the right and left wing varieties) from the last election cycle and memoirs by D-list celebrities.
I think that’s what I’d consider a bad book store.
Ooh! Do you have a copy of Ethel The Aardvark Goes Quantity Surveying ?
Four copies actually.
Thanks for completely missing the point of the thread.
A good (new) bookstore has a wide selection of books in it. It should have the current bestsellers in it, but it should also have a good variety of classics, too. I went to a chain bookstore recently, looking to get something to read right then, and I also wanted to get a couple of gifts for my daughter and my best friend. I couldn’t find any books to buy. Not for me, not for my daughter, not for my best friend. All three of us are voracious readers, but I couldn’t find any books that any of us would like. Now, the staff were all very nice, and wanted to help, but every time I mentioned a specific book, they didn’t have it in stock. They always offered to order a copy for me, but why in the world would I want them to do that, if I have my own internet access? I mean, if I order from the bookstore, I have to wait a few days, and then go back to the bookstore to pick up my order. If I order online…I get my order quicker, and delivered to my door. I DID find a few magazines to buy, and a couple of those gift items (a bonsai tree kit, things like that), but I walked out of that bookstore without any books. And considering that I’ll read just about any genre, that’s a pretty pathetic outcome for that bookstore.
On the other hand, on my last visit to Half Price Books, I spent about $100 on books for myself (and remember, this is a used book store), plus I spent over $75 on a charity purchase. And I could easily have spent more, if I’d wanted to. I didn’t even check the magazines, and I didn’t buy any gift items, though those were plentiful. My point is, the used book store had a much wider selection of books than the new book store, even though HPB mostly get their inventory from whatever people happen to bring in, and the new book store has (theoretically, at least) a master plan for their book orders.
Book shops need to have tables and chairs, where people can examine books that they’re thinking of buying. They don’t need to have coffee shops. Most of those coffee shops are overpriced, and the food is usually stale and tasteless. Also, some customers just read their material right there, and leave food stains on the books or magazines.
Book shops need large, clean restrooms. There have been threads on the SDMB about the sudden urge that takes many of us when we’re in a bookstore or library. Apparently, something about the smell of paper and ink triggers the bladder and bowels.
HPB doesn’t have cats or dogs, but they’re pretty good about having stuff that I can buy on the day of my visit. The chain book store doesn’t have books that I can buy on impulse. Guess which one I will choose to visit, when I’m not ordering online?
A good bookstore should have more books than I do.
We were at the beach a few years ago, and one rainy day my husband and I looked up used bookstores in the phone book and visited all of the ones in the area. One in particular was charming enough, set up in an old house and run by a little old lady, but I’d say she only had a couple thousand books in stock.
I love my local used bookstore, but my grandmother came to visit me once and when I took her to the store, she was incensed that they had mysteries mixed in with the regular novels.
I think B&N is better about this than Books-a-Million.
A good used bookstore should have oddly-stained and scabrous books of forgotten lore, written in characters not of this world and representing sounds no human mind could hear and yet retain the comfortable, essential ignorance of sanity. If once mastered, these foul and ancient tomes would waken dread Cthulhu himself, who lies dead and dreaming beneath the waves in R’leygh.
Also, there should be comfortable armchairs. And I’ll second the cat thing. Bookstore cats rock.
I know the store is good when I see the following:
- A table of signed editions of random books. You care enough, and have enough pull, to get authors to show up. Cool.
- A table of locals only interest books. Local author on local fishing holes, or haunted houses, or history of the town. Cool.
- The grey cat. And I am not a cat person.
- Handwritten tags of employee favorites in each section, with the employee blurb on it.
By the way, I’ve got a lot of respect for my local Barns and Noble - you know those “Staff Picks” shelves they have? I believe that they’re both genuine - the staff actually like these books - and not vetted for non-offensiveness by the management. Last time I went, one of the New Atheist books (Dawkins, if memory serves) was on the staff selections shelf.
Barnes and Noble may be a giant, soulless chain - but I think the book market is one of those fields that are actually improved in some ways by giant soulless chains.
I think the general description of a good bookstore and my personal description vary widely. In general, a good new bookstore should have many subject covered in depth, with a relatively small amount of shelf space (in front) dedicated to best sellers.
For me, a good bookstore sells used books, and has a good variety of the books and magazines I collect at low prices. They should also have an eclectic selection of stuff I haven’t seen before. Since I collect sf books and magazines from the '70s and older, it is a bit of a miracle that there are actually a few good bookstores around here.
My absolute favorite bookstore was a place in the East Village just down the street from McSorley’s, not far from Cooper Union, which was owned by a little old man and a little old woman, and which in 1968 had a copious supply of early 1950s sf magazines for 25 cents each. I have no idea of what else they stocked - I hardly ever made it past that display without buying as many as I could carry home on the subway. If there is a heaven, I hope that couple is running the bookstore there. Bookstore in heaven? Look, if there is no bookstore, it is not heaven, by definition.
I never would have made it past McSorley’s!
Stars, depending on how fast I was walking.
A bad used-books store has too much of: anything by Andy Rooney; anything by The Frugal Gourmet (though I have his entire output); glossy cookbooks with titles like “Wok Cookery” and calling for several dozen expensive ingredients (2 cups of fresh lobster meat???) and exotic things you will use one time only; coffee table books like The Illustrated History of the Cat (I adore cats, but I know all there is to know about them by now, and I really don’t need yet another 10 lb. book, published in England, full of pretty pictures of exotic breeds).
Add lots of vintage diet books, “How to Get Rich in Real Estate” books from a guy in a leisure suit standing next to a 1970s Cadillac, and “Fodor’s Guide to Brisbane: 1984” type books.
Europe On $5 ($10, $20…) A Day!