Last summer, my best friend and I spent a weekend in Madison, Wisconsin. The goal of the trip was to eat as much good food as possible, which was easily achieved. As we were leaving our last food stop we spotted a used bookstore just down the street. It was a blisteringly hot day and the shady doorway called to us.
Stepping inside was like crossing the threshold into another world. Sure, it was still hot, even with a rusty oscillating fan blowing. But you didn’t notice it as much, I swear. The shop itself was fairly narrow but quite deep. Bookshelves lined the outer walls and separated the middle into three long aisles. The stacks reached up to the ceiling and books were stacked tall and deep along them.
A fluffy tabby lounged lazily in Mystery. A older man with small reading glasses flipped through a book of Dutch masters. The owner, a lovely older woman, perched on a stool near the entrance, the breeze of the fan occasionally catching her.
My friend and I wandered through the stacks for ten or fifteen minutes. She purchased nothing, but I found a couple of books in the history section that I couldn’t live without. The books weren’t cheap, necessarily, but they weren’t expensive either.
What is it about used book stores that is so much better than the mall Barnes & Noble? Don’t get me wrong, I can also get lost in the glossy, dusted stacks of B&N. But it really isn’t the same thing as your favorite used bookstore.
For one thing, you generally know what you’re going to find in Barnes & Noble. Dan Brown’s latest and this month’s Oprah’s Book Club selection will greet you as you walk through the front door. There will be a table display of classics just before school or “beach reads” at the height of summer. The sections will all be clearly labeled and easily delineated. And as long as you know the author’s name, you can find just about any book still in print.
But used book stores have a bit of mystery. You never know what you’re going to find. Certainly not the book you go in looking for. But that Babysitter’s Club book your best friend borrowed and never gave back. The romance novel your grandmother kept on her bedside table. A book of fairy tales your second grade teacher read you. A cheesy 80s paperback version of a Louisa May Alcott novel you’ve never heard of.
Looking for something specific in a used bookstore is like going on a treasure hunt. Sure, that shelf says its Fantasy, but you’re just as likely to find a John Grisham novel as a GRR Martin. And Agatha Christie may be one of the world’s best selling mystery novelists, but that doesn’t mean a single copy of any of her works will be available. Or there may be twelve copies of Murder on the Orient Express and not a single copy of And Then There Were None.
There will always be magic in bookstores, no matter their type. But there is something just a little extra special about used bookstores. I recommend checking out your local one today. You never know what you might discover!
