The Strand

With today being the third day this week that I’ve had absolutely nothing of great importance to do (work didn’t schedule me until Sunday, and I only had class last night), I decided to actually leave my dorm for more than 20 minutes. Because I’m working my way into book-related fields, I found it fitting to visit some of the independent bookstores here in the city (rather than just going to the closest B&N). Unfortunately, I only made it to one of the two I was planning on going to today, and that’s because I bought too many books there and I didn’t want to lug them all around the city.

The bookstore I went to, The Strand, claims to have 18 miles of books on its shelves, and I’m sure that’s an understatement. This store has three floors jam-packed with new, used, rare, and discounted books; I only visited the main floor, which contained the fiction section, along with various other categories of books. The gaps between the shelves are narrow, and there are tables and carts galore. You seriously have to be a size 0 in order to fit between everything with ease. It didn’t help that it was super busy, and I heard one employee say that they had really slowed down in the new year. Slowed down?! People were everywhere! I’d hate to see that place on a “busy” day. Here’s what the shelf situation is like:

I spent about half an hour in there; if I hadn’t been wearing a bulky sweater and a winter coat, I could’ve easily spent the rest of the afternoon, but it was sweltering in there, what with all the people and the closeness and the fact that it was like 50 degrees outside and I had already been warm before going inside.

I bought 7 novels for the low price of 50 dollars. Oh, I also went into Forbidden Planet, which is a store for “alternative hobbies” (i.e. a nerd’s superstore), but I didn’t purchase anything, and it was also crowded in there. Next bookstore on the list: Books of Wonder.

P.S. I just saw this bibliochase in my Paste Magazine, and I want it. Now.

Edited: January 23rd, 2009