The readers of this blog are exactly the folks always searching for a new, wonderful bookstore. So this seemed like the perfect place to establish a list of the country's top bookstores. I'll kick it off, perhaps adding as I think more about it. But I hope that commenters will share lots of ideas. If this gets going, I'll try to incorporate comments into the post for easy reading (perhaps organizing by state).
This is one crowdsourcing exercise that might actually make a difference in some of our lives!
Update: I have incorporated suggestions from commenters to facilitate reading.
Asheville, NC area:
Malaprops Bookstore
City Lights Bookstore (Sylva)
Birmingham area:
Alabama Booksmith (new and used)
Boston area:
Brattle Bookshop (used and antiquarian)
Brookline Booksmith
Harvard Bookstore (Cambridge)
Bryn Mawr Book Store (used)
Burlington VT area:
Flying Pig Bookstore (Shelburne)
Charlotte area:
Chicago area:
Barbara's Bookstore
Seminary Coop
Unabridged Bookstore
The Book Table
Denver area:
Hudson Valley/Catskills NY
Spotty Dog Books & Ale (Hudson)
Golden Note Book (Woodstock)
Iowa City
Lexington KY
Joseph-Beth Booksellers (three other locations including Cincinnati)
Lexington VA
Miami
Books & Books (multiple locations)
Minneapolis area:
New York area
Mysterious Bookshop
St. Marks Bookshop
The Strand
The Community Bookstore (Brooklyn)
Greenlight Bookstore (Brooklyn)
Oxford MS
Philadelphia area:
Joseph Fox Bookshop
A Children's Place Bookstore
Portland, OR area:
Raleigh-Durham area:
Regulator Bookshop
(Durham)Fly Leaf Books
2nd Edition
The Bookshop
The Internationalist
Richmond:
San Francisco area:
City Lights Booksellers
Green Apple Books
Moe's (used) (Berkeley)
Black Oak Books (used) (Berkeley)
Kepler's Books (Menlo Park)
Santa Barbara
Chaucer's Bookstore
The Book Den (used)
Seattle area:
Elliott Bay Book Company
Upper Case Books (Snohomish)
St. Louis area:
St. Petersburg
Vero Beach FL
Washington DC area:
Kramerbooks
Politics and Prose
Hooray for Books! (Children's) (Alexandria)
Magers & Quinn in Minneapolis, Minnesota!
I don't know if used/antiquarian book shops are eligible for the list. If so, Brattle Street Books in Cambridge, Ma. has long been a cherished Boston institution.
Park Road Books in Charlotte
Tattered Cover, Denver, Colorado
There is nothing like the Seminary Co-op in Hyde Park, on the U of C campus.
I'll second the vote for the Tattered Cover in Denver — I could spend weeks there. I also love Brookline Booksmith and Harvard Book Store in the Boston area.
The Seminary Co-Op in Hyde Park (Chicago) is wonderful. Also highly recommended are Unabridged Books in the Lakeview neighborhood of Chicago and Prairie Lights in Iowa City, Iowa.
I agree with Jordy about Harvard Book Store — that's an easy one. Great used book section in the basement, too. (If you're thinking about used books in Cambridge, I think the Bryn Mawr book store out on Huron is definitely worth a trip.
In Chapel Hill Fly Leaf Books (next to the fabulous Foster's Market) is worth a visit; and I'd add the student bookstore at UNC has a fantastic and large book section. It's not quite the Harvard Book Store, but it's very strong.
As to used books, I'm actually partial to the 2nd Edition bookstore inside the RDU airport. Now that says something very positive about the triangle that they have a used bookstore inside the terminal!
And The Bookshop on Franklin Street in Chapel Hill is another absolutely fantastic used bookstore. The Internationalist, which is across the street from The Bookshop is good if you're looking for radical literature. Worth a visit, certainly.
Ok–couple of other thoughts here. Was just talking with a Richmond friend a week or two ago about The Fountain, a charming bookstore downtown in Shockoe Slip. Hadn't thought of that place in years, but I'm glad to learn it's still there. I'd also add the Virginia Book Company, which basically serves the VCU community but has (or did twenty years ago, anyway) a pretty good collection of new academic books.
Haslam's in St. Petersburg, FL.
Square Books in Oxford, Mississippi.
http://www.squarebooks.com/about
Other good Bay Area bookshops: Moe's and Black Oak Books in Berkeley, Green Apple in the Inner Richmond (SF).
Kepler's in Menlo Park, California (sort of the Silicon Valley).
In Santa Barbara, California: Chaucer's Bookstore and The Book Den (the latter is largely a used bookstore). (And I second those two Berkeley bookstores above.)
I've ordered books from Strand Book Store in NY city, does anyone know about that bookstore (I've never been there)?
A few more: Malaprops in Asheville, Joseph-Beth in Lexington (Kentucky) and Cincinnati, and the Mysterious Bookshop in NYC.
A second vote for Green Apple Books in San Francisco on Clement Street.
I lived in NYC a while ago and never liked the Strand as much as I felt like I should, or as much as I liked (for example) Moe's. More books at the Strand, but also more not-so-interesting books to wade through to get to the interesting ones, especially on the sale carts outside. The Strand also tended in my experience to be very crowded, space-wise and with people. It was almost on the scale of Powell's in Portland, but in a much smaller space, with more customers. But maybe it has changed for the better!
There used to be some great used bookstores around the corner from the Strand on 17th and 18th Streets, but I think they might all be gone now.
Elliot Bay Books in Seattle
City Lights Bookstore Sylva, NC!!!! http://www.citylightsnc.com
Books & Books (Coral Gables, FL, and Miami Beach, FL)
In Brooklyn, Community Books, and Greenlight Books. In the Chicago area, Book Table.
Hooray for Books in Alexandria, Virginia and the the The Flying Pig in Shelburne, Vermont!
In Saint Louis you'll find two locations for Left Bank Books. See http://www.left-bank.com/
Uppercase Bookshop, Snohomish, WA 30 miles north of Seattle.
Books & Co in Lexington, VA (corner of Jefferson and Nelson)
McNally Jackson, NYC
Full Circle Bookstore in Oklahoma City is a real gem.
For the next few weeks there's the Chester County Book and Music Store in my hometown of West Chester. It has a fabulous collection — for instance, I bought Betsy Blackmar's Manhattan for Rent there some years ago — a great but specialized nineteenth century of NYC. Whenever I'm home I try to go there — it's a real gem. Alas, I have just heard that they're closing.
Don't miss Book People in Austin, TX. In Chicago, Women and Children First is a great one also.
The Book Barn in Niantic, CT is a fantastic used bookstore.
Grolier Poetry Bookshop (Cambridge, MA): http://www.grolierpoetrybookshop.org. It's just around the corner from Harvard Bookstore.
In Cambridge, Schoenhof's is fantastic for foreign language books and the Grolier is an incredible store specializing in poetry. I believe that Book Culture (which used to be Labyrinth Books) remains the best scholarly book store in NYC. Labyrinth Books retains a store in Princeton, NJ. Posman's Books (with a couple of NYC locations) is also excellent, although with a very different emphasis. The Drama Book Shop in Manhattan has a comprehensive collection of works related to its name.
For anyone who makes it to Boise, check out Trip Taylor Bookseller (used) and Hyde Park Books (new and used).
Talking Leaves in Buffalo. http://www.tleavesbooks.com/
Women and Children First in Chicago should also be on the list.
Raven Used Books (Cambridge, MA) is excellent (www.ravencambridge.com) — they also have a Boston location that I've never been to, but which I suspect would be quite good as well.
Reading Reptile in Kansas City is fabulous for children's books.
Raven Used Books in Cambridge, MA and Boston, MA, specializing in scholarly books
Warwicks in La Jolla, Ca. Has weekly authors come in to speak about their book.
Avol's Books, Madison, WI
Paul's Books, Madison, WI
Talking Leaves, Buffalo, NY
Full Circle, OKC, OK
Powell's, Portland, OR
Kepler's, Menlo Park, CA
Valley Book Shop, Amherst, MA (now only online, I think)
Children's Book World on Haverford Station Road in Haverford, PA is a fabulous bookstore and resource. Its staff is incredibly knowledgeable, and it has a wonderful tradition of bringing authors to meet the kids.
Mrs Dalloway's in Berkeley, Point Reyes Books in Point Reyes Station in West Marin, north of San Francisco and Copperfield Books in Petaluma, CA, also north of San Francisco
These are more literary bookstores than college or social science bookstores
Winchester Book Gallery, Winchester, Virginia
Vroman's, Pasadena CA
Labyrinth, New Haven CT
The Haunted Bookstore, Iowa City IA
Prairie Lights, Iowa City IA (already mentioned, I think)
Green Apple, San Francisco CA (already mentioned, I think)
In memoriam: Shaman Drum, Ann Arbor MI (closed a few years ago . . . sigh)
Kinda in memoriam: Bookstar (Loma Theater location), San Diego CA (WAS amazing; purchased by Barnes & Noble a while back, so probably technically disqualified, but still – how cool is it to have the bookstore in the old theater?)
Common Good Books in St. Paul, MN. A local gem run by Garrison Keillor.
House of Our Own Bookstore in Philadelphia, PA.
San Diego/La Jolla is blessed with D.G. Wills AND Warwick's. Both gems with different strengths.
Three Lives in NYC (Greenwich Village).
In Eugene, Oregon: Smith Family Bookstore; J. Michael's Books; The Duck Store; Tsunami Books; Black Sun Books