More Vacation Memories: Visits To The Bookstores

One of my favourite treats on any holiday (well, any time really) is to snoop out the used bookstores in town and while away a blissful hour or two browsing bulging shelves. 

Beacon Books, Sydney BC

“Standing there, staring at the long shelves crammed with books, I felt myself relax and was suddenly at peace.” ~ Helen Hanff, Q's Legacy

Victoria and Sydney, BC, both have wonderful new and used bookshops with treasures galore. Although this trip didn't have as much time available as we might have liked, we did manage to squeeze in a brief but happy hour at Beacon Books in Sydney before boarding the ferry back to the mainland.

Beacon Books is described as a general bookstore of secondhand books with thousands of good used books covering categories like the Arts, Classics & Literature, General Fiction, Nature, Travel, Nautical, Music, Reference, Canadiana, Self-Help, and the Sciences. Includes Modern First Editions and Authors Signed editions, and collectible, rare, and antiquarian books.

The good news is that if you can't get there in person, their inventory is available online through AbeBooks.com. I've ordered books this way and have always been satisfied with their great service.

Hubby on the snoop

I'm grateful that hubby gets almost as much pleasure in a bookshop as I do, and so we each go our separate ways, down the aisles to our favourite sections, promising to meet back at the front of the store when we're done. Which means I have to carry my own armful of possibilities. And, we do set a time limit ... or we might miss lunch or in this case our ferry.

One author I went in search of was Kazuo Ishiguro, author of Remains of the Day, which is also a movie starring Emma Thompson and Anthony Hopkins. I loved the movie, read the book over summer, and now I wanted to find more of his work. Here's a quote from the book -- which happens to fit the theme of today's post....

“If I'm alone at home, I get increasingly restless, bothered by the idea that I'm missing some crucial encounter out there somewhere. But if I'm left by myself in someone else's place, I often find myself a nice sense of peace engulfing me. I love sinking into an unfamiliar sofa with whatever book happens to be lying nearby.” ~ Kazuo Ishiguro, Nocturnes: Five Stories of Music and Nightfall 

Hahaha ... loved discovering this photo of Tom and Mary in Behind the Scenes at Downton Abbey.  Do you see what I see? Hint:  What's that Mary's holding?

I actually found the book for $5.00 at a Winners in Chilliwack -- as SIL hunted for a birthday present I found this treasure amongst a pile of junky sale items. Woo-hoo! Surely, it will help while away the hours and weeks till the first episode airs here in North America come January.

It's airing in Britain now ... I found a teaser article you might want to read by Nick Briggs in The Telegraph (UK).

  

Sorry, the above photo is awful, I snapped it quickly as I didn't want to get 'caught'. But I found wonderful photos of the interior on their website, so you'll be able to get a good idea why I felt like swooning when I walked in the front door. Click here. 

By the time we arrived at this store, time was of the essence -- we only had about 10 minutes at Tanner's Books. (Ferries don't wait for book browsers.) Not a used book store, it calls itself a bookstore and more, with the largest newstand on Vancouver Island with magazines and newspapers from Canada, the United States, and Great Britain. Stocking over 2000 magazines to meet every possible topic and interest, it was Magazine Heaven, never mind everything else they offered!

You mean, in our online, social media kind of world, where digital reading is prominent, there is still such a haven with print magazines for people, like us, who still love to hold magazines and books in our hands? W-o-n-d-e-r-f-u-l !

“Perhaps there is some secret sort of homing instinct in books that brings them to their perfect readers. How delightful if that were true.” ~ Mary Ann Shaffer, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

I breathed a quick prayer as to what I should choose. I mean, there just wasn't time to even glance at more than a couple dozen of those colourful covers. One magazine jumped out -- fairly new on the market and certainly new to me. Called Bella Grace by Stampington.com, the front cover sold me, and all 160 ensuing pages are filled with imaginative stories and articles, photographs, creative sayings, and ideas for making life's journey more beautiful. Right up my alley!  To see some excerpts from this issue, click here.

  

At Bella Grace, they believe that:

• Every cloud has a silver lining.
• An ordinary life can be an extraordinary life.
• There is beauty and magic to be found everywhere.
• It's OK to embrace imperfection.
• Life should be lived with a full heart and open eyes.

There, 'nuff said for one post ... I had great fun working on this one with you in mind!

Wishing you a beautiful, bookish kind of day,
Hugs,
Brenda
xox