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)
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.
Posted by: Ellen Wertheimer | August 12, 2012 at 05:30 PM
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
Posted by: joel dobris | August 12, 2012 at 10:05 PM
Winchester Book Gallery, Winchester, Virginia
Posted by: Catherine Grosso | August 14, 2012 at 02:48 PM
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?)
Posted by: bte | August 14, 2012 at 06:10 PM
Common Good Books in St. Paul, MN. A local gem run by Garrison Keillor.
Posted by: Jason Marisam | August 14, 2012 at 07:59 PM
House of Our Own Bookstore in Philadelphia, PA.
Posted by: anon11 | August 15, 2012 at 12:01 PM
San Diego/La Jolla is blessed with D.G. Wills AND Warwick's. Both gems with different strengths.
Posted by: Bob Bohrer | August 15, 2012 at 02:40 PM
Three Lives in NYC (Greenwich Village).
Posted by: Ruth Parlin | August 15, 2012 at 02:57 PM
In Eugene, Oregon: Smith Family Bookstore; J. Michael's Books; The Duck Store; Tsunami Books; Black Sun Books
Posted by: Margie Paris | August 16, 2012 at 11:59 PM