Hello All,

I hope this finds you well and enjoying a restful weekend. As you know, one of my reading goals for the year is to support more local bookshops over large retailers like B&N and Amazon. And, this February, I was given just the opportunity!

I am most thankful to my friends for supporting my book habit, and for accompanying me to Downtown LA’s very own “The Last Bookstore”. This was only our second time ever exploring LA (and tackling it’s own unique kind of traffic), so we did hit a few bumps along the road – and a farmer’s market – before locating the establishment on the corner of South Spring Street.

I’d been wanting to visit this place for a long time and it did not disappoint! Not only did it have two huge floors, but it also housed several themed rooms, art installations, and shops!

I took in the magic of each section one step at a time, starting off with Fiction, Classics, and Young Adults. I allowed books to jump out, letting them choose me instead of me choosing them. (I eventually walked away with P. Schonstein’s A Time of Angels: A Novel, M. Tokuda-Hall’s The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea, and an annotated copy of Frankenstein geared toward scientists and creatives of all types.)

On the second floor, I discovered not only a lovely Carroll-esque art installation (among several others) but also a wonderfully witchy little shop selling tarot cards, crystals, jewelry, and art by Liz Huston. I bought a few postcards to use as bookmarks there before heading out to find the book labyrinth. (Yes, they have a book labyrinth!)

It’s really an all-day kind of visit, but we were strapped for time as the drive back to the Central Valley was long. Before “re-entering the real world”, however, I made sure to leave well stocked in books and, of course, a hoodie.

Do you guys know of any bookshops in Northern California that I should visit?