newelty

Best bookstore slogan ever: Books you don’t need in a place you can’t find.

Back when I was a starving student, I’d camp out in the coffee shop of the Book Mill, located in Montague, Mass. During one particularly broke period, I would longingly visit a book I wanted on a regular basis. The owner noticed–and gave it to me.

How awesome is that? The Book Mill was the place that instilled in me a love of great old book shops and an endearing respect for any bookshop owner who can make it work.

Have you ever revisited a  book or movie you loved when you were young…and then had it  slowly dawn on you that it’s not quite the wonderful thing you remember? That you had remembered it through a sentimental haze?

I revisited the Book Mill a couple of years ago, and it was just as good as it was in my memory.

A bookstore in a creaky grist mill from the 1800s, located right above a river, filled with dusty chairs that you could spend a day in. Coffee shop filled with sunlight, located down a twisting road just outside a tiny New England town. Great books. What’s better than that?

P.S. The photos above are from an excellent photo tour on Publishers Weekly’s site by Allison Morris. Go check it out.

P.P.S. I love the set of driving directions on their website, explaining why your GPS will not help you find the Book Mill:

How to Find Us - Wander up county roads and you will find the Bookmill… but the chances are infinitely better if you do not use your GPS or even accept directions from the usual online sources. “They” don’t know that there’s a bridge out near here (a bridge that will never be repaired) and they send you by crazy routes anyway.

And it’s absolutely true.