Bookshops of the World

I stumbled across this bookstore while googling 'bookstores of the world', it appealed to me immediately probably because one, it's outdoors, two it has that Mediterranean feeling of being on holidays and reading books, and three it's something vastly different to anything I've seen before. Bart's Bookstore located in California is the largest outdoor bookstore in the world, boasting an extensive range of rare books - a definite for my list of bookstores to visit before I die.
I don't know what it is but unusual shops like this gets my heart rate going in a good way, especially when it houses books.
My favorite all-time bookstores are those old stores - not the musty, smelly types, but the old-style that surround you in all their glory of colorful jackets lining the walls from floor to ceiling, boasting new titles you've not seen before or perhaps have forgotten about until now.

One of my all time favorite stores like this is The Hill of Content Bookstore located in Bourke st Melbourne. It wasn't until I'd visited the Reading's bookstore at the State Library Melbourne that I learnt of this quaint bookshop after a staff member kindly referred me there.

You'll find this bookstore just a short stroll from the Treasury Gardens and Parliament House which dates back to the gangster days of Squizzy Taylor an Australian-based career criminal in the 1920s, famous for his pick-pocketing, arm robberies and murder. ( A bit of history folks)!

Yep, this bookstore is as good as they can get. I don't know about you but I can't get enough of being surrounded in books and this is what you get when you visit the Hill of Content bookshop. In my opinion nothing can beat an old style book store either, with a rickety sweeping stair-case taking you to a new level of more books; more books! You can also find the often very hard to get journals like The Australian Book Review. I usually visit this bookstore with a list in hand of titles I'm keen to take home and more than often I leave with titles I never came out looking for - but never disappointed in doing so. Who would go to Big W to buy a copy when they could spend a few lazy hours perusing the shelves here?

If you haven't yet been fortunate enough to visit this bookstore I highly recommend that next time your in Melbourne include a visit here.