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Post by cromagnonman on Sept 11, 2017 22:13:01 GMT
You've well and truly sold me on the attractions of the place SP. I can see a safari north is definitely now in order. Thanks for the info.
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Post by Shrink Proof on Sept 12, 2017 11:33:06 GMT
Let us know how you get on. But if you're going to that part of Scotland, watch out for Sawney Bean - a Vault-worthy legend if ever there was one....
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Post by cromagnonman on Sept 12, 2017 12:02:56 GMT
Let us know how you get on. But if you're going to that part of Scotland, watch out for Sawney Bean - a Vault-worthy legend if ever there was one.... Will do. I always did wonder where he went after he gave up doing Sharpe.
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Post by cromagnonman on Nov 2, 2018 0:24:39 GMT
Here are the details for this week's book foraging habitat recommendation: My word, but this place is the absolute epitome of what second-hand bookshops used to be and so rarely are nowadays. Small and intimate in physical dimensions but abundant in charm and character. Set back from the kerb on a quiet side street five minutes walk from Chalk Farm tube station it is an oasis of bliss. But with nothing else in the road to generate passing footfall it is nothing short of miraculous that it has survived for close on forty years now. But survive it has, for which a drone of gratitude is due the Great Librarian. Being Camden it will surely surprise no London based Vaulters that the shop's main emphasis is on the arts and social sciences. But it doesn't neglect more general stock and, by golly, it has paperbacks on trolleys parked outside. When was the last time you ever saw that in London? Buffeted by the wind and rain of a dismal November day, but sheltered by the shop's protective awning, I pursued a delightful hour in the ancient art of mooching. The range of genre fiction on offer was rather spartan I must concede but its a measure of the place that I still came away with these beauties even so: Even though this was my first time inside the shop I found something oddly familiar about it. Turns out Dennis Waterman and Alun Armstrong filmed an episode of New Tricks there once with Roger Lloyd-Pack playing the proprietor.
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Post by jamesdoig on Nov 2, 2018 6:58:10 GMT
Thanks for that - love it! And a great haul too.
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Post by Shrink Proof on Nov 2, 2018 9:30:39 GMT
A second hand bookshop is rather like a proper pub (not a themed one - shudder) I feel. There's something reassuring and faintly cocoon-like about being there. What the Dutch call gezellig (sorry, it doesn't really translate fully, the closest English word is cosy, and it's not that close). One key factor for both proper pubs and decent second hand bookshops is that they seem to be run by folk who are much more interested in what they do than in making money. And anything that's a one-off and gives two fingers to those corrupt councillors and robot developers who want every town to look like every other gets my vote.
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Post by dem bones on Nov 2, 2018 21:32:23 GMT
Thanks for the Walden info, Crom. Been meaning to visit Martin Heaphy's 'Sounds that Swings' in Camden for ages (not sure if he still sells paperbacks, though), so an incentive to take them both in early 2019.
Violated self-imposed banishment from Spitalfields Market this morning. Mercifully, Fridays are almost like old times with vintage record fair, proper stalls, etc. One guy had a table set aside for books, £2 a time. Not a huge selection - 100 tops - but an attractive one, predominantly 60's/ 70's paperbacks, plus a box-full of Charteris The Saint novels in various editions. Amiable trader, too, told me he's there the first and third Friday of the month. Will keep under surveillance and report back. My £2 went on a pre-ravaged copy of W. Howard Baker's Danger Man: Departure Deferred (Consul, 1965).
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Post by cromagnonman on Nov 5, 2018 20:52:39 GMT
If you like a second-hand bookshop to have so much stock that it needs to be stacked as well as racked then a pilgrimage to Hurlingham Books on Fulham High Street, just around the corner from Putney Bridge tube station, is an absolute necessity. Its no exaggeration to say that this is among the most amazing bookshops you will ever visit. The premises aren't large by any means, but the stock is so vast and so interesting that the hapless browser can easily lose all track of time within its precincts, thereby running the serious risk of eventually stumbling forth wizened and penniless like some baffled refugee from a bibliophilic Brigadoon. The shop frontage constitutes an attraction in its own right; its impossible to see into the shop because the windows are bricked up by towering walls of paperbacks. Easy enough to spend an hour gawping at them alone. Once inside its a joyous thing to appreciate - as you penetrate deeper into its successive grottos of fiction - how much of the stock is given over to vintage paperback editions. I'm struggling to remember the last time I ever saw such an accumulation of old paperbacks in a high street setting. Condition is largely excellent and most books are very reasonably priced at £1-2 a copy. Here's a sample of the sort of thing that can be found there: Cromagnonman says: Get thee gone to Putney without delay and nab thyself a bargain.
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Post by Shrink Proof on Nov 5, 2018 21:18:23 GMT
That looks fab. If only it were closer....
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Post by dem bones on Nov 6, 2018 8:15:54 GMT
Looks even more must-visit than Walden Books. Great haul, too. Love the cover art - first time I've ever seen a paperback copy of Pendulum (creeping up the 'to read' pile ....)
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Post by cromagnonman on Nov 6, 2018 10:33:12 GMT
Looks even more must-visit than Walden Books. Great haul, too. Love the cover art - first time I've ever seen a paperback copy of Pendulum (creeping up the 'to read' pile ....) I'd go so far as to quantify this as an essential place to visit Dem. If there is a shop still extant in London with a superior stock of vintage paperbacks then I'd be delighted to be advised of it. Chap on sentry duty was friendly and chatty and very obliging; quite happy to give me free run of the back rooms where most customers seem not to venture. Equally cool with the idea of letting visitors risk life and limb on ladders clambering up to rummage on the high shelves. And would you believe the shop has a warehouse too near Wandsworth Bridge with a million books which they're happy to let you visit by appointment. Great great shop.
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Post by helrunar on Nov 6, 2018 12:25:37 GMT
That shop sounds like paradise, Cro. Wow!
Cheers, Hel
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Post by helrunar on Nov 6, 2018 12:36:14 GMT
Also, The Bang Bang Birds wins title of the week here. Don't think it was shelved in the Ornithology section, somehow.
H.
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Post by cromagnonman on Nov 7, 2018 0:12:47 GMT
That shop sounds like paradise, Cro. Wow! Cheers, Hel If it isn't then its as near as dammit, Steve.
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Post by cromagnonman on Nov 7, 2018 0:31:18 GMT
Also, The Bang Bang Birds wins title of the week here. Don't think it was shelved in the Ornithology section, somehow. H. Quintessentially 60s isn't it. Just one of three Diment novels I picked up at the shop. Chances are that the fourth is in there somewhere if I can only excavate it. Speaking of 60/70s spy thrillers thought you might like to see these which I acquired recently: two volumes in the now all but forgotten Band of Angels series by Graham Montrose. Bought purely and simply for the exquisite Barbara Walton covers. The author's actual name is Charles Mackinnon, but its amusing to note that even though he is Scottish he clearly felt his name wasn't quite Scottish enough to satisfy the period's preference for Caledonian monikers on thrillers ala Maclean, Fleming and Kyle et al.
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