The Best Bookstore in the World (part 3)...

For today's best bookstore award, we turn to Nancy Viau, author of the middle grade sensation-to-be, Samantha Hansen Has Rocks in Her Head!!

Nancy, what's your bookstore story?

My favorite bookstore doesn't look like the average bookstore at all. See?

And that's because it isn't!

But this is what my area has to offer in terms of an independent bookstore.

I live in a quaint, quiet Jersey town that is seldom on the map for anything unless it's antiques, a broken-in horse, or a cow or two. This Main Street "bookstore" offers not new books, or even almost new books. It has reeeeeealy old books--books you would not find anywhere else on the planet. Books your grandparents and great-grandparents loved; books that are cherished by its owners and sold, now and then, if someone happens to wander in on a Saturday afternoon. And if that someone is in the market for a Hollywood postcard from the twenties, or an Elvis poster, all the better.

Honestly, this place is more barn than store and the musty smell brings you back to those days when you climbed up in the attic searching for those interesting items that thrilled your ancestors. That's not a bad thing. This unique shop is quite precious in an almost-bookstore kind of way, but I won't be searching the shelves for a contemporary anything anytime soon.

Though I did stop in a few years back, and came out with a job opportunity....tutoring the owner's relative in reading...Hmmm...

Oh, I almost forgot, my town does have another bookstore. Perhaps this one will offer me a bit more inspiration?