My name is Simon, I buy books

I was doing quite well at a month-by-month record of the different books I bought, but it rather fell by the wayside. So, instead, here is the record of a couple of different visits to London over the past few weeks, and the books I bought on my journeys. The photo is of books bought there, various other times, review books, gifts… so not all are mentioned in this post, but do give a yell if you’d like to hear more about any of them!

Firstly, I went up to London on a wet and windy day – to see the excellent productions of The Lover and The Collection as part of the season of Pinter plays at the Harold Pinter theatre. Astonishingly expensive, so I’m glad it was good. While there, I went to visit Rachel (my ‘Tea or Books?’ co-host) in her lovely new flat – and the entire time I was there, her piano was being slowly taken up the stairs. So we couldn’t have our planned lunch together – but it did given me time to dart along to ‘Word on the Water’ – a bookshop on a barge near King’s Cross.

It’s very small, and was lovely and warm when I went. It’s also very low, and I couldn’t stand up fully – but I was crouching to look at books anyway. The selection is necessarily limited, in such a small space, but seems to be well curated – and I came away with a copy of David Sedaris’s diaries.

After the theatre, I popped into Any Amount of Books on Charing Cross Road, which was having a sale in its basement. Dangerous. I bought a few books for other people (I’m so noble) – and, yes, a few for myself. More specifically, The Play Room by Olivia Manning, The Christmas Pudding by Nancy Mitford, and a book by Marghanita Laski about Mrs Ewing, Mrs Molesworth, and Mrs Hodgson Burnett – the first two names are ones I know vaguely, but nothing more. Frances H-B has survived rather better, of course.

On this trip, I was also reading Mrs Gaskell & Me by Nell Stevens – as reviewed the other day – and went off on a hunt to buy her Bleaker House. Easier said than done. Where to look for it?? I went to the enormous and wonderful Waterstones on Piccadilly, and looked through biography and generic literature… they didn’t have it, it turned out, and I went down to Hatchard’s to make the same exploration. (Incidentally – having the queues right in front of the door makes going into Hatchard’s rather an overwhelming process – but, once inside, it’s a lovely building.) No luck – but the man on the desk (once I’d assured him it was definitely Bleaker House that I was after) found it for me – in the creative writing section.

I was back in London this past weekend, meeting up with my dear friend Lucy. She had devised a tour of independent bookshops in East London, which is a part I don’t know very well. It’s also a part that seems to have few secondhand bookshops, so we were only looking at independents selling new books. Since I like to support bookshops by buying at least one, I had to ration myself between the shops…

First up, Libreria. No phones allowed, so I couldn’t check the title of the book I was after – but happily stumbled across it nonetheless: This Little Art by Kate Briggs, all about translation. I read quite a lot of it on the train home, and loved it, so watch this space – indeed, it’s not in the picture above because I’m currently reading it. Libreria is very, very hipster, but (/and) a great shop with a thoughtful selection. Better for browsing than going with a title in mind, I think.

Next, we came to Brick Lane Bookshop – not quite the same brilliance in their selection, but I did enjoy the essays shelves. I hadn’t heard of Difficult Women by David Plante, but it sounds wonderful – as well as looking wonderful, being an NYRB Classics edition. It features portraits of Jean Rhys, Sonia Orwell, and Germaine Greer. Yes please!

When we got to our third planned bookshop, Broadway Books, we discovered that it was closing in three minutes… we had a quick rush around and were asked to leave, so they didn’t get the sale I was contemplating of a Stefan Zweig. But somewhere to try again one day!

While I’m writing about books that have come into the house recently – I have to mention the C.S. Lewis books that Karen/Kaggsy very kindly sent to me recently, while she was having a clear out! I’ve read a few of his non-fiction titles on Christianity and Christian life, and really like them, so am chuffed to get these. Even better, the rest went to my aunt and her church – as my aunt lives a few streets away from Karen!

I’m going to cut back on book buying again next year, one way or another, so I’m making the most of these little treats while I can!