The Known World

 It's been a long, bleak winter here in Melbourne, so it's been great to enjoy a warm, sunny, spring-like weekend. With spring, then summer, on the way, people will be getting out and about more, so I thought I'd update this blog with a post on a fabulous second-hand bookshop I visited over winter.

The Known World is owned by Michelle Coxall, who I knew - very fleetingly - through work in the late 1990s. Her beautiful bookshop is located at 28 Main Road, Bakery Hill, Ballarat, and stocks high-quality books, including art and history books, modern first editions, and vintage children's books. Don't miss the passageway leading to a staircase that takes you down to a second room full of books.

Michelle has run a second-hand bookshop for a couple of decades now, at various locations in and around Ballarat - many booklovers will remember The Known World's predecessor, Buninyong Books in nearby Buninyong. It is always a joy to explore her bookshop - she's selective with what she stocks, so whatever you're looking for, if she has it, you're going to go home with a lovely copy.

There is, as everyone knows, plenty to do at Ballarat, including visiting Sovereign Hill and the Eureka Centre. This part of Victoria has a number of second-hand bookshops to explore, so it's worth spending a day driving around the Goldfields region to visit them.

I haven't been getting out and about as much as I'd like, and because I don't post very much, this blog receives little engagement. I'm wondering whether to stop blogging here and move all future second-hand bookshop posts over to my Instagram account. My Insta account is currently a mish-mash of posts about my writing, my favourite vintage books, and my visits to second-hand bookshops and other literary places. I'm thinking of making it less of a mish-mash and focusing mainly on second-hand bookshops and my favourite vintage books - more of a hobby account than a writing account.

If you see this post, let me know what you think of this idea.  I shall leave this blog up regardless, so people visiting Victoria can find the bookshops I've blogged about (those that have survived the last few years, at any rate). 

And if you've a trip to Ballarat planned, don't forget to check out The Known World.

Time Booksellers

 

You know the expression "Never judge a book by its cover"? Well, the same applies about never judging a bookshop's stock by its premises.

I was a bit taken aback to pull up outside a soulless-looking warehouse in an industrial estate in Somerville. Could this really be a bookshop?

But when we stepped inside Time Booksellers, it was like entering the Tardis. Not only is this a bookshop, it's an enormous bookshop. More than that, though, it's not like being inside a warehouse. It has a real antiquarian bookshop feel, complete with old-fashioned ticking clocks and fine-quality books.

There are thousands of books here, so many that's it's almost overwhelming. Their specialist area is Australian history, including Aboriginal history, military history, and history books about Australia's various states.

There is also an emphasis on literature - mostly Australian literature, but also UK and US literature.  I don't think I've ever seen so many volumes of poetry in a bookshop before. There's also a collection of chess books that Beth Harmon would be proud to own!

Sports books are upstairs, along with even more history books. The owners are planning to extend their collection with a newly built mezzanine section that's just waiting for more bookcases to be installed.

Time Booksellers is open by appointment during the week. However, the owners recommend that if you know what you're looking for, their website is the best starting-point. That way you can see what they stock, and either order online or go in to check out the books.

This makes a lot of sense, as the bookshop is so enormous that you could probably have spent Melbourne's July-November lockdown in there and still not have seen everything. 

 

Books at Yarck

I'd never heard of the tiny Goulburn Valley township of Yarck until the other day when we stopped there on the way back from Euroa. But I'll definitely be going back because among its few facilities is a gorgeous bookshop.

Books at Yarck has a great collection of books, from cookery and gardening books near the front of the shop to crime fiction and sports titles in the smaller room at the back. The sports section was well stocked with Olympic histories (something I also noticed at the bookshop in Euroa), so if you want to mug up on previous Olympic Games in the run-up to Tokyo, you'll find some great books here.

A sofa near the children's section allows you to peruse the books in comfort and there's a fire for cold winter's days.

Books are reasonably priced and there are some great bargains to be found in the trolleys outside the shop.

There's a bakery just down the road from the bookshop, but there's not much to do in Yarck. However, book lovers won't need anything else when they visit - searching this gem of a bookshop for treasures will be more than enough. 

The Already Read Bookshop

What's even better than coming across a gorgeous, well-stocked second-hand bookshop in a small country town?

Discovering that every dollar you spend in that bookshop goes to supporting the town's library, that's what.

The Already Read Bookshop in Euroa's main street is entirely staffed by Friends of the Library volunteers. It sells jigsaw puzzles, DCDs, records and magazines as well as books.

And what a great selection of books it has. An entire room is devoted to Australiana, which includes history and reference books, sporting memoirs and histories, novels by old and modern day Australian authors, as well as stacks of once-popular magazines.

All the genres, including crime and romance, are represented in the main room, and there's a particularly impressive collection of Penguin classic paperbacks, most of them with the distinctive orange spines.

Prices are colour coded and very reasonably priced. There are some great bargains to be found here, including the three history books I snagged for $7. 

The Already Read Bookshop has a lovely, welcoming atmosphere, and is only a short walk away from the library it supports.

We found another delightful second-hand bookshop on our way home, and I'll blog about that in a couple of days.

Euroa is a quiet town with a community rather than touristy feel. It has some great cafes and bakeries for lunch or morning tea. 

Paradise Books

 

Back in the early 2000s, when I started re-collecting girlsown fiction, Daylesford in central Victoria was one of my favourite places to visit. It had two brilliant bookshops - Paradise Books (then called Avant Garden) in a former bank building in the main street, and the lakeside Book Barn.

Paradise Books/Avant Garden contained 14 rooms on two levels stocked with a mixture of second-hand and new books, comics, sheet music, and CDs and DVDs. It boasted a huge collection of vintage children's books - a beautiful copy of Dimsie Among The Prefects was among several purchases I made there.  

The Book Barn was gorgeous in a different way - one large, split-level room, with a woodfire in winter and an amazing view over the lake. The well-stocked children's section was near the fire, giving it a cosy feel.

But times change. I visited Daylesford yesterday for the first time in eight years, and sadly the Book Barn closed its doors two years ago. There's a cafe there at the moment, but it was closed.

Paradise Books is still there, however, offering the same eclectic mix. The main room (where the counter is) is now totally devoted to new books, with the second-hand books arranged by subject in the other rooms. There's a good range of second-hand detective fiction, but the stock of vintage children's books seemed very depleted. I'm assuming it's been hard to get hold of stock over the past year because of the various lockdowns and restrictions. I spotted some Lorna Hills and a copy of Ivy L Wallace's Strangers at Warrender's Halt, so it's still worth girlsowners dropping in to see if there's anything they want for their collections.

 

One room I always visit on the second floor is the one with all the comics. I always look to see if there are any copies of old girls' comics and there never are - but yesterday I spotted a pile of Bonnie comics. The title meant nothing to me, but it looks like it was a contemporary of Bunty and Tammy. There were also copies of some old comics aimed at very young children in the 1960s and 1970s - Playhour and Jack and Jill.

 

Daylesford has changed a lot since our last visit, and doesn't 'feel' as family-friendly as it was 20 years ago. It has lots of cafes and restaurants, and there's nearby Hepburn Springs for spa treatments, if that's your thing. Outdoor types can enjoy plenty of bushwalks around the area. Bibliophiles will want to explore other nearby(ish) towns with bookshops, including Castlemaine, Woodend, Ballarat and Kyneton.

Through the Looking Glass in Sassafras

 

So many shops in and around Melbourne have closed as a result of lockdown, so I was amazed and thrilled to discover that Sassafras, on Mount Dandenong, has a new second-hand bookshop.

Through the Looking Glass opened around the time Melbourne's four-month-long lockdown ended, and couldn't be in a better location, right in Sassafras's main street.

If the name sounds familiar, that's because the owners have another bookshop just down the hill in Belgrave. I've reviewed the Belgrave shop previously, and it's fantastic that they are doing well enough in these challenged times to open a second bookshop.

The Sassafras shop is absolutely gorgeous inside - spacious and with lovely bookcases, old tables and chairs, and, of course, an eclectic range of books to browse. Their children's section tends towards more recent authors like John Flanagan and Rick Riordan, but there are some older books by authors like Enid Blyton as well. There's a large selection of fantasy and sci fi books to the left as you enter the shop and lots of contemporary and literary fiction.

If you're up in the hills for the day, Sassafras has several cafes and gift shops, and you don't have to travel very far to find pubs, restaurants, and more cafes and gift shops. Alfred Nicholas Gardens and the Dandenong Ranges Botanical Gardens (aka the National Rhododendron Gardens) are also close by.

If you're visiting with kids, you might also want to check out the nearby Olinda Pool and Olinda Playspace.  

As a local, I'm delighted to see another second-hand bookshop in the hills. With the Belgrave and Sassafras shops, along with Rainy Day Books in The Basin and Kallista Books in Kallista, it could well be time for the Dandenong Ranges Second-hand Bookshop Trail from around 10 years ago to be revived.

Finally, a road trip!

After what's seemed like a very long year, my husband and I went away for a few days' break earlier this week. We went to Cape Paterson and Wilson's Promontory, testing our fitness by climbing Mount Oberon. Proud to report we had no trouble ascending Mount Oberon, but we were very surprised by how many other people were at the top. I think Melburnians have collective cabin fever following our long, hard lockdown.

Anyway, no trip would be complete without a bookshop visit or two. This isn't a second-hand bookshop, but anyone driving to the Prom should drop into the Alison Lester Gallery and Bookshop at Fish Creek. Alison Lester is a leading Australian children's author, and the shop sells her picture books as well as prints and cards of her illustrations. It's well worth a visit, especially if you have young children or grandchildren. 

 The Ramalama Book Exchange in Wonthaggi has survived lockdown, which is good news for anyone heading to Bass Coast beaches for the upcoming Christmas holiday period. I've reviewed them before on this blog, but they stock a good range of crime, romance, children's and sci-fi/fantasy books, and are located in a former bank, complete with some of the old furniture.

There seems to have been a proliferation of little libraries over lockdown, and there are now at least three in Cape Paterson. This one, in Spray Street, is my favourite. 

I'm busy with work and writing at the moment, but hopefully we'll have a few days out over Christmas and summer, so I can check out some more bookshops.

In other news, my fictional second-hand bookshop owner, Matilda Channon, has had a couple more adventures tracking down the original owners of things she's found in donated books. 'Stranger Than Fiction' was published in The People's Friend a couple of weeks ago, and 'Secret Santas' is in their bumper Christmas issue, out now in the UK. I'm really happy with Sarah Holliday's illustrations, which capture perfectly the cosy feel of Matilda's bookshop. GOers will have noticed occasional references to children's writers and books in these stories, including (so far) the Chalet School, Enid Blyton, Malcolm Saville and Antonia Forest.

I hope everyone in Victoria is enjoying these first few weeks out of lockdown, and perhaps making trips to second-hand and other bookshops too.

Marysville BookNest

This past week has seen the 'ring of steel' between the Melbourne lockdown area and regional Victoria finally lifted - so, of course, my husband and I have been out and about, enjoying some long walks in places we haven't been to for months.

I'm pleased to report that Warburton's Wee Warbee Bookshop has survived the long lockdown period, and it looks as if the Marysville BookNest has as well. We visited Marysville on Tuesday, and the bookshop is open from Wednesday to Sunday, but certainly the building (a replica of the town's original police office) still appears to contain the bookshop, which opened almost three years ago, in January 2018.

Next time we visit Marysville, we'll make sure we go on a day the bookshop is open, so I can blog about it.

If you're in the area, it's worth visiting Bruno's Art and Sculpture Garden in the town as well as the nearby Steavenson Falls. Marysville is also close to Lake Mountain, which is great for hiking in summer and (I'm told) cross-country skiing in winter. 

ETA: Marysville's BookNest is open on Saturdays, Sundays and public holiday Mondays from 11 till 3. More information is on their website. Thanks to Ian from the BookNest for updating me re. this. 

Little library at Wandin

Now that we can exercise within a 25km radius rather than the 5km one, my husband and I have walked a couple of sections of the Lilydale to Warburton rail trail. This follows the path of the former railway line, and is primarily used by walkers, cyclists and horse riders. 

Near what used to be the old Wandin railway station is a little library. Pre-COVID-19 I used to always carry a book in my backpack, so I could swap it if I came across a title I wanted in a little library. That's something I'm going to have to start doing again as Melbourne opens up.

Shops are still closed for a couple more weeks, so I'm going to look out for little libraries on my walks, and let you know of their existence should you also plan on exploring the outer easern suburbs as the restictions ease.

A fictional bookshop

When I wrote in my last post that I wouldn't be visiting any second-hand bookshops for a while because of COVID-19, I had no idea that seven months later I'd still be spending pretty much all my time at home. Melbourne went into a second wave at the end of June, and we've all been tightly locked down since July - and particularly since August when a 5km travel radius was brought in, along with a curfew, and a 1-hour (later extended to 2-hour) exercise limit. 

Although I haven't been able to visit real bookshops, I've been spending a bit of time creating a fictional one. I've been writing stories for The People's Friend magazine for just over a year now, and in June came up with the idea for a story set in a second-hand bookshop in the fictional English village of Haweshill. It was published this week, and I've had two more stories about Matilda and her bookshop accepted, and there's a fourth currently in the system.

Melbourne's cases are now minimal, and we're all hoping to be able to find a COVID-normal soon. I'm looking forward to exploring real bookshops again at some point soon.

No bookshop browsing for a while

Stating the obvious here, but with the current situation, I shan't be visiting second-hand bookshops around Melbourne and Victoria.

If you're looking for a particular second-hand book, many of the bookshops I've visited recently sell through Abebooks, or direct from their premises.

So please do support second-hand bookshops by buying online if you can, so that they'll still be there for us to visit on the other side of this.

In the interim, stay safe.

Syber's Books

What's better than one second-hand bookshop run by a knowledgeable person? Two! And with Syber's Books you get exactly that.

Syber's Books is run by a husband and wife team and consists of a bookshop in Malvern and a warehouse in nearby Caulfield. Penny runs the shop and David looks after the warehouse. Although they call it a warehouse, it's open to browsers. Both premises are open daily from midday till around 5.30.

Syber's Books, Malvern

We visited the Malvern shop first - it's bigger than it looks from outside, and my go-to section, the children's books, can be found right at the back. In several places, the signs on the shelves didn't match the books on them, so I'm not sure whether that's a permanent thing, or whether the shelves were in the process of being rearranged.

There were a couple of cats wandering around the bookshop, and there was a cat smell towards the back of the shop that bothered me but not my husband (I like cats but have never had one, whereas my husband grew up with cats). Hence I didn't spend long looking at the children's books, but the titles I saw were mostly more recent - from the 1990s onwards. The sports book section (also near the back of the shop) was impressive, with a good many cricket titles.

The warehouse in Caulfield is huge, with so many books that you could spend hours browsing. No children's books are stocked there, but there are extensive crime and sci fi fantasy sections for readers in those genres.

The warehouse also contains a section on alcohol and there are plenty of cookbooks (David is a MasterChef fan). Both Penny and David know their trade well, and also sell online, if you live too far away to visit.

Penny's shop is at 227 Glenferrie Road, Malvern, while David's warehouse can be found at 666 Glenhuntly Road, Caulfield.

Syber's Books, Caulfield

Bound Words

If you're a 'girlsowner', there's nothing quite like the feeling of walking into a new-to-you second-hand bookshop and discovering it has an extensive collection of vintage kidlit.

It's always a bit like time-travel finding shelves full of titles by authors like Elinor M. Brent-Dyer, Angela Brazil, Enid Blyton etc. Especially when there are plenty of hardbacks!

So I was delighted to discover Bound Words in Hampton over the weekend. It contains the best selection of vintage kidlit I've seen for a while. There was even a Girls Gone By title in there - The Mystery at the Chalet School with the short story, Robin Heeds the Call. It is water damaged, but still a perfectly good reading copy, and only $7 should anyone reading this be interested in buying it.

The children's books are in the very back room of the three-room bookshop. Non-fiction (including art, music, history and education, as well as - somewhat incongruously - plays) is in the first room, with general fiction in the second.

There are lots of eateries and shops in Hampton, and Bound Words isn't far from the beach. I'll definitely be heading back there over the next few months.

Little libraries

I really enjoy coming across little libraries and looking to see what's in them. Recently, I had a run of finding books I wanted and then having to return the next day to replace what I'd taken. So now I've taken to slipping a book in my bag or the car, just in case. (And, of course, sod's law - I haven't found anything I want since I started doing that!)

I'd quite like to set up a little library outside our house, but until then there are a few favourite ones that I check out when I'm on my travels. Locally, there is one near Lilydale Lake, outside Lilydale Aged Care, and another in the Alchester shopping area in Boronia. The Boronia one is outside the Koko Lime Cafe, which I haven't been to, but it seems very popular, indicating the coffee is good. 

Little library near Lilydale Lake

Little library in Alchester, Boronia

I'll start adding little libraries to this blog, when I come across them. They're a great way of both coming across second-hand books and passing on books you don't want to keep.

Wee Warbee Bookshop

Yesterday, we visited Warburton and dropped in on the Wee Warbee Bookshop. As the name suggests, this is a tiny shop - and it's made even smaller by the chaotic piles of books that tumble over half the room.

As you'll know if you've read my blog before, bookshop chaos prompts me to walk out rather than hunt. However, I enjoyed a brief chat with the friendly owner while my husband explored some of the piles.

Wee Warbee Bookshop sells new as well as second-hand books, with the new books on the shelves and the second-hand stock in piles. Other than that, nothing is divided into sections, and there are no prices on the books - you ask the owner and he tells you what it is.

Book lovers willing to spend a long time fossicking will like this bookshop. Note that most of the second-hand stock appeared to be relatively recent (1990s onwards), so I'm not sure that you'd find any early to mid twentieth century gems tucked away.

Warburton is located on the Yarra, and there's a beautiful walk you can do along the riverbanks, with suspension bridges to take you over to the other side. There are plenty of eateries nearby.

And finally, apologies for taking such a long time between posts. It's been a busy time and we haven't been out and about very much.

City Basement Books

It's been a while since I posted - and that's because it's been a while since I visited any second-hand bookshops. November was a busy month for our family - our son finished school (and had Year 12 exams) and we also spent some time showing off parts of Melbourne and Victoria to overseas visitors.

But I'm back on the bookshop trail now, starting with the brilliant City Basement Books in Melbourne's CBD. As you can tell from the name, City Basement Books is below street level - it's also much bigger than you expect, with an enormous amount of stock.

The usual suspects like crime, fantasy/sci fi and general fiction are well represented, and there's also a large history and travel section. But there's also a section for plays and books about the theatre, and even a shelf just for books about bushrangers. There's a cute little separate room for children's books, which at the moment has a bookcase dedicated to Christmas.

This is a place you could lose yourself in for several hours and the staff are helpful and knowledgable. It's conveniently located in Flinders Street, close to both trains and trams.

Mountains of Books

The great thing about the Mountains of Books book fair is that it gives local bookworms a chance to arrive early without setting the alarm for the crack of dawn. So, after a leisurely breakfast, I turned up not long after the doors opened.

There didn't seem to be as many stallholders as in previous years, and one stall was mostly devoted to trading cards (mostly footy and cricket). But there was a good crowd of people, which was great given the heavy rain will have put a few tourists off coming up the mountain today. Readers and collectors will find a diverse range of books at the fair, including a wide variety of Australian history books.

But the drawcard for me and many other visitors is Jilly Bookworm's stall. Her books are mainly 'girlsown' and 'boysown' hardbacks, all in great condition. Because she operates online, this is a rare chance to drool over her amazing stock - and hopefully find something you want to buy. I completed my Chalet School collection with a purchase from her stall a few years ago. Today I spotted heaps of Blytons, some Brent-Dyers and Savilles, as well as titles by Ivy L. Wallace, Antonia Forest and Dorita Fairlie Bruce.

 The book fair is open till 4 today, and again from 10 till 4 tomorrow, and it's an indoorsy thing to do on a wet weekend - so get along there if you can.  Details here.

It's Mountains of Books time again

The annual Mountains of Books book fair takes place again this weekend. Held at Ferny Creek, it always attracts great stallholders and a good crowd of booklovers. I'll certainly be spending part of my weekend there. Say hello if you see me.

Beach bookshops

Today has that air of summer about it, reminding me that we'll soon be able to swap reading by the fire for reading in the hammock or on the beach.

If you're heading to the Mornington Peninsula this summer and want to pick up some beach reading, a great place to head is Books by the Bay in Mornington. Right opposite the beach and conveniently next door to a cafe, Books by the Bay has lots of crime fiction, including contemporary trade paperbacks for $7.50 each. It also has a bookcase full of vintage crime, including 1970s Agatha Christie Fontana and Pan paperbacks for $3.50 each.

Note that they're all $3.50 regardless of condition. I found two copies of Cat Among the Pigeons, and one was in much better condition than the other, so it pays to check these shelves carefully if there's a title you particularly want.

Inside Books by the Bay

 
The bookshop is well stocked with true crime, including drug crime, corporate crime and scandals, and has great sections on history (especially World War II), fantasy and exploration. The owner is friendly and knowledgeable.

Mornington has another second-hand bookshop, Chapter House Books, in the town itself. Unfortunately it was closed when we visited. I always find this annoying, especially on a weekend, when you expect shops in tourist towns to be open. It doesn't help that many second-hand bookshops don't list opening times on their website (if they have a website at all). Anyway, a peek through the window showed that they sell contemporary romance, biographies and thrillers, as well as popular children's fiction from the 1990s. I'll have to review this bookshop another time.

Finally, Mornington has a gorgeous contemporary bookshop, Farrell's, which boasts an excellent children's section and is well worth a browse if you're in the area.

Sainsbury's Books

The name Sainsbury's will probably always conjure up images of the UK supermarket chain for this Pommie migrant, but here in Melbourne, it's the name of an absolutely gorgeous antiquarian and second-hand bookshop in Camberwell.

Sainsbury's Books is very well laid out with shelves devoted to art, history, military history, motoring, general fiction and collectibles, including rugs, ceramics, silverware etc. There a lot of old British texts, as well as books about Asia and the Middle East.

 For my own interests, the crime shelves consisted mainly of trade paperbacks by popular authors. The children's section was a tad disappointing for me, containing mostly picturebooks, and only a few vintage GOish titles, mainly Arthur Ransome and Mary Grant Bruce.

I did, however, find two excellent titles in the history section, which will help me with some research I'm doing.

Sainsbury's Books has been around for more than 30 years, and it's great to see that it's still doing well. The staff are knowledgeable and the bookshop was busy on the day I visited.

Sainsbury's Books is in Riversdale Road. Just round the corner in Butler Street, you'll find a cute little street library, so come armed with a book or two in case there's something you'd like in there.