Tomes Project

Bookstore Explorations is a post that manifested out of my own excitement to visit my very first independent bookstore.

So this 'un has more of a story with it than the last.

You know how people say "road trips are fun" well I am here to attest to the fact that while fun, they can also be horrific. I got high key lost looking for this god-forsaken bookstore. I drove into the wrong town and somehow Google Maps took me to a dance studio.

(Probably the universe's way of telling me to exercise more and sit around less, but who listens to the universe?)

And unlike most bookstores, this place was thriving. I struggled to find a parking spot in my anxious state, and I have honestly never seen so many people at a bookstore on a Friday night in my entire life.

It made me so happy.

What didn't make me happy was my phone's decision to die whilst I was in the store, hence the three very horrible photos. However, I think you might still be able to see just how many books there are in this store in these two pictures:

I picked up ten amazing books while I was there, but honestly there were so many more that I had to put back on the shelves.

There were entire columns of cubbies dedicated to Divergent, The Hunger Games, Game of Thrones, Percy Jackson, Vampire Academy, and The Mortal Instruments (I may have spent most of my time in the young adult aisle).

They had an amazing selection (however there was an astounding lack of Diana Gabaldon and Sophie Kinsella and Colleen Hoover), and I will definitely go back. Once my bank account recovers from the blow it took that Friday night.

Also, they had an amazing CD/DVD/Vinyl/Comics section that I didn't even touch. (Possible round 2?)

Are there any stores like this in your town? Tell me about them down below!

Sit down, kids, it's story time.

Am I ever going to Barnes and Noble again? No. (Not while I am in college at least.) If you follow me on Twitter, you know that I work at Panera. Naturally (because I am a naturally difficult person to deal with) I don't work at the one five minutes away from my dorm, I work at the one that requires interstate access.

So, one day as I was sitting at a red light on the edge of downtown, I saw this beside me:

then the red light turns green, and I get whiplash trying to figure out which street I am on because I need to get back to this spot. I think I just spotted an independent bookstore.

Fast-forward a week or so, and I have my first Friday night off in what seems like forever. As a bookworm, I had planned to spend the night in while everyone else on my hall went to a party to get turnt. (Is that what the kids call it these days? I wouldn't know because I am a 90 year old stuffed into an 18 year old's body.) Then I remembered that sign Come and Be Literated (A++ to whoever came up with that slogan) and begin madly searching google maps and facebook pages for companies until I found it: Starline Books.

Just look at those shelves. Look at 'em.

The picture on the left is the entrance floor (1st floor), and it houses pretty much all of the literary and contemporary fiction. There is also a small cubbie of graphic novels and comics.* This was the main wall of books, and while they don't have absolutely everything, they will order books in for you! Also, students and educators get a 10% discount at checkout!

*Side note: There is also a cubbie for local authors, one of which is the beloved Victoria Schwab (one of her homes is good old Nashville).

The picture on the right is the ground floor, where the majority of the children's, MG, and YA books are kept. The boat bookcase houses some outdoors guides and the little island of cubbies in the middle houses MG on one side and non-fiction on the other. And again, while they didn't have everything, the YA and MG shelves were stocked with new releases.

I ended up picking up The Goldfinch by Donna Tart, which came highly recommended to me by the shop owner (currently hitting myself over the head because I can't remember her name) along with Tart's first novel A Secret History.

I am so glad that I found this bookstore, and I will definitely be going back.