(Booking Through) Vacation Spots

Do you buy books while on vacation/holiday?
Do you have favorite bookstores that you only get to visit while away on a trip?
What/Where are they?

I always seek out and visit local bookstores when I travel. Being a frequent traveler, I have blogged so much about bookstores overseas, ones that I never miss and frequently visit while I’m in town. The ones in Hong Kong are really my backyards, despite the fact that most of them are located in pretentious and soulless malls. During the most recent trip there in April I had the pleasure to find trade paperbacks of On Chesil Beach and A Short History of Tractors in Ukranian. Distributors of Hong Kong bookstores are usually from the UK so there is a fairly good chance that I’d find a trade paperback for a title that is still available in hardback only in the US. Eslite has a book emporium that is open 24/7 in Taipei. When I was backpacking through Malaysia last December, to my utter delight and surprise, I found two wonderful bookstores in Kuala Lumpur. For a country whose primary language is not English, Kinokuniya at the Twin Towers offers a very expansive selection of titles in English language. This is where I finally found a copy of Somerset Maugham’s travelogue, The Gentleman in the Parlour. Treaded by so many backpackers and tourists, the Thai capital of Bangkok is also a heaven for book lovers. The alleys in main business districts of Silom and Sukumvit are dotted with many small, hole-in-the-wall bookstores full of used titles. They’re like bookcrossing centrals with towers of paperbacks left by other travelers. Not to be missed, of course, is Shakespeare & Co in Paris, which Lewis Buzbee has mentioned in The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop. Closer to home, in the neck of my wood is Stinson Beach Bookstore in Stinson Beach. I always stop by and see what’s on their new book table on the way to Bolinas. It’s your classic neighborhood-style bookshop housed in a wooden shack with a porch. How they fit in all the books in this tiny little shop I have no clue. But they have more than enough of a selection that will keep me from running out of books to read while I’m up along the California coast.