![]() ![]() Additionally, I found there are a plethora of shops that carry books, though not exclusively, and several comics and manga shops on the island. Skull-Face Books is a new independent bookstore catering to new-and-used books and vinyl, Arts & Letters Nuʻuanu offers native books and art, Logos Books of Hawaiʻi, niched to Christian reading, and BĀS Bookshop is niched to art and design. There were a few more places I discovered but haven’t had time to visit in person yet. Boy, did I feel lucky! (And for kicks, this was the first independent bookstore on the island that supported me as an indie author by stocking my books). I found a lovely, first US edition, signed copy of Witi Ihimaera’s Whalerider here. It’s a tiny shop filled to the brim with a new-and-used collection, offering a diverse collection of titles. Independently owned and operated since 1998, BookEnds was voted the Best Neighborhood Bookstore by Honolulu Magazine. Located the farthest on my quest was BookEnds in Kailua. Please note these images were taken from two separate articles written about BookEnds Kailua. There aren’t any bookstores in my area of the island, which means traveling to a bookstore is a necessity-including the single Barnes & Noble.īut this intrepid explorer was committed, and so off I went. During peak traffic, for example, to get the 20 miles from my home to Honolulu would take a minimum of an hour, give or take an extra 30 minutes, which means that a quick trip to a bookstore isn’t happening. Though everything as the crow flies seems close and the mileage between cities on an island like Oʻahu sounds manageable, the reality of trekking those miles is a production. So before you go on the quest with me, a comment on island living for context. They are imagination bottled between four walls with the possibility of discovering buried treasure. There is something magical about walking into an independent bookstore done right. So I decided to go on a trek…a journey… a quest (FYI, this must be said like Peregrin Took from Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings, the Fellowship of the Ring ) around Oʻahu to look for independent bookstores. With the closure of Borders in 2011, it left Oʻahu with a single, big-chain bookstore, Barnes & Noble located in Honolulu, and a smaller Japanese conglomerate called BookOff. LOVE THEM! It isn’t surprising for a bibliophile and writer, but for this Oʻahu resident-especially one that lives on the south shore-access to bookstores is problematic.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |