Thrifty ReadsUsed & out-of-print books
Stacks of antique leather-bound books with gilt spines, an old book lying open on top, in warm light

Thrifty Reads · used & out-of-print books

A Good Book. A Comfortable Chair. Nowhere Else to Be.

Some books have lived a hundred lives before finding their way to yours. Come in, have a look around, and find one worth taking home.

Wander the ShelvesDiscover Our Story

There’s always another shelf to explore.

On the oak table by the door

Fresh From the Shelves

Just come in, still smelling faintly of somebody else’s house. Have a look before they’re shelved.

Everything recently arrived

The long shelf by the fire

The Forgotten Classics

Austen, Dickens, the Brontës, Hardy and Shakespeare, in the old editions people actually read: pencilled names inside the cover, the odd bus ticket for a bookmark.

The Classics

Browse the whole shelf

Behind the glass, ask to see

A Little Something Curious

First editions, signed copies, out-of-print oddities and books with stories of their own.

Everything rare & curious

Pull the chair a little closer

The Reading Nook

There is a particular kind of afternoon that old bookshops were made for: grey at the window, warm by the lamp, and nowhere you need to be until the light goes. This corner is for the notes we write on afternoons like that, about books we’ve loved, odd things found between the pages, and what to read next.

“The person, be it gentleman or lady, who has not pleasure in a good novel, must be intolerably stupid.”

Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey (1817)
Meghan’s bookseller notes go here: a favourite find, the story behind a particular copy, or a reading list. Written by her, in her own voice; nothing in this space is invented.

From the bookseller’s notebook

Meghan’s Pick · The Remains of the Day

The best book about a butler ever written, and the saddest. Read it on a grey afternoon.

— M.

The Remains of the Day, $5.50

Meghan’s Pick · Watership Down

Not a children’s book, whatever the spine says. Bring tissues for chapter 50.

— M.

Watership Down, $6.50

Meghan’s Pick · The English Patient

Dense as a desert night. Go slowly; it rewards you.

— M.

The English Patient, $4.50

Seven Shelves to Wander

Every book in the shop sits on at least one of these. Some sit on two, and nobody minds.