Littered with books

I stumbled upon this little bookstore last year, and there’s just something slightly other-worldly about it that draws one in. To linger, to soak in its book-littered atmosphere.

Perhaps it’s the skylight. Perhaps it’s the shelves and shelves of books, with little paper tags sticking out to describe authors, genres, books.

Spot the stairwell

As one climbs upstairs, each step resounding loudly, a soldierly rap on hollow wood, one enters an upstairs that dreams are made of. A book lover’s realm of fantasy.

In true fairytale fashion, a staircase leads up… to nowhere.

Or perhaps not quite nowhere. The stairs’ end could be a viewing point, or a little recess, where one may sit and get lost further, in a labyrinth of a good book.

And the dark beams on the ceiling are so, so, beautiful.

Wooden floorboards, wooden shelves, wooden stairs, wooden beams on the ceiling. Then paper, pulped from woody ancestors.

If only I could have an entire shophouse Just Like That.

Books are priced at a premium (some books more than others), but hey, it’s certainly not easy to keep an indie bookshop like this going. So I try to make it a point to buy something, as a friend inspired me to. Doesn’t seem quite fair to enjoy the entire bookshop so much without contributing to its continued existence.

I came across a “petrifying parody” (pictured below) of the popular “Goodnight Moon” (not a favourite, anyhow) that was quite funny. I didn’t buy it, but got another children’s book for the girls instead. They do have a good selection of children’s books, stocking all the best authors.

This entire space could only have been created by a person (or persons) with a deep affinity and love for books. Even the shop’s name is so wonderful to me.

I don’t think I’ll ever meet its creator(s), but this blog post is a little shout-out – thank you for bringing this into being. It must have brought your dreams to reality, and it has brought some of mine so, too.

In a dystopian universe that I sometimes feel we are already in, a shop like this makes for the perfect little pocket of resistance. Against total uniformity, against chains of commercial might. Standing for Alice’s wonderland, for daydreaming, for idle imagination, for nothing seemingly purposeful in itself. For the journey instead of the goal. For the scent instead of the material.

Yet, ironically or otherwise, its conduit is palpable. Pages that can be turned. A book’s heft that weighs heavily on hands and laps.