Antoine's comments (member since Jan 16, 2009)

Antoine's comments from the beantown bookworms group.

I almost wept when I saw that Avenue Victor Hugo was gone. That was always the store where I would find the book I had given up on. The Booksmith on Boylston street was great too, especially for fantasy and SF. And in Harvard Square, I still haven't gotten over the loss of Wordsworths.

Kate wrote: "I don't mind going to the big airy chains like B&N (Burlington's is best closest to me), but I love a cute little bookstore. My favorite of all time, Derby Street Books in Salem, is closing!"

I'll believe it when I see it; it has been "closing" for over a decade. On the other hand, most of my favorite bookstores are indeed dead and gone. In fact I see that someone else has pointed out that it is not closing. I'd second Trident on Newbury, Cornerstone in Salem, and the Beverly Farms book shop. Banbury Cross, in Wenham, sells only children's books and the owner has wonderful taste.

But my favorite, hands down, is way out in Montague, MA: The Book Mill: a rambling old mill building filled with secondhand books; it is in the middle of nowhere (the store's motto is "Books you don't need, in a place you can't find.), but it is a spectacularly beautiful nowhere, and it shares the space with a café/wine bar and what is supposed to be an excellent restaurant. Destination Browsing.

I have often mused (as a literary man) about the fact that men are as casually excluded from Book Clubs as they are from, say, women's restrooms. It seems to be something that is taken absolutely and completely for granted. As a father, I have happily and comfortably been invited to join so-called "mommy's groups" but I have never ever heard of a man in a book club. I don't mind. But it strikes me as odd, since it isn't as if men don't read, although (on the whole) men probably do read less.