I Love A Mystery

Awfully heartened to see this shop stay open. They recently found several (evidently quite rare) books for me that I’d forever been scouring the countryside for. I’m now a mere two books shy from completing my vintage collection and they are still on the hunt for me.
Sidebar: They could’ve charged a lot more than they did, and if I were flush with cash I would gladly give it to them.
Also love just being in this shop, pawing around the staff’s smartly curated displays of books and listening to book club conversations from the coffee quarter. It feels almost like a gentle old pub that only you know with the dark green walls and lovely wood everywhere. (A feeling you won’t get from ordering books online!) You can’t help feeling happy in here~ a testament to the ladies that run the place~ their love of books and people is palpable… and catching.

I love this place. Great location, great employees, some great books, some not my type, but it’s all good. Very enjoyable business!

Like their website claims– «It’s not just a bookstore… it’s an experience!» This bookstore definitely creates an atmosphere that goes along with the genre of books that it sells. Like Colleen mentioned, it makes me feel like I’m in the library in Clue and I’m trying to figure out if Colonel Mustard was in the library with the candlestick.
Luckily, since mystery books are usually such a fast read for me, I’m glad that this bookstore sells used copies. This way I can sell my old books and use that money to buy new ones. I don’t buy mysteries a lot for that reason either– I have to make sure I have enough time to basically read the entire book in a day or two, because they are so suspenseful! I race ahead, so excited to find out what happens in the next page. Mystery readers soon become into kindred spirits– no one else understands your need to finish a book as soon as possible!
I also love this bookstore because it is locally owned and hasn’t yet succumbed to the global takeover that Barnes and Noble and Borders are spearheading. They were supposed to be building a Borders in the new shopping development in Mission, and I love a Mystery is battling against it. It is hard to believe that a bookstore based on a single genre has become so established in the KC metro, but once you go in, you’ll see why. I don’t think they have anything to worry about! :)

I have been going to this bookstore for over a year and couldn’t agree with Coleen more! From the fun sign on the outside to the inside décor this is an awesome little shop dedicated to one specific genre with I find most appealling. They do sell new and used books which is an asset when there are stores like Half Price books out there.
If you are a fan of mystery books or just an avid reader who enjoys bookstores this is the perfect little Mission treat on Johnson Drive.

I felt like a troubled blond walking into a detective’s shady office… my first visit to I Love a Mystery was all about mystique. This should be a destination for anyone who loves to read, young and old (they sell children’s mysteries too), rich or poor (they sell both new and used books.) I was thoroughly impressed with what this bookstore had to offer, cultivating that wild excitement that makes me want to sit for hours by a fire reading one of their books.
I also realized I knew little about the genre, besides a few Agatha Christie staples in grade school literature, I was way over my head in what looked to me like a very dense collection of paperbacks on hundreds of dark wooded shelves.
Thank GOD for the staff! When I walked in, I first saw two women sitting near the entrance of a wood table drinking tea and talking animatedly about their day and their mysteries. They stopped to introduce themselves to me, ask if I had been there before, and when they realized I had not, showed me around!
I was lead to the historical mystery section (I learned there’s just about every sub-​genre to the mystery genre you can think of: romantic mysteries, crime solving mysteries, thriller mysteries, etc.)
While they talked on, I fell in love with I Love a Mystery —
I loved the dark ivy green paint against the deep den-​colored wood.
I loved the vintage spy/​mystery/​crime board games propped up on the back shelves (they had Scotland Yard and Dragnet, Clue and 221 B Baker Street).
I loved the Halloween decorations eerily placed in the shadows or the corner shelves.
I loved that the door to their storage room was rehabbed to look like a detective’s with that frosted effect and type-​letter stencils of the detective’s name plastered on front.
And I just found out from their website, that they have a reading club that I’m seriously considering joining now. Maybe I’m a sucker for mystery, but I am so grateful there is a bookstore like this in Kansas City that makes reading almost game-​like, SO FUN.