Griffith & Partners

DISCLAIMER: I am definitely biased as this was my Dad’s shop! I’m afraid it’s now an espresso bar (which I’m sure serves lovely coffee!), as my Parents decided to move out of London for a quieter life. My Dad ran it for 13 years and was very fond of the regular customers and the locals who would stop by for a chat thank you for the lovely review Berry I’ll make sure to pass it on.

This is one of the best of Bloomsbury’s second hand bookshops, a tiny shop opposite Great Ormond Street Hospital with tables of books outside, mostly poetry and fiction for £1-£3. Inside are rarer and more interesting tomes, good academic books and beautiful, old hardbacks too. It specialises in topography, English and Welsh, but sells everything else too. I pop by if I feel like reading about goat farming, because for some reason I always chance upon a book on that subject when I’m there. The owner is helpful and friendly, and so is his daughter (I haven’t met the eponymous son). They buy books from customers too sometimes — I once took them a pile of nice books I no longer had space for and got a fiver for them, which I promptly spent in the nearby Mary Ward Centre café. The cosiness of the shop makes it perfect for browsing and sniffing the mustiness of books to pass the while.