Comments on Ryde Bookshop from Satisfied Visitors...

Ryde Bookshop:
Extract from 'Book and Magazine Collector'

My wife and I recently spent a holiday on the Isle of Wight and had a very enjoyable time. I have for some time been aware of the Ryde Bookshop, said to be Bibliophile's paradise.

So off we went and I located the shop. From the outside it looks just like a bookshop, that is until you enter.

There are rooms and rooms full of books on shelves in boxes all spread over three floors. The owner, I believe, estimates that there are some 60,000 books in total.

This is a true bookman's Aladdin's Cave. I spent a couple of hours browsing, not long enough, and later that evening persuaded two other similarly interested guests at our hotel to do the same. They went along and were in raptures about the place.

If you are a bookman this is a must. Take yourself off and enjoy the atmosphere of books. Sit down in the various rooms and take in and smell the sheer pleasure of a plethora of books. Gems and nostalgia abound, and you never know, the one you have been searching for may be there.

I vow to return, and while my wife shops, it will be an adventure in books for me.

Derek Summers
from Book and Magazine Collector, October 2007