I recently travelled to the wonderful Edinburgh city, and you bet that one of my priorities was to do a bookshop crawl. So that is exactly what I did, and what I’d love to share with you today!
Whenever I go travelling, I always love to explore the bookstores that are on offer (and sample the goods). And I’ve always intended to start a little series on my blog where I can share those adventures with you. This time, I actually remembered to take photographs so that I could do just that.
And Edinburgh is a fantastic city to start this blog series with. Granted, there will be long hiatuses being posts in this series – unless I can dig out some old photos from previous trips! Edinburgh is closely associated with literature – and I even found a Conan Doyle pub & Sherlock Holmes statue. I’d had no idea before that point that Doyle was born in Edinburgh. I wish I’d had time to try out that pub, but I’m afraid I didn’t and so can’t say whether it’s anything to write home about.
Edinburgh is a grand and beautiful city, and there are a delightful number of bookstores to check out. A good few are clumped together in achievable book-crawl distance from each other, with a few outliers that you might want to save for a separate jaunt – or at least for after a break with a well-deserved cinnamon bun.
So, shall we dive in?
Waterstones
128 Princes St
First cab off the rank is Waterstones. Of course.
Waterstones is lowkey the love of my life. I’m very envious of people who call it their local bookstore. So while it may be a big chain bookstore, I love visiting a Waterstones when I’m in the UK/Ireland.
The Waterstones in the centre of town is a nice big one, and I had a good run of luck finding some lovely books here. When you first walk it, you’re faced with the glory of the ground floor – a vast, open room that stretches all the way back and is FILLED with tables upon tables of hardback books. The walls are lined with new releases (all hardback!) and other fun categories.
There are several floors to this bookstores and when you make you way up, you pop out right into the sci-fi/fantasy section, with the children’s and YA areas to your left. There is so much to see in Waterstones – I’ve always loved how each floor often holds a collection of thematic genres (non-fiction was mostly upstairs, for example). Plus, there is a cafe that overlooks the city and I’m fairly certain would have castle views too, come to think of it.
I happily spent several hours in here before moving on with the rest of my book crawl. I found a wonderful sprayed-edged edition of Warrior, Princess, Assassin by Brigid Kemmerer, which was a particular highlight. It was so hard to restrain myself and walk out with only a few books. And I also got a tote bag, which felt very indulgent and super fun.
Golden Hare Books
68 St Stephen St
I continued my trek going north of the new-city side of Edinburgh and heading into Stockbridge. For this trip, I was staying not far from the Waverley train station, so that was my point of reference for how far away/feasible bookstores were to visit.
Golden Hare Books was one of the furthest bookstores I made it to on this trip. It’s a beautiful walk down classic, Scottish-looking streets. I managed to take a route that took me past the Catherine Sinclair Monument, which was very thematically on point. Sinclair is known as a writer and philanthropist, but very much so for her children’s books. It was one of those great moments when I crossed the street specifically to see what the monument was for and then read “children’s books” and took it as a sign, thinking the gods smileth upon me today, that there must be many great books ahead of me. And true that was.
Anyway, back to the bookstore, I digress. Golden Hare was one of the few stores I actually did not buy a book from, however, I thought they were incredibly well stocked. Comprised of only 3-ish rooms, it’s small but cute.
This is an award-winning bookstore and came highly recommended on a lot of lists that I looked up before travelling. It’s definitely an impressive stocklist for a small store, but I also would add, with no shade thrown, that even though many blogs declare this to be unmissable and peak bookshopping experience, it’s okay if you don’t get to it. There was nothing unusual stocked here and it really is quite small. Sweat not the stress if the walk is too far.
Ginger and pickles
51 St Stephen St
Right across the street from Golden Hare Books is Ginger & Pickles – a kids’ book specialist. It’s very, very small and cute. The day I was there, it was actually quite a warm day so I did a quick twirl around the store and back out again. Man, do the British need to discover aircon or what?!
But I must emphasise that this is a seriously adorable, tiny bookstore. It is a one-room shop, so the picture I took below is from the front door facing in. It certainly had the vibe that it was curated by someone who knew their picture books well and love them. For such a small space, I thought it was quite sweet how it was setup. So many of the picture books were face-out, so you could see them in all their glory.
But again, if this is too far out of your zone of doability (this was the edge of mine), then, well, tis but one room. No need to go too far out of your way – everything here was stocked in the other stores, too.
Armchair Books
72-74 West Port
Trotting back to the centre of town and crossing over to the old town, I wandered through the markets that pop up in the shadow of the castle on a Saturday morning, en route to Armchair Books.
I actually walked straight past this the first time. It’s tucked into a row of shops on the street front (and the looming castle views are very distracting). The street is a steep slope and oh boy, was this a busy shop or what? Happily, I managed to snap a few mostly people-free photos for you.
If it hadn’t been quite so crowded and, if I be honest, if it hadn’t had such a strong musty, damp smell, we might’ve browsed for far longer. As it was, it’s like a warren of bookshelf-lined corridors with an abundance of books crammed everywhere. But it didn’t have the right atmosphere (or odour) on the day we were there to be at leisure. Plus, I was ready for lunch right about this point.
There is so much to browse here, and I’m sure many hidden treasures. I looked high and low here for some editions of Mercedes Lackey’s books I’m after, but alas, no dice, and I left empty-handed.
Topping & company Booksellers
2 Blenheim Pl
May I present to you, my favourite bookstore in Edinburgh. I can’t believe that the reviews/recommendations about this place I read when researching it weren’t 10 times more hyped. This place is NOT to be missed. DO go out of your way to get here. This is a serious case of, if you had to visit only one store, which would it be? THIS ONE.
I knew that this was a first edition & signed edition specialist, but I thought it meant that in the same way that places like Waterstones have many hardbacks that are signed with sprayed edges. But ho-ho! Good sir, I say to you, take yourself and your wallet here and feast upon the delicacies.
This is a multi-storey bookstore (I think 2, from memory) and it’s quite large. It is like a big house where every room is organised according to genre or collection – I took a picture of the chalk map they have on the ground floor to help you find your way. It’s very cute. I would like to live in a house organised like this one day. A reasonable wish, no?
But what had my jaw dropping to the floor, was that each and every hardback that was a first edition or signed (or both) had a protective sleeve over it (like how Goldsboro Books prep their special editions, if you’re familiar), lovingly adorned by staff members I presume (I dare not think of the time this takes), AND, they include a little paper slip within the sleeve to identify the special editions. If anyone knows if the staff do, in fact, have to sleeve each book by hand, I’m desperate to know.
Take a closer look at some of the pictures to see the black paper strip singling out these editions. This makes browsing a thousand times easier. Instead of relying on facing out signed copies to proclaim their status, even books that are spine-out are easy to see as the black strip is visible the whole way around.
So I certainly had a whale of a time combing through this store and examining every book with a black slip. Being somewhat deprived of this in Australia (we hardly ever get hardbacks, let along this volume of signed ones), I was in heaven.
In particular, being able to easily identify a book as a first edition was seriously awesome. If you like to collect special books, this really is an important thing and made me feel the books I found were even more valuable, just because of the special treatment.
The store was bustling and busy, and everyone I saw was milling around carrying a small tower of books. I don’t know, in fairness, if there is always such a high hit-rate of signed books, as we were in Edinburgh during the Book Festival, so I’m sure many authors were in town doing the rounds. But I hope it’s always like this. I came away with 3 new books and Chris, my partner, also came away with 3 new books. It was very hard to show restraint. I will dream of this bookshop every night.
Typewronger books & McNaughtan’s Bookshop
4a Haddington Pl & 3A, 4a Haddington Pl
Typewronger Books was a fascinating little bookstore. It virtually shares a space with McNaughtan’s Bookshop, so I’m combining them here, as you can walk between the two inside (two front doors, but an archway inside connecting them).
I put Typewronger Books on my list, took off my list, and put back on again. Ultimately, I decided to check it out because it was en route to all the others stores. The thing that baffled me was, is this actually a bookstore? I don’t know why I was so challenged to work this out before arriving in Edinburgh (the answer is yes, it’s a bookstore).
It’s a small shop selling new books and secondhand typewriters. It is also a typewriter repair store – very unique. The vibe was cheerful and chatty when we went in and there were some excellent recommendations being handed out by the person on staff that day. For such a small store, this really did have an excellently curated collection. There was plenty I could have bought, but #restrained.
Well, less restrained and more that I was financially exhausted trotting into this off the back of Topping & Company, so I was busy feeling slightly guilty and somewhat poor. It was very cute to do a little circuit and spy all of the typewriters adorning the shelves, though.
Oh! And one super cool thing that Typewronger does, is that you can get a store stamp in the book you purchase. Apparently this is what some famous bookstores do, so that you can collect store stamps on your bookstore crawl. Love that idea so much.
Poking your head through the archway brings you into McNaughtan’s Bookshop, which is Scotland’s oldest secondhand antiquarian bookseller, cute! This secondhand store was less crowded but also less smelly (in fact, not smelly at all) than Armchair Books. So I can recommend it on that basis, at least.
There was a huge selection of books inside McNaughtan’s, and I easily could have spent more time browsing the selection. But I had several bags of books on my shoulders at this point, and agenda of even more bookstores to get to. So I pressed on and turned my eyes away from the expensive and tempting rare books.
Elvis Shakespeare
347 Leith Walk
This was a cute little addition to the bookstores lining this street. While I didn’t find anything of particular note myself, the fact that this sold both secondhand books and records was a fantastic combination, I thought.
But I must say, while I liked the idea of this very much, several write-ups online painted an idea of this having a huge selection and much memorabilia (maybe just online?), but I didn’t think it quite lived up to expectations.
To me, this seemed more like your average, run-of-the-mill secondhand store – plenty of good things to find, but I think I’d gravitate towards Armchair Books over this one, if there was something in particular I was hunting down.
Nonetheless, how could anyone possibly walk past a shop with a name like Elvis Shakespeare?
Argonaut Books
15-17 Leith Walk
Ah, now here was an excellent bookstore. One of the newest stores lining this street, Argonaut Books had a cool vibe. It’s a bit bigger than many of the teeny tiny stores you’ll have visited and the staff were very friendly. AND, I got a free tote bag for spending over a certain amount – which was honestly a highlight. Who doesn’t love free tote bags?!
This has a great selection of fantasy and sci-fi, and it also offers a place to sit and work, while overlooking the street. I was really impressed with their selection and, as mentioned, though I thought I might have out-shopped myself, I walked away with another three books from here.
They had signed editions, hardbacks galore and I even got one special sprayed-edged edition. The more I looked, the more I found. Absolutely deadly.
Transreal Fiction
46 Candlemaker Row
This is nestled down a cute little street called Candlemaker Row. It’s in the heart of Edinburgh’s old town and was a store I circled back to later on our visit to tick off the list. I kid you not, I walked past this 3 times before finding it on this street. It’s not particularly hard to find, but I must’ve been blind that day – though, it is quite a nondescript entrance. So for anyone else who is going to hunt this one down, I present to you the storefront:
It’s another small bookstore but it’s also a fantastic sci-fi and fantasy bookstore specialist, which is why it was one on my list worth a special trip to make sure I got to it. There were so many books I could have picked up, but honestly by this point I wasn’t 100% sure how much room I had left in my suitcase so held off unless it was something super duper special. It was a real close thing though, I tell ya.
But if you’re not running the risk of almost running out of suitcase space, I highly recommend putting this one on your list. I think you’re guaranteed to find a spec-fic book you’ll enjoy.
FRUITMARKET BOOKSHOP
45 Market St
I also stumbled across this little shop at the Fruitmarket. I don’t know if it’s always there, but they had a cute little selection of books to nosy through, and why not, if you’re passing?
This doesn’t come up on any lists of bookstores to visit but I happened to pass by. It’s part of a bigger thing that is the Fruitmarket, so I guess it’s more like a gift shop? But in any case, this is right in the middle of town, on the old town side but near a bridge to cross over the new town. And they had a mix of fiction and non-fiction – lots of art books and non-fiction that you might not find elsewhere.
Edinburgh International book festival
In addition to the bookstores, the Edinburgh International Book Festival was on. And guys, if you find yourself in Edinburgh when this is on, I highly recommend finding some talks to go to. It’s held at Edinburgh University and they set up a tent and food trucks out front so you can eat and then browse the books, many of which are signed (tent = bookshopping, trucks = food, to be clear there).
This was extremely well organised and filled with some absolutely epic line-ups. I was there for only one week of the festival, but managed to book in to see 3 different talks. The moderators were fantastic and these were some of the most engaging and thought-provoking author talks I’ve been to. I’m so sad that I don’t live in the UK so as to attend every year. And there were some author I’d’ve loved to have seen, but alas, I missed them.
The first people I saw were Alwyn Hamilton and S.F. Williamson. They were talking about their new books, The Notorious Virtues and A Language of Dragons, respectively. They were an absolute delight and I, of course, bought both books (I’ve since read A Language of Dragons, see my review linked in the previous mention) and got them signed. Hearing both authors talk about their writing process and the intention behind certain things they did in the books was really interesting.
The second author I saw was V.E. Schwab. That was incredible. Not only is she the most adorable human being on the planet, she was absolutely inspiring. She was in conversation with Nikita Gill (author of Hekate) and they had such a great on-stage rapport. This was my favourite talk. I cannot wait to read the book. Schwab is so well-spoken; the way she articulates herself is incredible, and having been successful in the industry for some time, she also had some great and important insight to offer as to what it is was like to be a woman writing in this space. If you ever get the chance to hear Schwab talk, I highly recommend making it happen.
The final author I listened to was Adrian Tchaikovsky. As you can see below, I nabbed a great seat right near the front. I wanted to hear Tchaikovsky talk because I was on the fence about whether to keep trying his writing. I’ve read City of Last Chances, one of his fantasy novels, and found it good but overwhelmingly high-brow. I thought that perhaps his writing was too literary for me (even though it’s spec fic), but having listened to this conversation, I’m so wrong, and I need to read his stuff. Specifically, his sci-fi.
He was an absolutely charming person and 10 levels of interesting to listen to. He was talking about his two 2025 releases: Bee Speaker and Shroud. Both sounded incredible. My partner picked up a copy of the former, but we did then find out halfway through the talk that it was book 3 in the series – though I think we can get away without reading the first two. Shroud, in particular, sounded amazing, but we ran out of luck when it came to finding a copy to pick up on this trip.
Tchaikovsky was another author that blew me away in how much thought goes into his writing. I think I must’ve struck lucky with some deep-thinkers this time – I couldn’t believe the levels of consideration and social commentary that unpinned the writing of all four authors I listened to.
At the end of this trip I came away with a glorious 23 new books. I had sampled all the goods and been to (nearly) all the bookstores. Here’s a picture of some of them, though this is not the full 23 – I did buy the last few at the airport on the way home 🤭
Have you been to Edinburgh? What’s your favourite bookshop there?
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