Sydney: A Book Lover's Paradise

In Metro Manila, people seem forced to spend more time reading traffic signs than actual books. But as the Paranoid Traveler discovers on a recent trip to Australia, the walkable city of Sydney happens to be a paradise for book lovers. 

If you love books, I feel your pain. We, book lovers, here in Manila or perhaps anywhere in the Philippines are not spoiled with a preponderance of book stores. Whatever few stores we have, they are predictable. You step into one, you step into others, and they mostly carry the same titles. You even have to brave the traffic to go from one store to another! But that's not the case in walkable Sydney. On my recent trip, I discovered seven book stores that are all within walking distance from one another and they are as varied as the titles they carry.

Copyright Photo: The Paranoid Traveler/PFN

ABC Shop

Queen Victoria Building

The Queen Victoria Building (QVB) is the main place to shop if you have money. If you don’t, it’s the place to take a selfie with its beautiful architecture. But for a book lover, the place to go is the ABC Shop although it is just a small store with very limited selection. It can serve as the appetizer for our book store-hopping in Sydney's Central Business District.

Abbey’s Book Shop

131 York Street

If you step out of the QVB on to York Street, Abbey’s Book Shop will be there to greet you with its general and specialty titles. It’s bigger than ABC but not that big to overwhelm you with its size. Very neat and well-organized. The second floor houses the science fiction titles.

Dymocks
428 George Street

Dymocks reminds me of Powerbooks when the latter still had its branch in Arnaiz, Makati back in the 20th century. It’s spacious and holds a lot of popular titles.

Copyright Photo: The Paranoid Traveler/PFN

Kinokuniya

Level 2, The Galeries/500 George Street

Kinokuniya is the biggest book store in our two-kilometer radius trip but it is not as big as our “Fully Booked” in Manila. I almost wept at the sight of shelf after shelf of graphic novels that are not readily available here that I was prepared to pay for extra baggage on my flight back home. I felt crowded inside though as they seem to be running out of space and ideas on how to display all their books neatly. It sort of resembles my own modest library as I, too, am running out of space for all my books.

Copyright Photo: The Paranoid Traveler/PFN

King’s Comics

310 Pitt Street

If the graphic novels that I bought at Kinokuniya were not enough, King’s Comics promised to fill the void being Sydney’s premier comic book store. Since it is a geek shop, I satisfied my inner geek with some toy purchases as well.

Copyright Photo: The Paranoid Traveler/PFN

Elizabeth’s Book Shop

1/343 Pitt Street

Directly across King’s Comics is Elizabeth’s Book Shop, a second-hand book store that has been in operation for 40 years. Even though it is a used book store, it is clean enough that one need not use a hand sanitizer afterwards.

Copyright Photo: The Paranoid Traveler/PFN

Comic Kingdom

71 Liverpool Street

The Comic Kingdom is heaven to any vintage pop culture collector out there. It carries old comic books like Richie Rich and Sad Sack in good condition for only $2 each! The store ambience is as old and creaky as their merchandise of fast food toys and movie magazines from the eighties. But they do sell new superhero titles as well on the second floor.

I guess the wonderful thing about having a walkable city like Sydney is that you get to discover shops that are in not your itinerary but end up in your "must-come-back-again" list. And by again, I mean, come back again the next day for another round of book sniffing! 

Traveler's Notes:

Currently, there are only two airlines operating service out of Sydney to the Philippines.

• Philippine Airlines operates four weekly flights to/from Manila
• Qantas operates four weekly flights to/from Manila

Often what can be frustrating and limiting for Filipinos travelling abroad is the steep cost of accommodation in some foreign countries. However, Sydney does have a selection of affordable hotel options including:

• Capitol Square Hotel
• Rendezvous Studio Hotel
• Travelodge Sydney Hotel