Magnolia’s Bookstore.
Courtesy Mason Dauber
As an avid reader, I admittedly spend a lot of my time not only reading books but also searching for them. While it can be tempting to scroll through seemingly endless options online from the comfort of my own home, whenever I’m up for it, I enjoy going to local bookstores to browse. This past weekend, I had some spare time and did exactly that; I went to Magnolia’s Bookstore, and it exceeded all expectations.
Magnolia’s Bookstore, established in 1992, is located in the heart of Magnolia Village, adjacent to Petite Pierre (Magnolia’s iconic French bakery). The interior of the bookstore is cozy and quaint due to the gray carpeting and dark wood shelves running through the store. Additionally, the shelves are positioned in a way that creates multiple distinct room-like sections of the bookstore, further adding to the intimate and cozy atmosphere.
One of the bookstore’s strongest characteristics is its wide selection—featuring sections such as mystery, sci-fi, business, travel, foreign language, biography, and history, to name just a few. Furthermore, a variety of writers are represented, with authors ranging from Jeff Kinney to Alice Walker to Kazuo Ishiguro to Leo Toltsy to Jon Krakeur. Magnolia’s Bookstore’s website claims that their selection will “keep you interested but never overwhelmed,” and I couldn’t agree more. While their selection was far from sparse, containing countless books that I would love to read, there weren’t too many so as to make me feel inundated with a surplus of options—every book that was in the store felt like it was meant to be there.
Besides just having a good selection of books, Magnolia’s bookstore also has recommendation cards lining the shelves, featuring concise reviews of the books written by employees. This is something that I haven’t seen at a lot of other bookstores, and I really appreciated this personal detail. As I read through a given recommendation card, I became much more inclined to want to read the book due to the very specific and helpful information provided—much more beneficial than the generic blurb on the back of the book.
Not surprisingly, as shown by the recommendation cards, Magnolia’s Bookstore has phenomenal staff—the employee I came into contact with was kind, provided me with helpful insight into finding a book that would interest me, and was eager to talk about the many books she had recently read. In an era where so much book shopping seems to occur online, completely void of human connection, I really appreciated being able to talk with another person about books; her genuine enthusiasm for all things literature made me excited to read the books I had picked out, and it made me want to come back to the store again soon.
Lastly, I appreciated how Magnolia’s Bookstore provided free gift wrapping. One of the books I ended up buying was a gift for a friend, and the employee carefully wrapped it with vibrant wrapping paper alongside a bow made of ribbon. While I could have wrapped it myself at home (though not as beautifully as she did it), it saved me some time and gave us an extra moment to chat about books we had both read recently.
While I just walked into Magnolia’s Bookstore with the intention of browsing, I ended up walking out with multiple books in hand, both for myself and for a friend. This bookstore had such a comfortable atmosphere that made me never want to leave, and being able to interact with others and discover new books in a natural manner was a really worthwhile experience, one that paled in comparison to shopping for books online. I highly recommend visiting Magnolia’s Bookstore, and, if you’re able, I would urge you to support it in whatever way you can.
Mason Dauber is a junior at Lakeside School. He lives in Magnolia.