{"id":12902,"date":"2010-07-08T11:16:24","date_gmt":"2010-07-08T15:16:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/offmetro.com\/ny\/?p=12902"},"modified":"2025-08-21T09:40:34","modified_gmt":"2025-08-21T13:40:34","slug":"used-bookstores-baltimore-md","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/offmetro.com\/ny\/12902\/used-bookstores-baltimore-md\/","title":{"rendered":"Literary Escapes: Four Favorite Used Bookstores in Baltimore"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Dozens of famous authors, including Edgar Allen Poe, H.L. Mencken and David Simon, have lived in and drawn inspiration from Baltimore, making it a wonderful place for a literary escape and a fitting host for the Annual Baltimore Book Festival in September. In advance of the event, which is scheduled for September 22-24, squeeze in some summer reading with some titles from these <strong>four used bookstores <\/strong>that honor the literary heritage of the city.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Normal&#8217;s Books and Records:<\/strong> This perennial award-winner ranks as John Waters&#8217; favorite Baltimore book shop, and the collectively owned operation has been selling esoterica for 18 years. In addition to philosophy, classics, metaphysics and contemporary fiction, Normal&#8217;s has a ton of vinyl and indie &#8216;zines from around the world. (425 E. 31st St., <a title=\"Normals Bookstore in Baltimore\" href=\"http:\/\/normals.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">normals.com<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p><strong>The Book Escape:<\/strong> This impeccably organized Federal Hill shop has both new and used titles, and exacting standards mean there are no tattered and dog-eared titles cluttering up the shelves. As a nod to its perfectionist tendencies, The Book Escape finally managed to snatch the City Paper&#8217;s Best Used-Book Store award last year, robbing Normal&#8217;s of yet another title. (805 Light St., <a title=\"The Book Escape store in Baltimore\" href=\"http:\/\/thebookescape.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">thebookescape.com<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p><strong>The Kelmscott Bookshop:<\/strong> The city&#8217;s largest antiquarian book dealer opened in 1977 in what used to be Baltimore&#8217;s Book Row. While the focus here is on rarities\u2014like a first edition of the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn selling for $1500\u2014not everything is out of reach for those on a poet&#8217;s salary. (34 W. 25th St., <a title=\"Kelmscott Bookshop in Baltimore\" href=\"http:\/\/www.kelmscottbookshop.com\/index.php\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">kelmscottbookshop.com<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p><strong>Royal Books:<\/strong> Next door to Kelmscott, this shop also deals in first editions and literature but also has a collection of vintage film posters, books on film and original screenplays. As a nod to some of the Baltimore writers that developed American crime fiction, you&#8217;ll find a vast selection of hard boiled books here, too. (32 W 25th St., <a title=\"Royal Books store in Baltimore\" href=\"http:\/\/www.royalbooks.com\/index.php\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">royalbooks.com<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p><strong>How to get there: <\/strong><em>Consult our <a title=\"Baltimore Transportation Advisor\" href=\"https:\/\/offmetro.com\/ny\/manhattan-to-baltimore-public-transportation-guide\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Manhattan to Baltimore Transportation Advisor<\/a> for multiple travel options.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>Photo: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/ms_sarahbgibson\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">cinderellasg<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<div id=\"_mcePaste\" style=\"overflow: hidden; position: absolute; left: -10000px; top: 208px; width: 1px; height: 1px;\">http:\/\/www.royalbooks.com\/index.php<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Dozens of famous authors, including Edgar Allen Poe, H.L. Mencken and David Simon, have lived in and drawn inspiration from Baltimore, making it a wonderful place for a literary escape and a fitting host for the Annual Baltimore Book Festival in September. In advance of the event, which is scheduled for September 22-24, squeeze in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":47,"featured_media":37758,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[350,747,358,849,748,316],"tags":[233,293,143,142,474],"class_list":{"0":"post-12902","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-baltimore","8":"category-bus-2","9":"category-maryland","10":"category-shopping-2","11":"category-train-2","12":"category-weekend-getaways","13":"tag-books","14":"tag-budget-friendly","15":"tag-bus","16":"tag-festival","17":"tag-literary-adventure"},"acf":[],"mv":{"thumbnail_id":37758,"thumbnail_uri":"https:\/\/offmetro.com\/ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/07\/2744341043_13917a231b_z-300x200.jpg"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/offmetro.com\/ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12902","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/offmetro.com\/ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/offmetro.com\/ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/offmetro.com\/ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/47"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/offmetro.com\/ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12902"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/offmetro.com\/ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12902\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/offmetro.com\/ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37758"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/offmetro.com\/ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12902"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/offmetro.com\/ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12902"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/offmetro.com\/ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12902"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}