My happy place (well, one of them...!) ;)

Dh & I bonded over our shared love of books, almost from the very start of our relationship, almost 43 (! -- gulp!) years ago now. And long before I ever set foot in Toronto, he'd sung me the praises of the World's Biggest Bookstore (WBB) there. It was one of the first places he took me on one of my first visits to the city where we would eventually make our home. 

I was reminded of the WBB when the Toronto Star shared a recent first-person article marking 10 years since the store's demise. It ceased operations on March 30th, 2014, shortly before I lost my job that summer, and was demolished that November. It was not, as the article notes, actually the world's biggest bookstore -- but it was still pretty darn big. :)  Housed in a former bowling alley (!), it had none of the charm of cozy independent bookstores or even the polished, carpet-and-wood ambience of the mega-bookstore chain outlets. There was nowhere to sit (except maybe on the stairs?), no cafe serving elaborate hot and cold drinks, no tempting tchotchkes. 

But there were BOOKS.  Tons & tons of books, tens of thousands of titles, on two floors, stretching almost as far as the eye could see. Books on every topic under the sun. Bargain books, older titles as well as recent bestsellers, and lots of in-betweens. Titles you wouldn't find anywhere else, in those pre-mega-bookstore chain, pre-Internet, pre-Amazon days.  It was located just off Yonge Street, the main north-south street that divides Toronto into east and west, near the Toronto Eaton Centre mall and the subway (and, coincidentally, on the same street as the clinic where I went to have my ultrasounds done when I was in fertility treatment).  It was two subway stops north of where I worked, and I'd sometimes go there on my lunch hour -- although an hour (including subway and walking time there and back) was hardly enough for a truly satisfying browse. 

(I once stood in line there for my entire lunch hour to get the actor Charlton Heston -- one of my mother's favourites -- to sign a copy of his recently released memoir as a Christmas present for her.  This was pre-"Bowling for Columbine" and "From my cold dead hands," and while I was never the fan my mother was -- and less so when I realized what a gun nut he was -- it was still kind of cool to be standing in a line that stretched around the perimeter of the store, and hearing the booming baritone voice of Moses himself resonating from around the corner, lol.)    

Chapters/Indigo's big-box stores may be nicer (although they're not as nice as they used to be, nor as full of books, and most of the comfy seating has been removed over the years), and independent stores may be cozier and more personal, but the dearly departed World's Biggest Bookstore will always hold a special place in my heart (and dh's).  

Here's another first-person appreciation of the WBB.