vinay87 Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 An hour? A few minutes? Or do you make up your mind before stepping in, thus spending only the time needed to pay the bill? I remember I've spent as much as 9 hours in a bookshop once. 9 hours to select 10 books. They gave me seven cups of tea that day. Mom thought I was lost or something. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
atticjnr Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 Wow, 9 hours is way more than I have managed. I do spend a dreadful amount of time in them though. I really can't help myself. I will go over shelves countless times, more so if it is a second hand book shop where everything is thrown on shelves and tables, roughly in the right sections. My girlfriend gets bored after a few minutes so I tend to go on my own if I can. I love being in bookshops and would love to work in one! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vinay87 Posted January 29, 2010 Author Share Posted January 29, 2010 haha I always go alone when I'm planning on skipping lunch to select books for the semester holidays. I walk in with about 20$ and walk out with 10 books. That's the fun part. Selecting the maximum amount of good books for that price. Sadly enough, when I have money, the books I want are never there and when I'm short, there are too many good books to choose from. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cookie Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 I could spend hours in a book shop without even realising it! My mom actually refuses to go into them with me! My OH get impatient with me too that's one of the reasons I like shopping on line because you can take ages and no one even knows. Although I prefer the atmosphere of a bookshop especially Waterstones which is designed more like an old library than a shop. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cosychair Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 If I'm just in for a wander or to pick up a novel quickly about 30mins, but sometimes I have book shop days when I go in with plenty of money to buy whatever takes my fancy. I make sure to go to a big bookstore to wonder slowly around all the sections choosing a pile of books, I have a little read of them to make sure I like the writing style then decide what's coming home with me. Then I have a coffee and chose which book I'm going to start first. The length of time of that type of visit is usually around 4 hours. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Raven Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 I can spend up to an hour walking around my local Watersones if it is quiet and the mood takes me. If it is packed I just go for what I went in for and get out again quick! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Janet Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 How long is a piece of string?! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Univerze Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 Honestly, since I don't have that much to spend usually, I spend a maximum of one hour in them.. now if I had like a hundred euros to spend, that would be a couple of hours, but not more. I tend to know what I'm going to buy more or less.. might decide on one or a few books in the store, but usually, I know already. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rawr Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 I haven't been in the city for around five months as i would like to go when i am working and able to browse to my own content Though when i do go exploring in the bookshops, it is usually for a very long time, i don't really set a time unless I have to be somewhere soon after. I would estimate with all the browsing and reading it would be anywhere between half an hour to forty five minutes. In libraries it is maybe an hour or two though! I love chilling out in libraries. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bettyboop33 Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 i spend a while in the peace of the store i usually know what i want to buy but i like too look around a bit more to see new titles for my list i go alone my friends are not book people Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scarlette Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 I stick around until the shop assistants start looking at me strangely and then I try to leave as nonchalantly as possible... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sirinrob Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 A minimum of an hour for me, browsing the shelves, noting authors I would like to read. I have been known to spend 5 hours just enjoying a bookshop, especially a secondhand one Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nollaig Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 Depends on whether I know what I want, and I usually do. If I do, I can be out in ten mins. If I have a choice, half an hour. If I stop by the sci-fi/fantasy, kids, and new releases sections I can be an hour. Never more than that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StephenKingman Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 Generally about 20 minutes or so. I usually have a quick browse of every shelf and scan the area to see if anything catches my attention and sometimes i buy a few books but more often i leave empty handed. Our local bookshop serves coffee and snacks etc to encourage you to sit and read books but i prefer a less noisy environment! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iamnotreal Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 Generally quite a while. If I know what I'm going in for, I'm in there for about half an hour because I like to have a browse while I'm there. If I'm just going for a browse, I'll end up being in there for one to two hours: I like to browse every shelf, and read the blurbs of any books that catch my eye. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ned Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 Usually about half an hour so i can have a quick browse over most of the shelves Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Inver Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 Depends if I know what I am going in for, but it is impossible just to go in and buy and come out without browsing....lol....so probably min on 1/2 hour but more if not in a hurry and then if there is a coffee shop bit attached well that is more. I miss my visits to Borders in Dundee for that have to say. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nicola Posted January 30, 2010 Share Posted January 30, 2010 9 hours! Some employees wouldn't spend that amount of time in the shop I usually have a rough idea of what I'm looking for so usually don't spend more than half an hour rummaging around. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BookJumper Posted January 30, 2010 Share Posted January 30, 2010 Take my recent trip to W Piccadilly to purchase the collector's edition of Shades of Grey. I knew precisely what I wanted and that I didn't have much (if any) more money than what SoG cost, yet this did not deter me from spending the better part of three happy hours browsing the entirety of fiction, horror, science fiction & fantasy, children's fiction, teenage fiction and classics. If I'd been richer and slightly less ill, those three hours could have been any number of hours. OH never comes with me to bookshops because he'd start getting frantically bored five minutes in. My family's more in tune with my modus operandi, we'll enter a boostore en masse, synchronise our watches - I kid you not - and reconvene at the till in an hour (usually to tell each other we need a further half an hour). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vinay87 Posted January 30, 2010 Author Share Posted January 30, 2010 aw... I wish I knew what it felt like to have family book shopping time Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kylie Posted January 30, 2010 Share Posted January 30, 2010 OH never comes with me to bookshops because he'd start getting frantically bored five minutes in. My family's more in tune with my modus operandi, we'll enter a boostore en masse, synchronise our watches - I kid you not - and reconvene at the till in an hour (usually to tell each other we need a further half an hour). That's really lovely. If I know what I'm going in for, I'll still usually browse around for at least half an hour. If I'm browsing generally I can take at least an hour. The longest I've spent browsing was at the twice-yearly bookfair, which was open for 8 hours in the day. I stayed there all day with my then partner. He tends to finish browsing before me, but he'll wander around then and look at anything, and he doesn't mind doing that because he's often found some interesting books that way. And the reason we have to stay so long is that the volunteers are continually putting out more books so you have to keep going around the same tables over and over to check out the new books. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anika Posted January 30, 2010 Share Posted January 30, 2010 I generally stop by my local Barnes & Noble once a week for a quick browse, which amounts to a half hour or less. I buy most books on the internet though, but I haven't calculated how much time that actually entails--I'm kind of afraid to think about it!! It takes a long time to find what I want, because I have certain non-fiction books I'm looking for, but don't know the titles or authors names. I've a vague idea of the type of book I want and if I'm lucky I find it fairly quickly, but that's rarely the case. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Weave Posted January 30, 2010 Share Posted January 30, 2010 It depends, if I know what book I am getting, I go in, get the book and then I am off If I am browsing, half a hour (with OH) , a hour or more (by myself) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
missybct Posted January 30, 2010 Share Posted January 30, 2010 I think one day I spent about four hours in Waterstones - I wasn't buying anything, but making a list of things I wanted to buy! Usually I am fairly swift if I'm going to the big stores, but if it's an independent bookstore or secondhand/charity shop, I can spend up to an hour! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jessi Posted January 30, 2010 Share Posted January 30, 2010 Anything from 20 minutes to an hour if the mood takes me Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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