Oakland! Message Board

I do not, in fact, own Story a City. Lack of civic pride, I suppose. I grew up in Oakland, and I still work there, although I technically live in Berkeley now. You may also want to join the SF Bay Area group (or not, depending on your tolerance for neighboring municipalities). :)

I don't own many Oakland-themed books. Gun, With Occasional Music takes place in Oakland and, of all places, Piedmont. And I believe some of Dark Cities Underground also does.

I understand that an Andre Dubus novel was based on the apartment complex you see on your right going down 80 past Emeryville. I can't remember its name - oh, House of Sand and Fog. Didn't read it, unfortunately.

I also have to admit to not owning Story of a City, sadly.

Hi! thanks for inviting me to join -- I'm honored to be part of an Oakland Library Thingers group. sadly I don't own Story of a City, either, but "Carter Beats the Devil" is set here, and I have a really obscure 1950's teen novel that takes place at Mills College. (Found at Bibliomania, one of the best bookstores in Oakland -- is it still here???) And I do have two books by an Oakland based author, Lynn Peril, who is also a member of the group. (Sorry, Lynn, I outed you. But your books rule!)

again -- thanks for inviting me -- what a great idea.

Oh yeah, Bibliomania is still around - 19th and Telegraph downtown. It kind of plods along - I love it, but I rarely see many other people in there. That neighborhood is starting to take off, though - Dona Tomas is going to be opening a second restaurant right across the street. Hopefully, in a few years, the street will be getting more foot traffic and more people will realize what a great store Bibliomania is.

What other bookstores do people like? I'm a huge fan of Walden Pond on Grand, and I like Diesel in Rockridge as well.

I haven't been to Diesel in ages. (I went to high school near there.) Relatively small selection, but mostly quality stuff. However, they are to blame (at least in part) for selling me J.G. Ballard's Cocaine Nights, which is one of the most disturbing books I've ever read.

I also used to live right across the street from Walden Pond.

One of the reasons I would never be happy living in the country is that I need to be in close proximity to at least one good use bookstore.

Yes, that's the precise reason - sometime last week or so - that I decided to stop thinking of moving to the country. I don't actually use many of the bookstores in the area frequently . . . I tried to avoid Cody's, for example. But the few I use, I couldn't do without.

I really like Walden Pond - their radical magazines and literature are wonderful . . . I used to like Diesel and Pendragon a great deal, though I'm rarely in the area any more. The problem with Diesel for me is that the areas they cover are done better by other places close by. University Press Books covers theory and Dark Carnival does science fiction . . .

Are we only discussing Oakland bookstores? I've already mentioned UPB; I like Serendipity Books and Black Oak a great deal too. All are in Berkeley though. In Oakland, I like Spectator Books a great deal; they don't have a very complete or even necessarily a very flashy collection, but I find surprising (and useful) things there regularly.

I've never gotten around to visiting Dark Carnival. How do they compare with Other Change of Hobbit?

I used to live right next to Spectator, and I've certainly bought many a book from them -- probably my favorite find being Venus on the Half-Shell, the Philip Jose Farmer novel which is supposedly written by Kilgore Trout, the Kurt Vonnegut character based transparently on Theodore Sturgeon.)

Bibliomania over on Telegraphy & 19th?! I used to work in that area about 8 years ago and I remember walking past that bookshop. Sometime later, I had a dream I was walking past that bookshop and over time I didn't know if the shop was real or just something I dreamed. I couldn't find it when I walked by that area. But now it's confirmed and I must check it out.

Fave bookshops in the area: Spectator (#1) and Black Swan, both on Piedmont. Then there's Pendragon, Walden Pond, Moe's, and Black Oak (which I haven't been to in years). I'm just hoping Moe's doesn't fall victim to what Telegraph Avenue has been going through lately, business-wise.

I haven't been to Bibliomania in years -- I'm glad it's still there. I love Spectator, and i love Black Swan's selection -- I'm just so happy there are two great used bookstores on Piedmont Avenue. But I'm moving away from there to the Laurel neighborhood -- are there any good bookstores in that area? A Great Good Place For Books in Montclair is close by and that's a great store (with author appearances), but I don't know any in Laurel.

I just wish that Cody's had decided to keep the Telegraph store instead of opening the new one in SF. Still, i usually choose to go to the Fourth St. store and avoid Telegraph as much as I can. After working in Berkeley for 8 years, i just try to avoid Berkeley in general... but I did go into Pegasus the other day. Frank Portman ("King nerd") is doing an event there on the 17th that sounds fun...

Kukkurovaca - I couldn't really say. I've only been to Other Change of Hobbit once.

I found a new and interesting bookstore walking down Broadway kind of round the intersection with Grand . . . a few blocks from the Paramount in between it and the car dealerships. It was called "Dan F. Books" or something like that . . . there's a Louisiana Lobster right next door.

...well, "interesting" is a bad word. Maybe "interestingly disturbing" . . . it's almost all military history and related topics - espionage, firearms, strategy, technical specifications and manuals, naval history, that sort of thing. Some miscellaneous books - a single shelf of antiquarian stuff, some paperback novels, etc. Really run down, but it seems like there isn't a book in the place that sells for more than $2. I found a few books on labor history and a 1914 edition of Leaves of Grass there - each for less than $2.

The customers are mostly scary men (as distinct from the non-scary type). I overheard some of them talking about the SUV driver who ran 15 people down recently, and they were talking about how people ought to learn survival skills so that their peripheral vision would be better. When I mentioned that I saw the bookstore from the bus, the first thing the owner asked me was whether I'd ever seen a crime committed while riding it, and then he started talking about his police officer friends. It's that sort of place.

Oh, yeah, the Army, Navy and Air Force recruiting offices are about 2 minutes' walk towards the Paramount.

How interesting. I know that area pretty well, or at least I used to, but I've never encountered that establishment, perhaps for the best.

The creepiest bookstore I can think of is Cartesian Books near Dwight and Telegraph in Berkeley, which has a very distinct smell...

What a great conversation! It's fun to hear from others who share my haunts. As a Pendragon employee, of course I have to rate it first on my list of neighborhood favorites, but I do adore Spectator and Diesel, too. Black Swan has always felt a good bit less welcoming to me.

Dark Carnival is further than those for me, but it's great fun. I prefer it to the Other Change of Hobbit, though I like TOCH, too. After all, it was where I first heard of Tananarive Due, and where I purchased my copy of Whispers from the Cotton-Tree Root edited by Nalo Hopkinson.

One Oakland-set book not mentioned yet is Chitra Divakaruni's Mistress of Spices. And did you know that Jonathan Lethem also used to be a Pegasus/Pendragon employee? It gives a modest bookseller great hope.

PS--speaking of Nalo Hopkinson, I highly recommend her books The Salt Roads and Skin Folk. Even though they're not Oaklandish. :)

If you don't mind my asking, what's the name of the novel that takes place at Mills? I'm currently attending Mills and I'd love to get my hands on it.

Sorry, I haven't checked out the community for a long time... It's called "A Time to Dance" by Regina J. Woody. I found it when I was at Mills -- but I STILL haven't read it. Someday...

Hi, I just found this group ... Another Oakland resident here.

PS I hated Blues City. Just saying.

So glad to see an Oakland list! :)