As one of England’s historic university cities, Cambridge has a wide variety of fantastic bookshops to explore.

Heffers is one of those - a vital and well regarded part of the literary scene in Cambridge, having been present in the city for over 100 years.

Formerly owned by the Heffer family, the shop was founded by William Heffer in 1876, initially selling stationary and later adding books. Heffers was eventually sold to Blackwell’s in 1999, but retains its independent charm.

A city beloved by bibliophiles, Paris is packed with stunning bookshops, libraries and literary cafes.

For those interested in literary history, you really are spoilt for choice. Follow in the footsteps of Hemingway by dining at Brasserie Lipp, and sip coffee with Oscar Wilde at Café de Flore and Les Deux Magots. You can even visit the home of the famous French author Victor Hugo, who penned The Hunchback of Notre Dame and Les Misérables.

Paris has continued to embrace and champion the written word, and you’ll find dozens of bookshops to visit around the city. There are even a number of booksellers that specialise in English language books, making these shops a must visit for English speakers.

I explored Paris’ famous English language bookshop and literary meeting place, Shakespeare and Company.

I arrived at the bookshop on one of those cold yet sunny winter mornings as part of an excursion with Viking Cruises. The tour guide had allocated us an hour of free time to spend as we liked, and as most of the tour group pottered off to peruse the nearby Christmas market, I rubbed my hands together with glee, knowing that I was about to visit one of my bucket list bookshops.

Although many people report having to wait in line to enter Shakespeare and Company, I was fortunate and ended up walking straight inside.

Located in Paris’ Latin Quarter, The Abbey Bookshop is an independently owned Canadian bookshop specialising in English language books.

I was excited to finally visit this iconic shop during my recent visit to Paris, where I embarked on an exciting press trip with Viking Cruises, which involved sailing down the Seine on a roundtrip from the capital.

Located in West Port, above Edinburgh’s colourful Grassmarket, Armchair Books is one of the city’s most beloved secondhand bookshops.

Of course, there’s huge competition in Edinburgh when it comes to bookshops.

The city has more than 20, spanning books used, new and antiquarian, with some shops specialising in specific genres such as science fiction and romance. I like to think that there’s room for all of them, and I never leave the city without a new (to me) book in hand.

I visited Bucharest in October 2024 as part of my 30th birthday celebrations. As well as visiting the fantastic Therme Spa that’s been hugely popular on social media, I was also keen to visit one of my bucket list bookshop locations: Cărturești Carusel.

Translated as The Little Bookshop, I stumbled upon Den Lille Bokbutikken while stopping in Haugesund during a Norwegian Fjords cruise.

Here’s everything you need to know about the largest second hand bookshop in the midlands.

I recently found myself on a trip to Birmingham and discovered Astley Book Farm on our route. Located in the county of Warwickshire, Astley has just 200 residents, meaning that it’s a village with more books than people!

Here’s everything you need to know about Lush’s new poetry bookshop which you can find on Oxford Street in London.

The Poetry Pharmacy started life as a pop up at Lush Studios, which is the brand’s dedicated event space in Soho. It then moved to the flagship Lush shop on Oxford Street in June 2024 where it’s open on a permanent basis.

Welcome to the world’s first bookshop town, Hay-on-Wye. Here you’ll find more than twenty bookshops selling all kinds of books: from new to second hand, fiction to non-fiction and books for children and adults.

Hay-on-Wye also plays host to the annual book Hay Festival which sees 300,000 guests visit the town across eleven days.

Here are all of the bookshops that you’ll find in Hay-on-Wye!

Welcome to Hay-on-Wye, the world famous book town located on the Welsh border. With more than 20 bookshops to its name, Hay really is a book lover’s dream, and an essential bucket list location for any reader.

You’ll find the UK’s largest book festival, Hay Fest, there each summer, along with a more modest iteration in the winter. It’s a cultural hub and the place to be for anyone who loves books.

Tucked away in the northernmost corner of England, Barter Books can be found in Alnwick - a small town in Northumberland. The shop is a complete showstopper with lots of unique features, and is easily one of the best book shops that I’ve ever visited.

Barter Books is housed in Alnwick’s beautiful Victorian train station, which was decommissioned in 1968. Today the space is simply magical.

Welcome to one of my all time favourite bookshops. Topping & Company are a small UK based bookshop chain that started in Ely, Cambridgeshire back in 2002, and has slowly spread across the country and all the way up to Scotland. Edinburgh is the youngest of their four branches, having only opened in late 2019, and it’s also their largest.

Blackwell’s is one of Britain’s oldest bookshop chains. Situated in the heart of a historic student city, the original shop is based on Broad Street, Oxford, where it originally opened its doors in 1879. But it isn’t just the shop’s history that makes it worth a visit. The Broad Street shop holds the world record for the largest single room in the world selling books - you’d have no idea from the outside!

Tucked away just beside London’s well known Leicester Square, Cecil Court is a magical little street lined with gorgeous victorian style bookshops. This street is said to have inspired Diagon Alley from Harry Potter and you can definitely see why – it’s a location that any book lover needs to visit in London. Keep on reading to discover the eclectic range of bookshops that line the glorious Cecil Court. You won’t be disappointed!