Los Angeles, California is well known for being the home of Hollywood, Tinsel Town, the place to be for all things film, but it also has a few great destinations for book lovers. Now don’t get me wrong, you definitely shouldn’t skip the tours at Warner Brothers Studio, Paramount Studios, or Universal Studios Hollywood if you have the chance, because in the end, film is just telling you a story in a different format. I’m just saying, don’t stop your touring after the film studios. Here are a few other locations you should add to your itinerary, along with some books to add to your reading list:
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The Los Angeles Public Library Central Branch
The Los Angeles Public Library Central Branch is the focus of The Library Book by Susan Orlean. Orlean’s book is part love letter from her to the LA Library and partly the story of an unsolved arson case that destroyed much of the library in 1986. Visiting the library today, you’ll find the building full of a vibrant community of patrons and a library fully recovered, providing services from book checkout and study rooms to a whirring makerspace and media center. Even if you can’t check out books, the library is worth a visit not only to see the place Orlean writes about in her novel, but to see the resiliency of this library. It’s not only rebuilt, but continued to modernize to remain relevant for the community of today.
Instagrammable Indie Bookstores: The Last & the Lost
If you’ve ended up in the bookspaces of social media, you’ve probably seen images from The Last Bookstore & Lost Books (also owned by The Last Bookstore).
The Last Bookstore, Downtown LA
The Last Bookstore is photographically famous for its book window and book tunnel. If you’re able to visit, these two features are hidden upstairs in the labyrinth of book shelves. The stacks create odd curving pathways accented with bizarre decor hidden in nooks and crannies. Like a skull in a cage (near the book window) and a sarcophagus.
Lost Books, Montrose, CA
Lost Books is photographically famous for its arched entryway made up of mostly plants and crates filled with old books. The whole shop is filled with used (lost?) books (perhaps the overflow of used books from The Last Bookstore?). The striking thing about the shop is its ceiling of greenery and the bookshelves made of crates set in a striking concentric circle configuration. Also there’s a bird cage amidst the shelves as well. So it feels like being in a bookish forest where the lost things go (Sorry in advance, if you click this link you’ll have the song stuck in your head the rest of the day!). And yes, you can find books on plants and gardening amongst the pre-loved classics, mysteries, and other genres.
Literary Destinations
Angels Flight Railway
Angels Flight Railway is the shortest railway in the world. You can see from one end to the other. It’s really just a funicular that takes you up and down one very steep block in the financial district of downtown LA. Riding one way takes about a minute. However, in Ransom Riggs’ Sunderworld Vol. 1: The Extraordinary Disappointments of Leopold Berry, it’s also the portal to the fantasy world of Sunderworld. In the book, this railway has been defunct for years, but a magical token portals the main character from Downtown LA to a fantasy realm. In reality, the funicular was shut down at various times due to safety issues, but today it runs daily and it’s only $1.50 per ride each way.
Unfortunately, I was not portaled into Sunderworld or any other world upon riding the funicular either direction, but it did serve as an excellent way to shelter from the rain for a moment. I happened to visit LA during a historically nasty rain storm that pelted LA for several days. You’ll have to ride Angels Flight and let me know if it portals you anywhere fantastical.
Stars Hollow: Home of TV’s Greatest Bookworm
I just can’t help including a filming location when talking about Los Angeles. This destination is open annually during the winter holidays and is found within the Warner Brothers Studio.
If you’ve seen the TV show Gilmore Girls, you’ll know that the main character, Rory, reads a lot. She caries a book everywhere just in case. She’s even quoted as saying, “I live in two worlds. One is a world of books.” People have even compiled a list of 300+ books that are referenced throughout the 8 seasons the show ran. (It’s called The Rory Gilmore Reading Challenge.) So this destination is the home of one of TV’s greatest bookworm.
It’s been 25 years since the show stopped filming, but the entire Stars Hollow town film set is still on a back lot of the Warner Brothers Studio. Now, normally you can visit this set as part of a WB Studio Tour. My understanding is during the three-hour tour they drive you in a little golf cart through the town and you maybe snap a photo as it goes by.
However, during the winter holiday season, the town comes alive again during an event known as Holidays Made Here. Instead of seeing the town as part of a tour, you can purchase an all-day access ticket to just Stars Hollow and spend a day shopping, eating, joining town functions, and spotting Gilmore Girls actors. There are daily activities all over the town including trivia games that run all day at the Black & White & Read Bookstore. You can attend a town hall meeting during which you can voice your own town-related opinions. There’s cookie decorating at Sukie’s place, or tea at the Dragonfly Inn, and in the evening there’s a tree lighting.
During this approximately three week period, Gilmore Girl actors return to Stars Hollow as their schedules allow to mingle with visitors. This year Scott Patterson (who played Luke Danes) was there every single day. The actress that played Mrs. Kim and the actor that played Ceasar also showed up for the evening of the day I visited!
Best of all, the shops and restaurants all open up! You can have coffee and pancakes at Luke’s, get Asian food at Al’s Pancake World, and have more coffee and a pastry at Weston’s Bakery. Then you can shop to your heart’s content at shops including Doose’s Market, the Knit Shop, and Stars Hollow Books.
Unfortunately, the Bookstore did not have any of the books on the Rory Gilmore Reading Challenge list. It did have the books written by actresses Lauren Graham and Kelly Bishop though. Mostly it’s a gift shop, but you can buy a shirt or a tote bag with the name of the fake bookstore on it! If you’re a Gilmore Girls fan, it’s the best fake bookstore you’ll ever go to.
Are you a Gilmore Girls fan? Have you been to LA? Have I missed an LA literary destination? Have you read Sunderworld Vol. 1? Tell me in the comments below!
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Kristine Harder says
Oh how I’d love to visit the L.A. Library! I read The Library Book earlier this Fall. I was thrilled to hear Susan Orlean read when she was a lecturer in Skagway at the annual North Words Writers Symposium a couple of years ago. I highly recommend S.E. Alaskan readers (or writers) take advantage of the Symposium’s annual free public reading the Thursday of the workshop. Other luminaries I’ve enjoyed include Eowyn Ivey (The Snow Child), Tommy Orange (There There), Travel Writers Paul Theroux and Pico Iyer, and so many more!
Elizabeth says
I remember seeing she was going to be a speaker at the Symposium! I was so sad I couldn’t get there to hear her!
Redding Finney says
LA is unknowingly imprinted in my reading over the decades. Of course it started with Raymond Chandler moving onto L.A. Confidential by James Ellroy and Inherent Vice by Thomas Pynchon. Stepping outside the crime and drug stories that populate the LA shelve space are the true tales of southern California. Most recent… I’ve just finished Firestorm by Jacob Soboroff. A tale of our future, and an introduction to the thousands of people that TMZ overlook. That lead me to finally read Joan Didion’s Slouching Towards Bethlehem, a collection of essays centered around California of the 1960s. Didion’s book was discussed in UnCool by Camron Crowe, about a teenage music journalist condemned to grow up in San Diego. Yet, I’ve seen references Didi0n’s book to over the years in other places. Of course, there are the movies and show business telltale books that never caught my eye.
Oh, to the point. I’ve never thought of a literary tour of LA. Usually, it’s buying maps with star’s homes or fancy stories. Now, there is a compelling reason to tour LA. Thanks