Rizzoli's - A Little New York Bookshop on 57th Street

My last morning in New York I just had to fit in a bookshop (bookstore to you Americans).  I found that on the same street as my hotel was a small-ish bookshop called Rizzoli's.  So there was just time to pop in there on my way back from seeing Bloomingdales before I got back to the hotel to await my airport transport.

It's a very narrow shop, on three floors.  It seems to specialise in coffee table books of the best kind, so if you like architecture, ballet, theatre, photographic tomes, this may well be worth spending an hour inside!  I was directed to the top floor for paperback fiction, and with only 10 minutes to look round I really didn't know where to start, and was then really confused, as whilst there were plenty of books, it seemed that, with the exception of a small amount of multiples, most books were just singles.  So I knew I would not have time to read along each shelf (and add to that the fact that I'd have to have my head turned sideways to read the spines!).  I did spot a Maeve Binchey there, but my book of choice was a New York Times bestseller, Rules of Civility by Amor Towles which I found in a pile of 3 only on the counter. 

Lovely old built in bookcases, floor to ceiling, and an eclectic selection of CDs also available for sale (1930s dance band music playing whilst I was there).  The ceilings are glorious rococco plasterwork, and they had a great selection of greetings cards too.  I would certainly give this lovely little shop more time if I had longer..... but I was flying home, and it was the only bookshop I had time for!