Park Slope's Last Indie Bookstore Invites Literary Exploration

In a neighborhood as literate as Park Slope, it seems strange that only one independent bookshop remains. Despite an owner in absentia and a gargantuan corporate bookseller up the street, Ezra Goldstein is holding down the fort at .

“The key to survival in a neighborhood where Barnes & Noble is six blocks away is to know the books that people want, and to have them up front,” Goldstein said. He is in talks to buy the 40-year-old store from its owner, Catherine Bohne, who moved to the wilds of Albania last summer to run a guesthouse. He hopes the transaction will occur within the next few months, before the store’s lease runs out.

“This is a very intellectual crowd," Goldstein said of Park Slope. "We don’t sell a lot of mass-market paperbacks.”

Or even books that crowd the bestseller lists: you'll find no Glenn Beck or Sarah Palin here, and the few copies of George W. Bush’s “Decision Points” haven’t shifted since they were stocked.

Instead, the store highlights things like National Poetry Month (otherwise known as April). A specially arranged display presents selections of familiar works (Walt Whitman) and more unexpected collections (Edith Wharton wrote a good deal of poetry in addition to her famous novels). Brooklyn poets will read from their work throughout the month (see scheduled events here), including Matthew Rohrer and Dorothea Lasky on April 19.

On a Sunday morning earlier this month, browsers settled into the bookstore’s sofas and chairs to quench their literary curiosities. Classical music played softly and, instead of simply purchasing books at the till, customers lingered to chat about literary matters with Goldstein and bookseller Erin Dickey.

In addition to new hardbacks and the array of literary fiction, The Community Bookstore stocks a tempting assortment of travel guides, art books, history, biography, poetry, science and philosophy. Cookbooks and gardening guides inspire healthy living. Science-fiction, fantasy and mystery novels occupy their own shelves. An entire back room is devoted to children’s books, with more space than up front in which families can spread out and explore new literary worlds. Browsers can also take books outside to the walled garden, where water trickling over a small rock pool lulls readers into forgetting the time.

The store’s personal, intimate environment presents books as beloved objects and inspires literary exploration. It honors the experience of reading and the sensual pleasures of books in a way that brightly lit superstores or downloading e-books cannot.

And if readers indulge their interests in dimly lit nooks for too long, The Community Bookstore provides a remedy: MoralEyes reading glasses (including a guide to help determine the required strength) are available for $19.99.