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Chamblin BookMine
Rating Details »
- Price Range:
-
$
- Accepts Credit Cards:
- Yes
- Parking:
- Street
- Wheelchair Accessible:
- No
8 reviews for Chamblin BookMine
YEE GADS! I've never written those two words together before but gosh darn-it, if ever there was a time to use it, it's now. Holy crap is this place insanely amazing!
Not since Powell's in Portland have I seen such an immense collection of used books. In fact, I think Chamblin's may possibly have Powell's beat. This place RULES!
I started off in the biographies and never even had a chance to check out another section. It took me 3 hours alone to clear the bio's and after that I was drained. Seriously. It was row after row after row... I was in a book lover's paradise.
I walked in just to browse... I left with 10 bio's(everything is half off the cover price!) and 4 CD's I grabbed by the register. Speaking of the CD's-
I scored 4 classics at $6 a piece: a rare early Pink Floyd singles collection, Rolling Stones December's Children, and two best of's: Gram Parsons & George Harrison. Some essential tunes that I had been desperate for as my rental car isn't iPod equipped.
Jacksonville, how lucky you are to have a used book mecca like this, I am SOOOO JEALOUS!!!
This is every bit of what I expect a book store to be. In fact, if they had a cat wandering the place, I have a sneaking suspicion the entire building would implode and form a singularity of awesomeness that would suck all of Jacksonville into it, annihilating much of Northeast Florida. I take utter delight in becoming hopelessly lost in the many aisles, and have literally had to use a GPS unit to make my way back to the checkout line. Prices are reasonable, to call the books in stock diverse is like calling the Sun kind of bright, and the staff is helpful. Just go, already.
LOVE this place. Old and new books, all over. The place is massive and very chaotic with how it's organized. Plan to wander the aisles forever and leave carrying as many books as possible.
How have I not written about Chamblin's yet? I've been going to this bookstore for at least 10 years, if not longer. The collection of books is incredible and overwhelming at times. This is definitely not a place that you can just drop in for a few minutes, then leave. Yes it is a bit chaotic and the ventilation could use some improvement. But it is the best damn used bookstore in Jax, hands down. If you consider yourself a bibliophile, you need to get to Chamblin's immediately.
I would go to Chamblin Bookmine to stock my bunker.
This place is book heaven. It's organized in a zany, chaotic kind of sense, where you can find the same book in different sections by author, genre, or purpose. The aisles go on forever--there are strange and beautiful section markers you'll never find in Booksamillion like "Beat" and "Gender Studies". Plan for a few hours. You may go in with friends, but you won't see them again soon. You don't get no stinkin' basket, you get a narrow little dolly. (Personally, I wing it. When my arms are too full to shop, I know it's time to go home.) You can trade in books, but beware--overstocked titles are sent back home. Your store credit is worth more than your cash in hand, but I've never minded. Books are usually, unless otherwise marked, half off the cover price or less. You can find anything in here--not quickly, but you can. I found three Chuck Rosenthal books in one shot: Elena of the Stars, Loop's Progress, and Experiments in Life and Deaf. It was AmA-zing. This is not where crappy books go to die. This is where all the people you'd like to meet set their literature free to roam.
This place has saved my life. I love it....and I mean I love it. I want to work there, I want to sleep there, I want to become one with it. I have found several books there that I have not been able to find anywhere else. I found a perfect copy of David Boring by Daniel Clowes. I found a few rare Francesca Lia Block. The store is large, with the downtown one being smaller (except downtown has an upstairs). There are DVD's & CD's as well.
I'm so glad that I don't have dust allergies because what would I do without Chamblin's? It saved my broke English Major ass in college when I had to buy 30 novels in one semester. It also serves as a good way to waste away a Saturday afternoon. I have a confession to make - I'm a book hoarder. No, not a collector... a hoarder. I don't care if it's a mint-condition signed first edition or a dog-eared $.50 paperback - I will buy it, I will read it (most of the time), and I will find a shelf in my house to put it on. It's gotten so bad that I actually stock up on books like they're being discontinued. For example, you know those tables of "Buy 2 get 1 free" books at Borders? Well, over the course of a few weeks, I ravished those tables. I bought books faster than I could read them so I started stacking them into tall piles around my bed. At some point, I finally gathered enough willpower to stop buying and start reading. Well, about halfway down my 2nd book stack, I encountered a book that I had already read before. In fact, it was the first book I had read from the 1st stack. I bought 2 of the same damn book in my Borders frenzy (it was "Haunted" by Chuck Palahniuk, in case you were wondering and, for those who have read it, you know how... um... unforgettable it was). Anyway, this is where Chamblin's comes in handy because they accept trade-ins! You can get either store credit or cash back. Store credit is a better deal, by the way.
The really cool thing about Chamblin's is its maze-like configuration. It's outgrowing its present location rapidly, so it's like wandering around in a labyrinth of books complete with dead ends and narrow escapes. If you've got allergies, bring some meds and, if you're claustrophobic, keep your happy place in mind because it's not for the weak. But, if you want 50 different editions of Moby Dick, you'll find them there. Chamblin's also has used dvds and music cds, if that's more your style.
They're supposed to be opening a new location downtown about 2 blocks away from my office and, when they do, I may never leave. Chamblin's, that is. Not my office. I'll leave THAT place faster than you can yell, "Fire!"
This is probably the largest used-book store I've ever visited. I was duly warned to pack a lunch and bring a sleeping bag if I intended to explore the whole place. It's a bit out of the way for a casual stop-by, which is okay by me because I have never left without a bag full of books, DVD's, etc.