Best Language Bookshops In Vancouver Near Me

4worldlovers: On Saturday, unbeknownst to us, an Irish pop star named Dermot Kennedy hid a handwritten poem in the shop and then announced on Instagram that the person who claimed it would win a backstage pass for his show at Rogers Arena that night. What then came to pass could be described as an unlikely intersection of the plotlines of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Bye Bye Birdie (but with Irish accents), as the hyperventilating fangirls of the Celtic diaspora descended on our quiet patch of West Pender Street. According to Rod it was great fun, “like Bloomsday came early!” and in that spirit it seems worth reminding you that even though Dermot’s poem was claimed almost immediately, we still have some rare and desirable literary works from another famous Dubliner in stock.

We will officially open our secret on-site art gallery, Gallery Hound, for an exhibit of rare and beautiful poetry broadsides. The first 35 attendees will receive a postcard of Basil Bunting’s advice to student poets (pictured above) plus a commemorative rubber stamp. Where the heck have we been hiding this gallery? The answer will delight our fans and irritate our detractors. Actually it might irritate our fans too. Running an independent bookstore is not about pleasing everybody!

You can enter to win a bag of stuff that communicates “I AM A LOVER OF BOOKS” while paradoxically not containing a single book. Intrigued? As per tradition, former Canadian swimming champion Murray White will do the draw at 6pm.

If you bring a wire clotheshanger, we will fold it into a unique custom bookstand for you. This is also per tradition, which is to say we did it last year and we’ll probably do it again next year unless we can think of a better gimmick.

Rod and Kim will both be in the shop working at the same time, hopefully putting to rest the paranoid theory that Rod is Kim wearing a “Rod mask and wig” and standing on a small riser, or that Kim is Rod wearing a “Kim mask and wig” and crouching slightly. Kim will be wearing her vintage Kiki Suarez “BookWoman” t-shirt and Rod will be periodically consulting F.C. Avis’ The Bookman’s Concise Dictionary. Kim is NOT allowed to consult this dictionary, nor is Rod allowed to don the BookWoman t-shirt. Of course we dream of a day when we are truly liberated from these binary strictures, but Canadian Independent Bookstore Day is not that day. We hope you will join us! And be sure to check out our friends at Banyen Books, White Dwarf Books, Pulpfiction, Kidsbooks, Hager Books, Book Warehouse, Massy Books, Lucky’s Books and Comics, The People’s Co-op Bookstore, and Iron Dog Books to see what they have planned!

Trying to direct local security patrol Honk and Hiss over to our besties Iron Dog Books at 2671 East Hastings who had their float stolen in a break-in this morning. But these two are awfully stubborn and frankly pretty scary and seem unwilling to make the trek, so perhaps we can encourage you - a lover of independent bookstores and defender of virtue, and significantly not a goose - to go there instead. Sure, you might not be able to fearlessly and aggressively guard their premises from vandals and thieves, but you can buy a book or two and show your support for the friendliest neighbourhood bookshop in this city! (At the time of this post, Hiss is defiantly challenging a Range Rover’s passage down the street while Honk watches unimpressed from the curb, occasionally turning to harrass pedestrians. We feel protected but in that uneasy sort of way where your protectors are a pair of sociopathic gangsters.)

A bright lamp aids the reader, and the ecstatic pink flames of a magnolia manage to illuminate the bookstore in a similar way. Maybe it just brightens the bookseller’s mood. Aren’t we fortunate to be magnolia-adjacent here in the 300 block of West Pender!

4worldlovers: Established in June 2000, we're one of Western Canada's largest and busiest bookstores, with more than 80,000 new and used titles in three neighborhood locations.

While our corporate competitors "diversify" away from print into bath towels, bottled water, chocolates & electronics, we're sticking with what we do best: an unrivalled selection of new, used, & out-of-print books chosen by readers, not algorithms.

Our new releases represent the best of what's available in current fiction and nonfiction, with an emphasis on books that will still be read in five, ten, or even twenty years.

Most new books are sold at a discount to Canadian cover price.

Our regular customers say that our Main Street shop has more turnover than any bookstore they've ever been in. Every day sees hundreds of new and out-of-print books added to the shelves.

Regular book sellers know we pay more for used books & bring in "the good stuff" ...the ones they'd rather not sell.

Whether you're seeking a recent Hilary Mantel, an out-of-print Clark Ashton Smith, or that little blue book about a pony you had when you were a kid, we'll either have it on our shelves, or can help you find it.

If we don't have what you want, we order new books at a discount of up to 40% off cover price. We can source almost any book published in North America, even those supplied by US publishers and wholesalers whose titles aren't normally available in Canada.

We also order graphic novels, but not single issue comic books, at discounts of up to 40% off Canadian cover price.

Our special order service is faster and cheaper than ordering online from Indigo and Amazon.ca. Unlike them, we never charge for shipping. And if you order $50 or more of books from us, we'll deliver anywhere in the Lower Mainland at no additional charge.

4worldlovers: At Massy Books we see every book as treasure waiting to be discovered. From rare, off-beat and out-of-print books to familiar titles and current-day best sellers, we scour the internet and places near and far knowing that the books we source have a perfect match in a reader or collector who is as passionate about books as we are!

Massy Books is 100% Indigenous owned and operated and a member of the Stó:lō Business Association. We acknowledge we operate on the traditional, ancestral, unceded, and occupied territory of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and sel̓íl̓witulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations.

4worldlovers: WE ENCOURAGE OUR CUSTOMERS TO BRING REUSABLE BAGS AND CARRY REUSABLE FABRIC BAGS FOR PURCHASES


In 1985, Ron Fryer first opened the doors of Kestrel Books to the Vancouver public. At the time there were many bookstores around the city (far more than there are today) but reading and book collecting had always been a passion for Ron. For years he had been dutifully packing his tiny townhouse with stacks of books in preparation to open his own shop. As he so eloquently put it, “My wife was patient but I know that she wanted our kitchen table back; every time you turned around, books were everywhere… piled to the ceiling.”

When the original shop on Broadway was damaged by a fire, the business relocated to Cambie street at 16th. Construction of the Canada Line on the Cambie Street corridor in 2006 forced another move across the city to where Kestrel Books currently stands at 3642 West 4th Ave, happily nestled among the tree-lined streets of Kitsilano. The shop is located just west of Banyen Books near Alma Street and Jericho Beach.


Kestrel Books were proudly awarded the Silver Award for ‘Best Used Bookstore in Vancouver’ in the 2010 Westender Newspaper’s ‘Best of the City” awards.

Now well into our third decade as a knowledgeable & reliable dealer of vintage books, we carry rare, fine, out of print & antiquarian books, as well as general inventory. Follow us on INSTAGRAM & FACEBOOK to get first glimpses of new & exceptional additions to our ever-growing library.