A trip to Gloucester City Centre

Earlier this week, Sue and I visited the city of Gloucester - we had a walk around Gloucester Quays, The docks and the town where I picked up a couple of books.

Gloucester Antiques Centre was one of my favourite parts of the trip - the shop has three floors of antiques and one stall on the ground floor had the largest collection of Railwayana and second-hand railway books and leaflets I have even seen outside of a railway show. Well worth a visit if you are ever in the area. For more information, see this link.

Tony

Hay-on-Wye - a much needed away-day

It's been some time since Sue and I have had an away-day but earlier this week we had a short two day break in Hay-on-Wye, the town of books. We took the Kangoo and booked one night camping at Racquety Farm which is situated just over the bridge on the north side of the town.

It should come as no surprise that I spent most of my time rummaging around old book shops and picked up these little gems (amongst others).

The first is Pigeonniers de France by Dominique Letellier a book brimmed full of both period photographs and beautiful illustrations. Published by Editions Privat in 1991.

Here are just a couple of sample pages - which I am sure will inspire loads of wargame buildings.

The second is this Shire Album - 160 The Gunpowder Industry by Glenys Crocker. This small booklet was found in a bargain box and bought for just 99p.

Once again, I have included a sample page.

On the way back home we stopped off in Hereford and I picked up some modelling supplies from The Hereford Model Centre.

It was only one night away, but given the restrictions we have been living under for the last 18 months, it felt like a real break - a memorable holiday and I picked up some bargains.

Tony

Two great charity shop finds

Sue and I recently visited the Daisychain Benevolent Fund bookshop, St. Johns, Worcester and I came away with these two second-hand book bargains, both of which I had previously looked at while at model shows or browsing ebay.

At just £5.00 each they were a real bargain and both will be added to my ever-increasing collection of model-making or painting books.

Details of the Daisychain Benevolent Fund Book Store can be found here.

Tony

On The Seven Seas by Chris Peers

In an an earlier post I said that I would give more details of my recent trip to Oxford. On The Seven Seas - Osprey Wargames No. 7 was picked up for a couple of pounds in a second hand book store in Woodstock on the day that we visited Blenheim to see the Shakespeare play. For such a bargain price - I thought it was worth a punt and have to say that I have enjoyed reading it. It has spurned me on to start thinking about how I could used the hundreds of Flintloque dwarf miniatures that I have painted up for The Great Sauerkraut Wars as I think small independent bands of dwarves with flintloques and blunderbusses would work well with the system of small units led by strong captains that is the core of these rules.

For more details of The Great Sauerkraut Wars, see this link.

On The Seven Seas by Chris Peers
Wargame Rules for the Age of Piracy and Adventure c. 1500 - 1730
Osprey Wargames No. 7
Published by Osprey Publishing in 2014
64 page card bound booklet/rules
Illustrated by Steve Noon with lots of Angus McBride colour plates
ISBN 9781472801401
List price £11.99 (but available from a number of sources for much less)
For more information see this link.

Tony

The Forgotten Arts & Crafts by John Seymour

This hardback book was picked up from a charity book store in Tewkesbury earlier this week. It is absolutely crammed packed with black and white illustrations and at just £2.00 will be inspiration for lots of forthcoming models.

The Forgotten Arts & Crafts by John Seymour
Published by Dorling Kingsley in 1984
My copy was published in association with The National Trust in 2001
384 pages and hundreds of illustrations
ISBN 0 7513 2782 4

Tony

The Channel Island at War

Yet another second-hand book purchase - this time a large card bound book called The Channel Islands at War written by George Forty which was picked up at a recent car-boot sale in Worcestershire.

The book is full of black and white illustrations which give a real flavour of what life on the islands must have been like. I particularly liked the illustrations of the underground and narrow gauge railway complexes.

Although not one of my usual periods or genres, I did like browsing the chapters.

The Channel Islands at War - A German Perspective by George Forty
Published by Ian Allen
ISBN - 978 0711026780

Tony

Another Book

Sue bought me this book earlier in the week. It is another charity shop purchase, bought for under £5.00 and features images of a number of 15'' gauge railways. The bonus is that is is signed by both David Mosley and Peter van Zeller.

Fifteen Inch Gauge Railways - Their History, Equipment and Operation written by David Mosley and Peter van Zeller
Published by David & Charles in 1986
96 pages with loads of black and white images
ISBN 0-7153-8694-8
List price - £9.95

Thank you Sue.

Tony

A selection of books picked-up in June

A short update showing some of my book prizes from June.

Back row; A Street Through Time - a gift from a friend of my Daughter-in-Law. Elric, At The End Of Time - another gift, Cross-Section Castle - from the same friend.

Front row; Rivers of London, a graphic novella called Black Mould from the Rivers of London series (well worth checking out) the book was picked up in a charity shop for just £1.00 and another graphic novel - this time Artemus Fowl which was a present from my daughter.

Tony

Airfix Magazine Annuals

Earlier this week Sue and I were tidying up the attic and I came across these early edition Airfix Magazine Annuals. The first volume (the black covered book on the bottom left) was bought for me when I was still in school - that's over 40 years ago!

It is a collection that I do not envision selling as the nostalgic value is worth so much more that the monetary. And as you can see they are very well read.

A real 'blast-from-the-past'.

Tony

My latest charity shop find

I picked this book up at The Severn Valley Railway charity shop at Bewdley Railway Station for just £1.00. The series of guides by Wild Swan is well known to me but I was not familiar with this particular publication even though it was first published in 1983!

I look forward to reading through the techniques over the next couple of days.

Architectural Modelling in 4mm scale by Dave Rowe
Published by Wild Swan Publications Ltd in 1983
70 pages with lots of black and white images and illustrations
List price £3.95
ISBN - 0 906867 12 6

Tony

Warlords by Tim Newark

Earlier this week Sue and I visited Gloucester Quays and after doing some shopping we walked into Gloucester city centre where I picked up this book - Warlords Ancient, Celtic, Medieval by Tim Newark from the free charity book exchange store on Westgate Street. A real bargain.

The store is a 'pop-up' and had quite a few military fiction books as well as a wide selection of travel guides.

3 bookworms out of 5 but worth the visit for the free books and wide selection.

Tony

Henry's Cafe and Bookstore Upton-upon-Severn

Earlier this month, Sue and I visited Upton-upon-Severn, a quaint river-side town in South Worcester. The town has always had a thriving second-hand book culture, but now we have Henry's.

Henry's is one of the new style Cafe bars with a thriving antiques and second-hand book store integrated into the cafe. The military book section, situated on the first floor is very well stocked and (when I visited) had many modern information booklets for under £6.00 in addition to a well stocked second-hand military and history section.

I know that the store is closed on a Monday. For more details check out their own web page here and in particular the short sections about and photos which offer some interesting background and a couple of images of the stocked book shelves.

Henry's Cafe and Bookstore
22 High Street
Upton-upon-Severn
Worcester
WR8 0HB

I would recommend Upton and Henry's as a great day out, there is lots to see in Upton and the many second-hand and antique shops make it a great hunting ground. 4 bookworms out of 5.

Tony

Industrie Fiorentine published by Alinari

This charity book shop find has been a great source of inspiration, with its many black and white images of the industries of 1900's Italy. I'm sure that some of the images will make it in to model form at some time.

125 pages, crammed full of beautiful B&W images for just £1.49. Bargain.....

Industrie Fiorentine Tra '800 E '900
An Italian language book
Published by Alinari in 1982
No ISBN number
Available via Internet Booksellers

Book Treasures and where to find them - part three Sedgeberrow Books, Pershore

Continuing with this series of recommendations, I present one of my favourite book stores; Sedgeberrow Books, Pershore, a secondhand and new book store that is situated in the pleasant market town of Pershore, Worcestershire.

The rather narrow frontage hides the fact that this shop stretches back some distance and contains what I believe to be the largest secondhand aviation and military book selection in the Midlands. The aviation section in particular is simply breathtaking with floor to ceiling shelves crammed full of unique and very hard to find aviation book titles in many different languages. The Military and Naval shelves are equally packed with a similar selection while to the front of the store there are shelves upon shelves of railway books. Please be aware that there are both secondhand and new publications intermixed and on display.

It is rare that I visit the shop and don't come away with some rare or unusual treasure. I give this very special shop a 5 Bookworms out of 5 and recommend Pershore as a great day out, particularly during The Pershore Plum Festival in August.

Sedgeberrow Books can be found at;
25 High Street
Pershore
Worcestershire
WR10 1AA

01386 751830

Tony

Book Treasures and where to find them - part two Oxfam Book Shops

In this second Bookworms feature I am highlighting not one but a group of Oxfam charity book shops - but in particular the Oxfam bookstore in Harbourne, Birmingham.

I have featured this shop in an earlier post but yesterday Sue and I drove up to Harbourne so I could drop off some spare model making books and magazines and browse the shelves to see if there was anything I wanted as a birthday present. I think this is one of the better run charity book stores, well stocked, efficiently run and very well laid out. On this occasion I purchased a boxed set of Dan Brown's Inferno CD talking book but there were other books that caught my attention, particularly military history and as featured in the earlier post a wide range of Role Playing Game guides and books.

The shop can be found on the High Street in Harbourne the full address is;

Oxfam Book Store

171 High Street

Harbourne

Birmingham

B17 9QE

I should also mention two other Oxfam stores that I regularly visit;

Oxfam Book Store

74 Hertford Street

Coventry

CV1 1LB

Which has a great selection of transport books and the widest selection of fantasy books and fantasy art books of any charity store I have ever visited.

Next we have the Oxfam Book Store in Cirencester where I found my White Dwarf issue No. 2.

Oxfam Book Store

7 W Market Place

Cirencester

GL7 2NH

Obviously there are more, but I find these are a few of the best. The stock is always changing and I would recommend popping in when ever you are in the area. Should you have any others that you would like to recommend. please include them in the comments section.

Tony

Hereford away-day

Sue and I had our first away-day of 2018 - a visit to Hereford where I was allowed to browse the charity book shops before going for a Thai meal. I was disappointed not to find anything that I wanted to purchase and with my birthday coming up next month Sue was searching for something to buy for me.

On the way back to Droitwich we stopped off in St Johns (a district of Worcester) and I saw a copy of the John Blanche and Ian Miller book Ratspike in the Daisychain charity book store (a book shop that has many second-hand bargain and is well worth a visit if you are in the area). At £30.00 it was a little too expensive (even for a birthday gift) but at least I got to look through the illustrations before making our way home after a great day out.

Hopefully there will be more successful away-days later in the year.

Tony

Daisychain Benevolent Fund Bookshop
37 - 39 St. Johns
Worcester
WR2 5AG

Book Treasures and where to find them - part one Cornell Books

Back in early 2017 I read a short magazine article called 'Where Bookworms browse for buried treasure' and ever since I have wanted to write a Blog entry detailing some of the second-hand book shops that I frequent. With nearly a year passed since I first set myself this target I think it is time I started.

Bookworms part one.

Cornell Books of Tewkesbury, Glos. is housed in this grand old building that was once The Wheatsheaf (or Ye Olde Wheatsheaf), 132 High Street, Tewkesbury, Gloucestershire GL20 5JR. It is a typical old school second-hand book store with racks of books from floor to ceiling, boxes of books awaiting sorting and even a bargain table where many books are discounted to just £1.00. The shop specialises in maps and the back room can be a treasure trove of old maps and guides. For me there are a couple of areas of interest.

Firstly there are shelves stacked with Railway books, a Military section and even a couple of old boxes filled with D&D magazines. Then we have the discount table at the front of the store (The Dining Room) as well as further discounted books on display out front (see image above) and in the stone lined alleyway to the side. I have picked up many magazines and book bargains, but as with all second-hand book stores it is the browsing that is the real pleasure.

I would give this shop a 4 Star (out of five) Bookworm rating, but advise anyone visiting the area to allow themselves some time to explore this treasure trove.

Finally there is a second-hand charity store just a few doors away called Bookworm which is also worth a visit.

For more information please see this link and this link.

Tony