New Haven Register (New Haven, CT)
Editors’ Pick: Magazine names state’s best used bookstores
This year’s BEST OF CONNECTICUT picks are positively popping with Nutmeg State goodness, all picked by you and our distinguished panel of Connecticut experts. From food and drink, to activities and entertainment, to shopping and services, it’s a celebration of the great things our state has to offer.
Below are our Editors’ Picks for the best in used bookstores, followed by the winners and runners-up from our Readers’ Choice survey.
For more award-winning Connecticut food and dining, see our 2022 Best Restaurants award winners, and our picks for the 25 Best New Restaurants in 2022.
Editors’ Pick Pourings & Passages
103 Main St., Danielson
As towns go, one might describe Danielson as small. Which is why spotting Passages & Pourings on the corner of Main Street is a surprise. It’s not small, whatsoever. Follow its history and it’s apparent — this used bookstore had no intentions of remaining tiny, even from the very start.
A customer wandering through Pourings & Passages spots proprietor Jim Weigel and goes into what can only be described as fangirl mode. “My dad used to call me up whenever the annual book sale was happening,” she gushes. She’s referring to Pourings & Passages’ beginnings in 1986, when it was part of an annual fundraiser for St. James School. The collection of books, which drew crowds, eventually outgrew St. James.
A nonprofit bookstore was established, with the tomes moving into a store above an insurance company in 2015. “I was a school librarian 37 years,” Weigel says. “I’d always wanted to be a bookstore proprietor.” The 1,000square-foot space played into his vision. “A bookstore should have coffee,” he declares. “There was a corner kitchen, so we brought in a table and chairs and had a little cafe.”
Five years later, that building was sold, and another opportunity presented itself. The Trinket Shop, for 50 years Danielson’s go-to spot for evening gowns and tuxedos, was available to rent. Just as goldfish grow to accommodate their bowls, the books, 20,000-plus of them, spread out nicely between Pourings & Passages’ five new rooms and 8,000 square feet. “It just keeps rambling,” Weigel says of the space they took over in April 2021. And as for St. James School, it has a perpetual fundraiser through the store.
Pourings & Passages’ allvolunteer staff sells 1,000plus books per week. Also on tap are DVDs, games, CDs and knickknacks. New batches of books, rigorously vetted for condition by Weigel, find residency on the store shelves. Ongoing events keep things lively, including book signings with local authors (Becky Adams and Josh Tate were recent guests), poetry readings and a children’s story hour.
People visit from as far afield as Boston, Rhode Island and Massachusetts. Waiting to welcome them: Weigel and a cup of coffee. — Bekah Wright
pouringsandpassages.com • 860-774-1712
Readers’ Choice
The Book Barn
Niantic
bookbarnniantic.com
Readers’ Choice: Runner-Up
Pourings and Passages
Killingly
pouringsandpassages.com
Readers’ Choice: Runner-Up
Whitlock’s Book Barn
Bethany
whitlocksbookbarn.com