Bookstores and Libraries in Bangalore: Where to Buy, Borrow and Read

“There is a 1915 reading room in Cubbon Park that anybody can walk into, and on most afternoons there are empty chairs. That single fact says something about how this city uses what it has.”

• On Bengaluru's most underused building

Bengaluru is a good city for books and an unusual one. Church Street has the browsing bookshops, Avenue Road has the second hand and textbook trade going back over a century, the lending library tradition still functions, and the State Central Library occupies one of the most beautiful buildings in the city and charges nothing.

There is also a genuine literary culture here: book launches, reading groups, poetry nights, literature festivals and a small press scene, almost all of it announced on social media rather than in any listing, which is the recurring pattern for culture in this city.

This guide covers where to buy new and second hand, the library options and what membership costs, where to actually sit and read, and how to find the reading and writing community. Our interesting streets guide covers Avenue Road and Church Street in their wider context.

Where Do I Buy Books in Bangalore?

Church Street for browsing new books, Avenue Road for second hand and textbooks, and independent shops in Indiranagar, Jayanagar, Koramangala and Malleshwaram.

Church Street is the browsing destination: cobbled, walkable, central, with bookshops alongside cafes and bars and MG Road Metro at one end. It is the only street in Bengaluru where you can spend an afternoon moving between books and coffee on foot, which makes it the default answer for a slow weekday afternoon.

Avenue Road is the other tradition entirely and considerably older. The book and printing trade has been there for over a century, in shops sometimes the width of a doorway, dealing in second hand books, textbooks, academic titles and Kannada language publishing. Prices run roughly fifty to three hundred rupees, the stock is unsorted in a way that rewards patience, and going at eight in the morning is the right move. Our streets guide covers the whole area.

“Avenue Road rewards patience and Church Street rewards an afternoon. They are two completely different pleasures and most people only know about one of them.”

• On the city's two book traditions

What Library Options Are There?

• The State Central Library, Cubbon Park. In the 1915 Seshadri Iyer Memorial Hall. The reading room is open to anybody, free, quiet and genuinely beautiful, and it is the most underused public space in Bengaluru.
• State run city and ward libraries. A network across the city with nominal membership fees, serving neighbourhoods directly. Variable in stock and condition, and extremely cheap.
• Private lending libraries. Roughly Rs 200 to 800 a month, frequently with home delivery and a curated popular fiction and children's collection. A genuinely functioning tradition here.
• Children's libraries. Several dedicated children's libraries and reading programmes operate in the city, and they are among the better things available to a family for very little money.
• Institutional and club libraries. The older clubs and institutions hold serious collections, generally requiring membership. Worth knowing about if you already belong to one.
• University and research libraries. Access is usually restricted to students and staff, though some permit reference visits with prior permission for specific research.
• Bookshop reading spaces. Several independent bookshops here have seating and cafes and are relaxed about people reading. Buy something occasionally and you are welcome indefinitely.

Where Can I Actually Sit and Read?

The State Central Library reading room, an independent bookshop with a cafe, or a quiet cafe in the residential neighbourhoods. The library is free and the best of the three.

The reading room in Cubbon Park deserves the repetition: high ceilings, long tables, natural light, silence, a 1915 red brick and stone building, no ticket, no membership, no queue. People have been reading there for a century. If you have lived in Bengaluru and never been inside, that is worth correcting this week.

For paid options, the residential neighbourhoods beat the strips: a cafe in Jayanagar, Malleshwaram, Sadashivanagar or Frazer Town at ten in the morning will be quiet and comfortable, whereas Indiranagar and Koramangala get busy and loud. Our cafes for working guide covers how to judge a cafe for sitting at length, and the etiquette is the same whether you are reading or working.

How Do I Find the Reading Community?

Through bookshop events, reading groups and the literature festival calendar, almost all of which are announced on shop and venue social accounts rather than anywhere central.

Bengaluru has an active and welcoming reading culture: book launches at independent shops, recurring book clubs, poetry and spoken word nights, writing groups and a small press scene. Most of it is free or cheaply ticketed, and most of it is discovered by following six or eight bookshop and venue accounts, which is the same method our events and galleries guides recommend for everything cultural in this city.

For somebody new to the city, a book club is one of the better social entry points available, for the reason our young professionals guide sets out: it repeats weekly or monthly with the same people, which is what actually builds friendships. It also happens to be one of the few social formats that works equally well for people who find large gatherings draining.

Same city, new stories, always.

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