Blackwell

The fantastic Blackwell's bookshop!!! If you are a book-lover, how could you resist? The luxury of browsing through the new books leisurely is every booklover's favourite pastime. And with the new Good Bean Coffee shop in some of Blackwell's stores, you could even sit down, have a coffee, and read. You could literally spend a whole afternoon there. One of the great things about Blackwells is that it is BIG. There are so many books that you are simply spoilt for choice. The book finding service is great too, and if the book you want is not in stock, the bookshop could order it for you for FREE. I have used this service many a time, and each time it ...  Read the complete review

Blackwells seem to have found their niche on many University campuses, at Exeter University where I am based we have the misfortune to have one too! I say misfortune, as regardless of the fact that they appear to want to serve student needs they are notoriously bad at doing that! In my local bookstore they have the smallest range of books that I have ever seen, in fact the whole business section comprises of one book case and considering the size of the business school this is rather suprising. Instead they offer a "supposedly" comprehensive ordering service, 4 weeks on I am still waiting, I expect that they may be on to the revised edition of the text by the ...  Read the complete review

In response to some critisism of Blackwell's, thought I should point out that the Oxford branch could be an exception to the rule. Whilst it is true that they don't always have every book needed, I have always been able to get hold of any book I've required within a week through them, which I don't think is that bad. As for the staff, they are generally as pleasent as you could expect. Of course if you go in to a small privatly owned bookshop, then the owner is much more likely to have a deep passion in books, and thus by somewhat more keen to help out, but for a large chain like Blackwell's, I think they do quite well. At least they try to ...  Read the complete review

Blackwells is one of the worst bookshops it has ever been my misfortune to use. They staff are surly and un-cooperative. Their prices are average, but they are appauling for academic books. They normally have about half the required number of reccomended text books for each course, and don`t have any stock of maybe a third of the reccomended books (at leas the Liverpool branch does). then when you order a copy of a book it can easily take 3-4 weeks or more to arrive, which is to long. By the time you have the book you are half way through the course, and then do you really want to spend £20 or more on a book you`ll only use for say another 8 weeks? If you ...  Read the complete review