Leakey's Bookshop

Please excuse the marketing but we thought you ought to know that gift vouchers are for sale in the shop and on our website.

Only a few weeks until Act 2 of Wagner's magnificent opera Tristan und Isolde comes to Inverness!

Performed by critically-acclaimed chamber orchestra The Mahler Players, who will be joined by a cast of world-renowned soloists, such as would rarely be seen anywhere in the UK outside of London.

Don't miss what is sure to be a special and memorable concert! Saturday 3rd & Sunday 4th December, tickets range from £9 to £38 🎟 https://mahlerplayers.co.uk/wagner-tristan-und-isolde-3rd-4th-december-2022/

Supported by HRI Munro Architecture

There’s a very special opportunity coming up for people in the Highlands to hear the legendary Sir John Tomlinson sing King Marke in Tristan und Isolde Act 2 with the Mahler Players.

🌟 Soloist spotlight - Sir John Tomlinson CBE 🌟

We are delighted to be joined by legendary British bass Sir John Tomlinson for our concert performances of Tristan und Isolde at Inverness Cathedral and Strathpeffer Pavilion!

Sir John Tomlinson will be singing King Marke, a role he grew very familiar with through his regular appearances at the Bayreuth Festival, a pilgrimage for dedicated Wagnerians. He appeared there for 18 consecutive seasons, also taking on the Wagner roles of Wotan and Hagen in the Ring, Titurel and Gurnemanz in Parsifal and the title-role in Der fliegende Holländer. He has become one of the world’s greatest exponents of Wagnerian roles.

Don't miss these special performances on 3rd & 4th December. Visit our website to book tickets 🎟 https://mahlerplayers.co.uk/wagner-tristan-und-isolde-3rd-4th-december-2022/

Typically when customers ask for Agatha Christie we explain she’s so popular that we’re lucky to have even one or two of her books on the shelves. After this recent acquisition we’re looking forward to telling the next person who asks - yes, we have everything she ever published!

Inverness Library are inviting you to pledge to read six minutes (only!) tomorrow on Wednesday 11th May as part of Keep the Heid and Read 2022. Find out more here: https://keeptheheid.scot

Keep the Heid and Read! 📚
⭐️ 'READING MOMENT' PHOTO COMPETITION TIME ⭐️

Read 📖 for 6 minutes (at least) on 11th May 2022. You can enter your pledge to read on the Keep the Heid and Read website:
https://www.keeptheheid.scot/

📸🤳TAKE A PHOTO OF YOU READING AND/ OR WHAT YOU’RE READING ON THE 11th MAY 📖
Send the photo to your local library, in our case Inverness Library, our email is: [email protected]
(make sure you add a phone number to be contacted by as well, just in case we can't get hold of you by email)

Be creative with your photo! THERE ARE PRIZES INVOLVED 🤩 The judging criteria topics are calm, whacky, cool, funny, happy.

❗️IMPORTANT❗️Pictures should be taken on 11th May and emailed to your local library service by 5.00pm on 18th May 2022.

Prizes
Each Library Service will have an overall winner and a 2nd and 3rd prize. Prizes will consist of £50, £30, £20 book tokens. Prizes will be provided by SLIC (Scottish Library and Information Council)

Terms and Conditions
By emailing a photo the sender confirms
a) that it is your own work and
b) that SLIC and/or the library service can publish your photo and name on the Reading Moment website if your entry makes it into a library service winner.

SLIC and Library Services cannot be responsible for any entry that is not received.

Entries can be submitted from 11th May and closing date is 5.00pm on 18th May 2022. Winners will be emailed as soon as the library service is able and announced on the Reading Moment website once all winners notified.

Only one entry per person is permitted

Entries may be received from children however they must be submitted through a responsible adults email account.
For those without access to email, library staff can assist with making a submission
Winners will be expected to attend a small handover event to receive their book token
The Judges decision will be final

Eligibility and judging criteria

Eligibility
The competition is open to everyone living in Scotland. Entrants will select their local library service
Entries will be made by email account
The photograph may be of a book, book title, person or group of people and/or all of these items
Local libraries will assist people who have no access to email and wish to enter their photograph for the competition

Judging
Each Library Service will appoint a panel of 3 judges. In our case they will be:
Author Helen Forbes, Sam Leakey from Leakey's Bookshop in Church Street Inverness and Toby Ritty manager of Waterstones Inverness.
Judging will be fair and unbiased: judges will declare any potential conflict of interest e.g. family relationship with entrants
Judges will use the criteria (calm, whacky, cool, funny, happy) to determine 1st, 2nd and 3rd prizes
Winners will be invited to their local library to receive their prize from a judge.
Library services will arrange local media press releases for the winners.
Judges are unable to comment on individual entries.
Entries will be judged on the impact of the photograph and engagement with the theme.
The judges' decision is final, and no individual correspondence can be entered into.

More great music (Beethoven's 4th and 7th Symphonies) being brought to the Highlands this weekend by the Mahler Players, conducted by our own Tomas Leakey!

Tickets for the Inverness and Strathpeffer concerts are available to purchase here: https://www.tickettailor.com/events/mahlerplayers or take a look at their page for more information.

A wee bit of bookshop and local history for you this afternoon...

Back in 1983 when we were trading from a (very) small shop on Grant's Close, we republished "Reminiscences of Inverness, Its People and Places" by John Fraser.

Originally published in 1905, it gives a fascinating account of the town as it was in 1845. The book takes the form of a narrated walk through the city, stopping frequently to comment on its buildings, history and inhabitants.

We printed 1500 copies and, although these are now long-since sold out, from time to time they turn up amongst books people bring in to sell.

If you'd like to know more just send us a message or ask at the desk the next time you're in!

New in: this certainly isn’t your average children’s alphabet book…

Neil Gaiman and Gris Grimly’s subversive take on an abecedarian fairy tale is a wild ride. They claim it’s suitable for ages 5 and up but we’ll let you judge that!

Inscribed and signed by Gaiman on the title page. Enquiries welcome via DM. **SOLD**

Wishing you all a very happy Christmas! We'll be taking a few days off but plan to be open as usual apart from on the following days:

Sat, 25 - Mon 27 Dec - Closed
Sat, 1 Jan - Mon 3 Jan - Closed

A freak gust of wind blew in the lovely stained glass window over our entrance this morning. It's all been made safe now but we won't be looking our best for a while!

Luckily the small individual panes somehow all made it through unscathed so we should be able to put things back together just how they were!

Wow – we didn’t expect to sell out so quickly! A huge thank you to everyone who placed an order. We’ll get on with packing and posting all your totes tomorrow.

If you missed out this time, there will be more opportunities in the future!

A small announcement - we recently made a Leakey's tote bag and since it's proving so popular in the shop we decided to make it available to buy online via the link below!

https://leakeysbookshop.com

We're only making 50 available in this first batch - more will follow but if you would like one before Christmas it's best to be quick!

Reopening Monday 26th April.

The first railway timetable.

Published on 19th October 1839, "Bradshaw's Railway Time Tables, and Assistant to Railway Travelling" was the first of its kind. This initial book covered the Liverpool and Manchester Railway; a timetable for the London and Birmingham Railway followed shortly afterwards.

Interestingly, this was before the introduction of "standard time", so different parts of the country still used different times depending on their longitude. This was understandably problematic for timetabling trains and the railways were in fact the major reason for the adoption of standard time a few years later!

We're not particularly looking to sell this book at the moment but thought it might be of interest to our followers to see it.

🚂🚃🚃🚃

We're honoured that Tatler Hong Kong have featured us on this list!

10 Of The Most Beautiful Bookstores In The World From Venice to Japan to Argentina, put this list of the world's most beautiful bookstores on your bucket list for once international travel is back.

In the 19th century Walter Scott's novels were read all over Europe, influencing Tolstoy, Stendhal and Fontane among many others, as well as having a huge impact on the perception of Scotland (and the Highlands).

The Waverley Novels include famous titles - Waverley itself, Rob Roy, The Bride of Lammermoor, Ivanhoe - and there are many many more to enjoy.

We have several complete sets, including the classic 48-volume edition published by Robert Cadell between 1829 and 1833, in a half leather contemporary binding.

It's still not too late to start a lockdown reading project...

For any enquiries please send us a direct message.

Lockdown in Leakey's has been a time of rediscoveries. We've had the opportunity to go through storage areas which have remained untouched, in some cases, for decades. This was a recent find - The Novels of Jane Austen, complete in 12 volumes in the Wi******er Edition, published in 1911.

*Update: the books have now been sold.*

We don't know when we'll be able to reopen, but we've kept busy during lockdown. Crime, thriller, sci-fi, fantasy and popular fiction enthusiasts will be happy to hear these sections are now in alphabetical order. The days of observing customers gradually realise they're going to have to comb through the whole bay to find the author they're looking for are over for now. 🤭

Merry Christmas everyone! 🎅🎄☃️

We'll be closed now for a few weeks because of the dreaded Covid but will continue selling online. At present this is through AbeBooks (link in bio) but there will be further developments coming soon - watch this space.

If you have any requests for specific books you'd like just drop us a direct message and we'll be happy to check if we have them - we ship worldwide. We'll also keep selling and shipping our gift vouchers; again, if you'd like one just drop us a message.

Stay safe everyone and best wishes for a happier and healthier 2021. 🎊🎆

With the last posting date for Christmas looming don't forget we sell gift vouchers at Leakey's!
🌲🎅☃️

You can buy them in person in the shop or we can post them to you, or direct to the recipient. If you would like we can include a Christmas greeting of your choice on our compliments slip.
Just send us a direct message and we can arrange this for you!
🎁🤶🛷

George Eliot (the pen name of Mary Ann Evans) wrote seven great novels, the most famous of which is probably Middlemarch.

Which of these complete leather-bound sets of her works are your favourite? They're all the same edition, published c.1890, but different bindings.