The Book Escape

What a gem! Great second-​hand book finds and friendly staff.

For a books store, this place is amazing. No big expensive coffee drinks being sold with food. It is JUST a place for true BOOK PURISTS. LOTS of old books, lots of books that will have you saying «I remember reading that as a kid!!». The difference here is when you pick up the book, it IS the original print, or perhaps a year or two later.
Charming sitting area to read. The reading area is small and intimate. You must check this place out if you are in town. I THOUGHT I was done, and then the very nice owner said there is another building @____@. REALLY? lol
SO I walked across a cute little courtyard, and poof, a whole other building. THIS building is filled with paintings, wood carvings, handmade unique jewelry… and more books. There is the cute wooden carved bear near a fireplace, resting on and around classic National Geographic’s. Very informed staff. I asked about several hard to find books, and he knew just where to look It is obvious this bottom floor is some ones passion, and it would not shock me if the owner lived upstairs. So very quirky and unique… I tried to capture the ambience in pictures.

Great used bookstore. A huge selection. Definitely a good place to stop in. Books range from $ 2 to $ 15.

Absolutely my favorite store in Baltimore.
Book are almost always in good or great condition, recent and vintage prints. I’ve bought paper backs for $ 3-​$ 6 and hardcovers for $ 5-​$ 10. Prices are great and there’s a huge selection. Staff is always very friendly and it’s always pretty quiet there which is nice. I couldn’t recommend this store more!

I’m a huge fan of used bookstores, but they tend to be disorganized and poorly stocked. The Book Escape is actually quite nice. Firstly, they have each book catalogued into a computerized database so you don’t have to rely on an employee’s memory as to whether or not a certain book or author is in stock. Second, the shelves are labeled with genres and subgenres, and then further organized into categories and alphabetized. If you don’t want to search through the shelves, there’s a section for popular books and classics right at the entrance.
The prices are pretty decent as well. Not as low as some bookstores I’ve been to, especially the hardcovers, but not bad. I picked up a copy of Room by Emma Donoghue for $ 4 and Dreamcatcher by Stephen King for $ 3 (both paperback).
Above all else, I love the quirky atmosphere. It’s filled with antique prints and pins and has cute handmade signs on the shelves. You know it’s a quality bookstore because the owner (?) keeps his dog behind the counter.

The only thing I don’t like about this place is the location. It is hard to get to with strange parking. But I can say I like the selection of non-​fiction and have gotten some of my favorite books from here. I appreciate the email updates on sales and they have good sidewalk sales from time to time with great deals.

A large selection of books all at great prices! Definitely will make another visit after I finish the 8 books I got today! XD

A must visit if you are a book lover or just looking for a book to read while you are in Baltimore. The store is close to inner harbor and they have a wide variety of books from arts, philosophy, suspense, mystery, how tos, playbills, and more! The prices are reasonable and based on the condition of the book and if it’s newer or a collectable. I picked up two recently published books for 9 dollars where I could probably get for 30 dollars paying full retail.

I had an amazing time there today!
Great selection of books !
Book selling begins in October!. My phone died while I was there but pics in the near future !
I plan on going back very very often! I’m literally in love w this place!
So much to choose from (new and used) !

This is definitely one of my favorite Fed Hill hangouts. I can (and have) lost myself for hours in their huge selection of books. Sometimes I’ll take my to-​read list and start collecting arm-​fulls of books, and other times I’ll just wander around and find great reads all the same.
Pretty reasonable prices and it’s always a treat to get caught up in a chat with the owner.

A must visit if you’re looking for used books. The place is jammed with a wide variety of subjects and very organized. We found good buys on lots of interesting books. They also have some higher priced special editions as well.
They have several chairs around to relax and read as well.
We were there on a late Sunday afternoon and only a few people there.
We’ll be back when we’re back in town.

Adorable shop! Stopped here while I was in town for a wedding. Loved finding 5 – 10 books to take home (not kidding) at a very reasonable price. Much more spacious than it looks and has comfy little seating areas if you want to stick around a while.

The bookshop had a lot of tempting books, but I was selling today.
I sold 20 books and got $ 25. I guess that’s an ok price. If you want store credit, you get around three times as much money. For me, store credit would be akin to giving an alcoholic a few cans of beer and hoping for the best — and I don’t need another hundred books.
Thank God they had a cat there.

Book Escape is my favorite independent bookstore in Baltimore. Excellently curated selection, labyrinthine, old bookshop feel, owner who looks like Lumbergh from «Office Space»…
This is an essential place to browse in peace, support a dying breed of shop, and score a few used books for $ 3 – 7. A great place to come and search for books for family and friends, especially around the holidays.
Also, purchasing their «Book Pass» is a great way to save money. $ 50 store credit with 30% off in stock new books and 20% off used books.

Unexceptional used bookstore with a collection that is uninspiring for the snobby reader and adequate for the typical one.
Prices are fair and the website’s search function is an uncommon and very useful option that might save a wasted trip but probably won’t get you to browse and find something unexpected.
Appears to be an intuitively bad business decision which should work in the reader’s favour but what do I know? I’m just a reader and couldn’t run a successful lemonade stand.

One of my favorites. They have a great selection of used books and even some new ones! So you can go in and get the recent book that everyone is talking about or spend hours perusing through their selections of good quality, well priced used books!
They have all the books separated by section so it’s easy to find what you’re looking for. I was looking for Christian books and they had a while section.
Also, I live in the area so it is a good place to sell your old books. They will either give you cash or they’ll give you more in store credit. I always go for the store credit since I’m there so much. It’s my one-​stop shop for books in Fed Hill :)

I came in here after 3 tries to sell some (less than desirable) books. The first place took all the «good» ones, the next two didn’t want anything that was left.
The book escape was my last ditch effort… I was in the neighborhood on an unrelated errand, and figured it was worth a shot.
These were weird books. A Czech-​English dictionary. A «drawing for architects» text in Spanish. Plus a few that are just «out of date» (3^rd store’s words)…books from Oprah’s book list 10 years ago.
I didn’t get any cash. But! I did get some store credit, and found some neat stuff. And considering that no one else would even take them, at least I got them out of my house and my car!
My jaw nearly hit the floor when I realized I was speaking with the owner, and that there was no question that he’d take them, just for how much.
Next time (if there is a next time), I bring them all here, first. Then they get the «good» stuff along with the «funky.» One trip. Easy peasy.

I love the book escape! Can’t believe I’ve never reviewed it before, as I’ve been known to lose hours in this place…
It’s the perfect blend of used bookstore-​ish traits (cramped, random, creaky, piles of books everywhere) and goal-​oriented book shopping (pretty well organized, good staff pics, best sellers in the front.) The staff is helpful when you address them (otherwise they just leave you alone forever, which is nice). They do have a computer (another reviewer said they don’t– you can look up a book and it will tell you if its in the store or in their basement storage. I’ve not been able to find a used book twice, only to have a staff person retrieve it from the basement in less than 5 minutes. They simply can’t fit everything upstairs in this lil place.
They also give fair prices for books you sell back to them. Even better, they’ll save your credit in the computer for you so you don’t have to hold on to it. You can check the status of your credit online at home, or just trust them (they do a good job.)
The cute little signs that play off the old row house the shop is in amuse me: «Beware of the Closet!» (Horror books in there) «Tunnel of Love» (Romance books kept in the fireplace.) Cute little touches.
Support the Book Escape rather than nearby Barnes and Noble– if they don’t have it– they will order whatever you want.

This is a great local book store. Quirky, friendly, and has some great deals on used books to boot! Only reason I am not giving them five stars is they close a little earlier than I would like during the week. Plus, they should have a cat roaming the bookstore.

All the charm of a used book store, with less of the concern about unkempt piles of books falling on your head. A great selection, good prices, and the books are findable!