Gallery Bookshop & Bookwinkle’s Children’s Books

A really great bookstore! Very nice selection and not over the top with non-​book items like so many bookstores these days. The staff recommendations are really excellent and different than my local store, which just made the experience even better! Highly recommend a stop here!

In a quiet little town on the seaside, there is a quintessential little bookstore that happens to have some really neat trinkets! There’s a big section of cards and stationary, but the shiny object that caught my eye was a button of the emoji cat with heart eyes, which is now proudly adorned on my backpack. This place is definitely worth a visit to look at the random little gifts and stationary!

I love this bookstore, good selection and the staff were very friendly

This is what a bookstore should be. Love live independent bookstores. I am willing to pay full price when the atmosphere is welcoming (with great views) and the staff helpful.
The Gallery Bookshop also has an excellent selection of greeting cards.

We love this bookstore! Great kids section and so very quaint! The staff is super helpful and knowledgeable as well. They always seem to have the right books for my kids!

One of my top 5 bookstores in California. I always love to come here when I visit and buying a bunch of things to read is now prt of the ritual. Great science fiction section, great magazines. Deep in many categories, including fiction and local stuff. Awesome cat. I love it that they had a sleepover for kids with a ya author. This place makes me glad to be alive

Such a great independent local bookshop!
I love coming to little gems like these. The staff is super friendly and they have a great selection of adult books and a huge children’s section. Prices weren’t bad and they also had a fun sale section.
They also have a great speaker/​artist series. Make sure to check out their calendar of events.
Also there is a cat as pictured, catsby as in the great catsby! So cute!

Very nice bookstore which is small but has enough variety in its selections to support a good hour long browse at least. Bought an annotated HP Lovecraft, a book on alchemy and a new mystery novel. They have an interesting selection of books on fairly tales and mythology and I wish I’d actually had more time to look before heading out of town. Only wish it was bigger but they can’t really help that … unless they can expand? Cool place.

I am so impressed with this place. This bookstore is not very big, but it contains a wonderfully curated stock of books and stationery. Everything I picked up, and I mean EVERYTHING, was interesting or cute in some way. This shop has real personality. Please do yourself a favor and stop here for a stroll — you’re sure to find something that interests you!

For my 100^th review (woohoo!) I want to give a big shout out for Bookwinkle’s! This is ONE GREAT bookstore! On the large size for an independent; yes, that’s INDEPENDENT bookstore — great seating in the large windows on the front with views over lovely bay in Mendocino. There’s an excellent card and gift selection, and lots and lots and lots of books to peruse. The staff was very helpful in searching for some items I’ve been looking for (have a book you want? engage your local independent bookseller in the search — they’ll enjoy it, you’ll support a local store!) The sidewalk along the street is a great people-​watching location, and the bookstore has a prime location. Enjoy, relax, learn, buy!

Awesome book store! Went there twice in less than 24 hours — everyone there loves books as much as I do. Really cool book-​themed t-​shirts too!

This bookstore has probably the best view I’ve ever seen from between bookshelves. You can see the beautiful water and vistas from the salt-​covered windows. Worth it to step in just for that.
Also, they had a great selection of books. Fun place to poke around in. I grabbed a couple of cute cards.
The staff was friendly and the prices reasonable.
The good: that. View.
The bad: don’t trip on the way out.

I love book store and the smell of paper and the sound of pages flipping. They have great collection of kids book and I highly recommend you visit Gallery Bookstore after lunch in downtown Mendocino. Mendocino has much lower sales tax than Bay Area :-)

One of the best book stores you will ever come across. The staff is helpful, if not a bit quirky :). The books and items are carefully selected, and there is something for everyone. You can also buy giftcards for people to use online!
This is a must-​see if you are walking around Mendocino Village.

a very lovely bookstore. clean, well lit, with a good selection, including a fairly beefy poetry section. lots of friendly staff selling books. it’s a short walk to the ocean. and in fact, you can see the ocean clearly as you walk out of the store. it faces the pacific!

Super staff and an incredible selection. This store is as much about deciding which items will need to wait on your wish list as it is about the many items you’ll buy. It’s clear they emphasize and honor offering unique, interesting, and entertaining books; both fiction and non-​fiction. There truly is something for everyone rather than a collection of best sellers available anywhere.
Gallery Bookshop reminds you of why there is nothing like a book in your hand and why browsing in a physical store is where magic takes place.

This bookstore was amazing and the best part of Mendocino. It was large and had a great selection. The cashier was dressed as Waldo. The store was full of people. It was great to visit such a fun independent bookstore.

The lovingly curated, locally-​tuned, atmospheric bookstore: please tell me that the Gallery Bookshop isn’t part of a soon-​to-​be-​extinct species!
This is what a small bookstore should be: a place to discover (and as their signs pointedly encourage, to buy!) the next fascinating or life-​changing title. It’s a much bigger bookstore than it initially appears to be, because unlike the bigger stores I’ve been in recently, they only shelve one copy of each title (except on the feature tables) so there is a remarkable variety of books to choose from.
Their table of notable recent non-​fiction was especially appealing. And I had an only-​in-​Northern-​California moment when I noticed they have a shelf specifically dedicated to marijuana gardening.
The collection of paperback fiction titles was more interesting as a reflection of what people want to read while at the beach (apparently, lots of historical novels and girls-​coming-​of-​age books) than inspiring in its feature selections or recommendations. The interesting novel suggestions were almost all on the recent release table, so if you’re up for buying your next fiction read in hardback, you’ll likely find something to tempt you.
The kids’ book room really is excellent, and a worthy bookstore in its own right (as the store’s name suggests). I particularly appreciated the small but excellent selection of kids’ books about California, where we found a couple of treasures to enrich our holiday.
I did feel a little sad that Gallery relies so much on the materials and recommendations of the independent booksellers’ association in order to select or highlight specific titles. I was much more interested in the hand-​written cards by the bookstore’s own employees: after all, it’s these purely local discoveries that make each independent bookstore worth patronizing in its own right (and not simply as a politically correct alternative to a megastore).
If you enjoy a bookstore browse as an enjoyable holiday activity, Gallery will hit the spot. And if you’re looking for your next holiday read, you’re sure to find something that appeals.

Oh boy do I love books and I love finding unique bookstores. As soon as we parked I spotted this gem and had to check it out.
It’s an independent shop but well stocked. You’ll find some rare and interesting books here and during our visit some man with a local pomegranate farm was visiting and sampling out varietals. My particular interest lately has been cookbooks and I found so many I liked however they were all priced high. I’m guilty of shopping at Amazon to avoid Publisher’s fees so I noted them down instead. Yes I know I should have at least bought one but who has the money these days.
This place is pretty neat though and has a great selection of books. Definitely check it out if you’re a bookworm.

The Beatles knew books…
«It’s a thousand pages, give or take a few,
I’ll be writing more in a week or two.
I can make it longer if you like the style,
I can change it round and I want to be a paperback writer,
Paperback writer…»
As you would expect in a hamlet like Mendocino, this is a charmer of a bookstore that has a large section called Bookwinkle’s devoted to the kiddies. It’s definitely worth a slow browse since your alternatives are eating at one of the surrounding tourist eateries, window shopping local paraphenalia, or hiking out to the headlands.
There is quite a large section devoted to local authors and books about Mendocino, and the salesclerk is especially knowledgable about local history. I can’t speak to the quality of the children’s section except to say that I have to admire an owner who likes Bullwinkle and Rocky enough to give them a lasting homage. You also have to admire a bookstore that has produced several published authors among its former staff.