The novelist Emma Straub’s Cobble Hill shop has an excellent selection, a cozy vibe, and a wonderful lineup of live events. With its brightly colored mural, tongue-in-cheek genre categories, and handwritten recommendations, Books Are Magic will charm those for whom reading is a pastime, an aesthetic, and a life style. —Katy Waldman

This is the Platonic ideal of an independent neighborhood bookstore, a throwback to another time that invites browsing and discovery. You can almost feel the joy and the judgment, the taste and the personality of the people who choose what to stock, what to display, what to recommend. It’s amazing that the store has managed to hold on through decades of West Village gentrification and the influx of designer boutiques around it. —Deborah Treisman

This shop specializes in self-published zines, artists’ books, periodicals, anything involving text on paper. Whether you come across the sole copy of someone’s photocopied poems or the much-hyped début monograph of an up-and-coming painter, there’s truly something for everyone. Their mission remains the same as when they started in the mid-’70s: to kindle faith in creative expression, the weirder the better. —Hua Hsu

No matter what country I’m in, I love to go to bookstores that are from a different one, and Albertine, a marvellously curated two-story French bookstore situated in a Gilded Age mansion on Fifth Avenue, is a true gem. Attentive staff, comfy seating, a broad but legible selection of new and classic Francophone literature (in both French and English), and much Proustiana, in a hushed jewel-box-like space. —Elif Batuman

When I’m in the mood to explore, to be surprised, to find something I didn’t know I needed, I head to Unnameable Books. A cozy shop where waist-high stacks of new and used volumes teeter amid eclectically stocked shelves, Unnameable has a homey feeling, like browsing your smartest, coolest friend’s library. Their curation highlights independent publishers and boasts a particularly excellent poetry selection. Plus, there’s a sweet back-yard space where the shop hosts readings. —Hannah Aizenman

Desert Island is so beautifully designed that it doubles as a work of art. The Williamsburg storefront has purveyed comics, graphic novels, artists’ books, prints, and zines on consignment since 2008. There are so many analog treasures stuffed into this place; there is so much loving curation. It begs you to take your time. I adore Desert Island—its lightness and imagination, its glorious delight in drawings and words. —E. Tammy Kim

Opened in 2010, the style-conscious shop’s carefully curated selection evokes the retro chic of Andy Warhol and Studio 54. Chunky counterculture art books abound, alongside themed shelves on fashion, food and drink, and the gay underground. The books fight for space with branded Marc Jacobs tchotchkes. It’s tempting to scoff at the idea of books as cool-factor design objects, but I always leave wanting to own everything in the joint. —Michael Schulman

A friend introduced me to East Village Books about six months after I moved to East Village. Cozy, crumpled, it is not the most conspicuous of bookstores. The bookcases are almost always covered with a thin film of dust, and the shelves do not hide their age. Like the used books it holds, the shop feels like the kind of place you return to time and again not in spite of the stains but because of them. —Jiayang Fan

Inside, you’ll find silence, a variety of used fiction and nonfiction titles, and some shelves with novelty themes, including “Bad Titles,” “Unfortunate Author Photos,” and “Great Jackets.” There are a couple of couches sitting in the shop’s front section, as well as a whole bookcase dedicated to books about New York City, and two shelves dedicated to New Yorker magazine writers: Joseph Mitchell; Lillian Ross; A. J. Liebling; James Thurber, etc. —Eric Lach

There are all kinds of interesting and welcoming small and smallish bookstores in my neighborhood—from Book Culture on West 112th to the Strand’s uptown outpost and much in between—but I have to give props to, yes, Barnes & Noble on Broadway and 82nd: their size, which doesn’t come cheap, insures that they have plenty to offer; they are kind to everyone, kids especially; and the new redesign is elegant and welcoming. —David Remnick