Blue Whale Books — Local services in Charlottesville

So, let me begin by saying that I absolutely adore used book stores. Upon entering, I immediately liked the way it was set up. However after perusing a bit I became nauseous and decided that since I was nowhere near anyone else I would lower my mask for a second to take a deep breath. The woman working there happened to be coming in from another room, across the store, not at all close to me. Rather than saying hello, she immediately scolded me in an extremely rude manner to put my mask on. I explained that I had it on the entire time and had just lowered it for a second to take a deep breath because I was nauseous. She was immediately dismissive to me. I put my books back that I had intended to purchase and decided to leave. I felt as though she were treating me like a child who needed to be corrected. I understand the importance of masks, and had anyone been anywhere close to me I would not have removed it. However, her behavior towards me was simply rude. I won’t...

The store was beautiful and had some really awesome chromo and lithographs. However, I felt very uncomfortable most of the time I was there because an employee was complaining about people coming in with bags from a nearby bookstore (I happened to be in that category), and that they never bought anything at their own store. One was even mimicking the way a customer was holding a bag from the other bookstore. I bought a beautiful and fairly priced chromolithograph there but I was extremely close to just walking out, and honestly, I wish I had. There was just a super weird vibe I got from the employees, as if they were judging me because I dared to shop at their competitor’s. If they intended for me to hear what they were saying, it’s messed up that they were trying to guilt someone into patronizing the store. If they didn’t, they really shouldn’t have been discussing it in front of customers. (FYI for the owners: I was there between...

Visited Blue Whale as part of the Charlottesville Book District Book Crawl. The store has an academic feel to it. Easily the most organized used bookstore I've ever been to. I'm a big history reader so it's annoying when the history section is all jumbled together. Not at Blue Whale! I was BLOWN AWAY with how organized it was. The history section was separated by country, and each country had a sub section for various periods of interest or historical events. It was a breeze shopping here and if I wasn't from out of town this would be my new favorite book...