Mr B's Emporiumof Reading Delights

Nic and Juliette Bottomley left the law in 2006 to open Mr B's Emporium of Reading Delights on John Street in Bath, and built one of the most admired independent bookshops in the country — twice named UK Independent Bookshop of the Year. It runs across several floors, hand-sells with real conviction, and invented the 'reading spa', where a bookseller matches you to a stack over tea. It is a shop organised entirely around the pleasure of reading and the judgement of people who do it for a living. In a city of chains and tourists, Mr B's is the bookshop Bath deserves. Go in without a list and leave with a bag.