Any Amount of Books
The Charing Cross Road Bookshop
Keeping the tradition of secondhand bookselling alive on Charing Cross Rd.
Continuing a tradition on Charing Cross Road
Charing Cross Road in London is a street that has long been associated with bookshops.
With new generations of collectors and readers continuing to enjoy the unique browsing experience a shop like ours provides, we don’t see ourselves as a relic of past times, but it’s still nice to look back and remember what came before us. There has been a book shop at 56 Charing Cross Road since the 1920s, if not earlier.
We are an independent family owned and run bookshop. We purchased the business in 2019 from the founder Nigel Burwood who set up the shop in the 1980s.
The first photo shows the bookshop at 56 Charing Cross Road in the 1920s, when the shop was owned by A.H Mayhew.
The second photo is of the shop as it is now. The entrance, lighting, signs and staff attire have changed a bit since since then, but like Mr Mayhew, we still put some of our books outside the shop each morning.
Bookseller?
Are you an experienced bookseller, particularly wishing to work with secondhand and rare books?
Interested in working with us on Charing Cross Road?
About the owners:
Gill McMullan:
Bookshop Director
Gill McMullan:
Bookshop Director
Gill has been the manager of Any Amount of Books since 1998, and Bookshop Director / owner since 2019.
Gill has been involved in bookselling throughout her working life, and most of that time has been with rare and secondhand books on Charing Cross Road.
Gill leads on all book content aspects of the shop: curation, book buying, valuations and pricing.
Michael Cubey:
Operations Director
Michael Cubey:
Operations Director
Michael makes sure that the systems and operational side of the shop run as smoothly as possible, from ensuring the shop is properly staffed, to building shelves, maintaining our databases to updating websites.
He is the first point of contact for any enquiries about selling us your books, working with us, and he takes an overview of the online sales side of the business.
and our booksellers:
We have a team of eight friendly and helpful booksellers working with us in the shop across the week, ensuring the shelves are well organised and ready for browsing.
"Everyone at this bookstore is so friendly and welcoming.” (google review)
"The staff are very friendly and happy to answer any questions/requests you have” (google review)
Professional trade affiliations:
We are members of these respected trade organisations for rare and secondhand book sellers in the UK and internationally:
The Antiquarian Booksellers Association
Founded in 1906, the ABA is the oldest rare books association in the world. It is the UK's leading trade organization for dealers in old and rare books, manuscripts, maps, print and ephemera.
Go to the ABA
The Provincial Booksellers Fairs Association
The Provincial Booksellers Fairs Association, or PBFA for short, is a bookselling association based in the UK dedicated to facilitating the trade of rare, out-of-print and antiquarian books through a series of fairs that take place across the country. It is the largest bookselling association in Europe.
Go to the PBFA
The International League of Antiquarian Booksellers
The League retains its original official languages, English and French, and consists of twenty-two national associations representing some thirty-seven countries and around 1700 individual bookselling firms.
Go to the ILAB
Interview with Bookshop Director Gillian McMullan
A video profile of our bookshop and interview with Gillian McMullan made in July 2020 (during Covid, hence the facemasks) by Lauren LaTulip of BlueStocking Books
Work with us:
We don't currently have any open vacancies.
When we have vacancies they will be listed here and promoted on our instagram, so please follow us to keep up to date.
If you have prior experience in bookselling, are looking to take your bookselling career in an new direction and want to explore the possibilities of working with us, you can send us your CV and and an email / cover letter setting out why you wish to work with us and what your previous experience is.
Please send any work related enquiries to Michael Cubey, Operations Director by email
Old Bookshops of Charing Cross Road:
More on the history of bookshops on Charing Cross Road :
An article on “The Bookshops of Old London” by ’The Gentle Author’ (read here.)
An interesting article on the history of Charing Cross Road itself (read here.)