Hay Castle bookshop in Hay-on-Wye, Wales, with other bookshops on the road behind.

A book town is a town or village with many used book or antiquarian bookstores. These stores, as well as literary festivals, attract bibliophile tourists. Some book towns are members of the International Organisation of Book Towns.^[1]

List of book towns

Scotland's largest secondhand bookshop, in Wigtown

Book towns with known dates of operation

• Kaifeng, China (17th century)^{[citation needed]}
• Jinbōchō, Japan (early 1880s)
• Hay-on-Wye, Wales (1961)
• Redu, Belgium (1984)
• Bécherel, France (1988)
• Montolieu, France (1989)
• Bredevoort, Netherlands (1993)
• Saint-Pierre-de-Clages, Switzerland (1993)
• Fontenoy-la-Joûte, France (1993)
• Mundal, Norway (1995)
• Wigtown, Scotland (1997)
• Zossen-Wünsdorf, Germany (1997)
• Damme, Belgium (1997)
• Dalmellington, Scotland (1997, though the last bookseller closed in 2005 and the project has folded.)^[2]
• Sysmä, Finland (4 July 1997)
• Mühlbeck-Friedersdorf, Germany (1997)
• Kampung Buku Langkawi, Malaysia (3 December 1997)
• Archer City, U.S. (1999)
• Montmorillon, France (2000)^[3]
• Southern Highlands, Australia (2000)
• Mellösa, Sweden (2001)^[4]
• Tvedestrand, Norway (2003)
• Sedbergh, England (2003)
• Blaenavon, Wales (28 June 2003,^[5] though the project had folded by March 2006.)^[6]
• Brownville, U.S. (2004)^[7]
• Hobart, U.S. – Book Village of the Catskills^[8] (2005)
• Atherstone, England (2005)
• Torup, Denmark (2006) ^[9]
• Richmond, South Africa (2006)
• Kampung Buku Melaka, Malaysia ^[10] (17 April 2007)
• Urueña, Spain (2007) ^[11]
• Bellprat, Spain (2008)^[12]
• Esquelbecq, France (2010) ^[13]
• Borrby, Sweden (17 July 2011)^[14]
• Clunes, Australia (2012)
• Montereggio, Mulazzo, Italy
• Óbidos, Portugal (2015)
• Featherston, New Zealand (2015)^[15]
• Cervera, Spain (2016)
• Montblanc, Spain (2017)
• Bhilar, India (2017)^[16]
• La Pobla de Segur, Spain (2018)^[17]
• L'Escala, Spain (2019)

Book towns with unknown dates of operation

• Sidney, Canada
• Gold Cities BookTown, Grass Valley, U.S.