I’d like to tell you a little story, but a true story about a book paradise I found. Groß Breesen is a little village right in the middle of Mecklenburg. Once my sister and I found it with our satnav, we could enjoy the landscape OR – and that’s why we’re actually here for – trade books in a cozy little hotel. Everyone I know, including myself, has some expendable books at home. Books that I have never read, no longer generally read, and probably would never read again.
When we went into the foyer, we could see what is so special about it: Everywhere we looked, there were books – not only on shelves but also in boxes, on tables or just lying on the floor. Comfortable arm chairs invited themselves to us in some corners and some guests were quietly reading. I decidedquickly that I was going to like it here.
The woman at the counter offered us to come and see the Bücherscheune (which could be translated as book barn – and really, it is a barn full of books). Because I am really interested in how many books one village could possibly have, I followed her with my sister. She went out of the hotel and straight to a little house which really looked like a barn. She opened the old lock on the door and switched on the light. Inside, it was dusty and fusty, and everywhere I looked, I could see books. Books plugged shelves, and books stacked in boxes. Around 300,000 books there, the woman told us. I trawled through the rows of thousands and thousands of books, sometimes pullingone out to read it, but often the books were so old that some nearly crumble away. The books are definitively not (organised into categories ar sorted by authors and sometimes it’s even hard to negotiate the rows.
“You can leave your books anywhere you want to”, the woman told us, so we did so.
After spending nearly an hour searching exploring the books, I found some that I really wanted to take home with me (an old edition of Sherlock and one by Erich Kästner). After I exchanged the books, we went back to the hotel. There, with my sister, I ate a really good plum cake, drank some coffee and enjoyed the stunning view.
This book hotel is definitely worth a visit!
