There’s a brilliant John Waters’ quote you may have seen on a tote bag, magnet, or newsfeed:

“If you go home with somebody, and they don’t have books, don’t fuck ’em.”

In NYC, it’s easy to find out this information without ever having to step foot in a book-hater hovel. Simply make sure your third date includes a stop at the New York institution, one of the few places that has managed to hold on in the era of Amazon, The Strand Book Store.

Arranging this “spontaneous” stop is easy! The Strand is located at Broadway and 12th, right by Union Square. This area has a ton of great restaurants and bars. Simply DON’T book a reservation at a popular place. When you arrive and are told there’s a 30 minute wait, pretend to be disappointed. Then exclaim, “It’s ok! I know exactly what we can do while we wait! Let’s go to the Strand!”

 

Arrive at the Strand and you can explore inside and out. Wander the 18 miles of books  gathering information like Harriet the Spy. Does your date look lost, like he’s never been here before? RED FLAG! Does he head toward the delicious selection of cookbooks? SCORE!

When at the Strand, you should have more conversation topics than the last Harry Potter book had extraneous chapters.

 

What’s the last book you read? What was your favorite as a kid? Have you read any or the Staff Picks in this awesome curated  display? When was the last time you read Catcher in the Rye? Have you ever been in a book club? Want to buy a book and read it together?

 

If you freeze and need a conversation topic, you can simply look at the outward walls of the store this summer as they under go construction.

I remember going on a date with this guy in the Union Square area and I delightfully suggested taking a spin around the Strand. The minute we stepped in the store he looked uncomfortable. “I’m not much of a reader,” he told me. I could have know right then and there we’d never work out!

But my current boyfriend? We stopped at the Strand during our first month of dating. We wandered around Cooking talking about food, drifted through Drama where I told him about all my favorite plays, and ended up in Poetry where we chose 2 collections that we promised to exchange upon finishing.

Just saying, from my personal experience, the Strand Test works!

Do you love book stores? Have you ever taken a date to the Strand? Would you? And let’s all answer the Strand walls question: What book inspires you? I gotta say Tina Feye’s Bossypants!