LOS ANGELES, CA – While many people think bookstores are drying up, Katie Orphan, the manager at The Last Bookstore, sells between 1,200 to 1,500 books every day.

They sell new books and used books and specialize in well, everything.

“We’re in the LA writers section and this place is really important to us as an LA bookstore,” says Orphan as she fills the shelves with new books. “When people come to visit us from all over the world, this is a place where they can find local writers to read while they're here and take home with them. And we have everybody from Charles Bukowski and James Ellroy to Amy Bender and Maggie Nelson.”

The Last Bookstore was Orphan’s first job straight out of grad school. Born in Reno, Nevada, she moved to Los Angeles in 2009 and got her job with the owner back when he was selling books on eBay from his loft.

Orphan is employee number one and helped open their first location in a small 1,000 square foot storefront on Main Street. When they moved over to Spring Street, the store grew 10-fold. 

“The Annex… is the most recent addition to The Last Bookstore,” says Orphan. “It allows us to better display art books and it also allowed us to better display the rare and collectible books that we had, which hadn't really been on the floor previously due to the concerns of damage but now you can come in here and see cases full of signed books and rare out-of-print titles.’

Orphan opens a copy of William Burroughs’s Cities of the Red Night and flips to the opening page.

“And see his signature right there,” said Orphan.

The Last Bookstore goes beyond your standard brick and mortar. Every nook and cranny is filled with assemblage art and it has become a social media destination. Instagram didn’t exist when they installed the book tunnel made of old used books back in 2009, but now everybody wants a picture.

“One of my favorite things to hear about our store is that it feels magical and then it feels like a breath of calm air,” says Orphan. “We’re a place where people can come and talk about ideas and talk about books and sit and read for hours. It’s where people meet their friends, where they bring their family. We see a lot of first dates. It's a place where you can come and feel a little bit restored in the midst of LA.”

Whether you are looking for the next best seller or that obscure first edition, The Last Bookstore is worth a visit.