This is part four of the Living in Sweden series. Here are the others for you to catch up on:
Find a Job in Sweden
Going for a Swedish Interview
Find an Apartment in Sweden
English books are expensive in Sweden. There’s also a limited collection of them at most bookstores so after a while you go crazy. But I discovered there are quite a few places to buy books in English in Stockholm at reasonable prices.
Secondhand stores – I’m normally not a fan of secondhand bookstores, but these stores have a hidden treasure of engelska bok, english books. Prices range from 10kr to 50kr and the biggest, most expensive ones at 100kr. Basically $14 tops for a book, great deal!
Small bookshops – Akademibokhandeln is very expensive for English books unless they have a sale or a special discount. I tend to avoid the store usually. I also avoid The English Bookstore in Medborgaplatsen for the same reason. It still leaves a few places to buy bookstores in Stockholm that are new book at cheap prices.
HEDENGRENS BOKHANDEL – Located in Sturegallerian, the mall in Ostermalm. If you go downstairs in the bookstore, there’s a small section up front with special discounted books. Plus there’s a section towards the back of the store with a large selection of English books in different categories. Some of them are pricey but there are always cheap books to be found.
Rönells Antikvariat – Birger Jarlsgatan 32 – Mostly antique and older books in Swedish and other Nordic languages, there’s a couple shelves of good english books for 10kr or 20kr. I usually see romance or crime thrillers, but it’s worth a peak especially if you are at the bookstore above.
A friend of mine recommended http://www.adlibris.com. Altough I haven’t used this shop yet, they seem to have a big catalogue. And the shipping should be free.
Akademibokhandeln isn’t too bad. I bought the most recent Dan Brown novel (The Lost Secret) hardcover for 229:- ($35.37 CAD). At Chapters/Indigo back home, the book is listed at $36.95 (though its 45% off at Chapters right now :/) + taxes.
So it isn’t TOO bad, from what I’ve seen. But that was a huge novel, so it may be against the rule.
Thanks Lukas, I haven’t tried them out yet.
Hardcover for 229:- isn’t so bad. It’s when softcover books hit past 300:- do i start getting annoyed, lol. Let us know if you find any others!
You can also check in the University bookstore, you can find cheap books in english there.
@Jesica – I’ve never heard of a cheap University bookstore. That sounds like an oxymoron.
Well I was studying in Linköping for a while and the bookstore had good options not only in english, also french and spanish, they also used to sell second hand books by less than 100 kr
HEY THERE!
I`m going to be in Sweden in almost a year! Tere are a lot of things I`d like to know about! I`m a little afraid!
I will be here often…
You should give Akademibokhandeln a 2nd chance. The one at Mäster Samuelsgatan (in Stockholm city) got a large section of English softcover books in the section named Pocketavdelningen. Pocketavdelningen is like a separate store in connection to the larger store. An English softcover book cost about 100 kr, and you can get 4 for the price of 3.
Arian! Don’t worry, stop by blog and read the folks on the blogroll, you will learn a lot and be fine.
Anonymous Swede – Thank you for that information! The smaller ones I visited, did not have such a great selection. There is one in Goteborg that did a 4 for 3 sales, maybe it is still going on.
Akademibokhandeln on Mäster Samuelsgatan is the largest bookstore in Scandinavia, so they will hopefully have a larger selection of English books as well.