Students find food for thought at bookstore cafes

To the harried student, the enveloping smell of coffee and a cozy atmosphere can often be a much-needed respite from Butler. Fortunately, Manhattan offers plenty of unique bookstore alternatives with some solid eats to top it off.

Hue-Man Bookstore & Café, located at 2319 Frederick Douglass Blvd., proudly displays Harlem’s roots. Boasting an entire section on the history of Manhattan, and of Harlem in particular, the store screams “New York” and showcases African-American culture. While novels by Toni Morrison and Zora Neale Hurston are to be expected, the array of African-American children’s books, religious literature, and even ancient African history books comes as a pleasant surprise.

Hue-Man represents a wholesome cultural experience, as R&B music plays in the background and posters of contemporary black musicians decorate the walls, along with traditional African masks. The café area contains a sizable bar with both iced and hot drinks. Pastries and wraps are also available, although books and magazines from the store area are not permitted in the café.

Straight down from Hue-Man on the D line, Housing Works Bookstore Cafe is located just around the corner from the Broadway-Lafayette Street subway station at 126 Crosby St. Though it appears narrow and unassuming from the outside, the store is in fact two stories high, with winding staircases leading up to the balcony stacks. Featuring standard categories of books including the arts, world literature, travel, and classic titles, the sheer vastness of the selection makes it hard to believe that 100 percent of the proceeds goes to Housing Works, Inc. The organization works to promote AIDS testing and to provide care for people living with HIV/AIDS—in fact, all staff members are Housing Works volunteers.

The rear section of the store contains the café, which has a fairly wide food selection. The large number of tables and free iced coffee refills make this an ideal study spot, and the “community wall” covered with HIV/AIDS-related resources serves as a reminder of the bookstore’s larger purpose. Bargain-hunters may also be interested in the several large carts displaying $1 books, and the entire wall containing uncorrected proofs for just $3.

Just a short walk from Housing Works is Bluestockings, which calls itself “a bookstore, fair trade café, and activist center.” At first glance, the cramped room piled to the ceiling with books seems like any other indie nook, but a closer look at the titles and their organization reveals the store to be far from typical. T-shirts line the front wall with slogans such as “ I like it when you… read to me baby,” and the front table features Mexican political literature right next to gluten-free cookbooks.

Conventional bookstores place new releases on their center table, but Bluestockings proudly displays (on the other side of the gluten-free cookbooks) an impressive variety of sexual guidebooks. Even more eye-catching is the daring selection of political pamphlets and books with feminist and LGBT themes. There is also a broad selection of magazines and literary journals. The café is confined to the area behind the register, where coffee and organic teas are sold. Tables are limited in number, but long plushy benches line the windows to maximize study space.

These three literary hubs provide a taste of New York’s best bookstore cafés. While some of the locations may seem a bit off the beaten urban path, the respite they provide makes the subway ride well worth it, if only for the inspiration and motivation afforded by a little change of scenery.