London's best indie bookshop crowned at British Books Awards

published 12 March 2025

The British Book Awards has named nine of the best independent bookshops across the country, and one of them is in London.

The nine shops make up the shortlist for the Best Independent Bookshop award, which will be announced in May as part of The British Book Awards. But if you live in London, there’s clearly one to visit first.

Queen’s Park Books is the London entry, a charming little book seller just a couple of minutes’ walk from Queen’s Park tube station.

“London’s winner has been the heart and soul of its Queen’s Park community for more than 20 years,” says The Bookseller’s blurb on the shop.

The shop was opened by the Fergiani family in 1994, and holds more than 10,000 books.

To celebrate the win, the shop has setup a 15% off code, usable in-store and online. It’s QUEENSPARKBOOKS, but don’t hang about as we don’t know if it will work after today, March 12th.

Other London bookshops that almost made the shortlist list include Muswell Hill’s Children’s Bookshop, Covent Garden’s Goldsboro Books, King’s Cross’s Housmans, Fulham’s Nomad Books, Hackney’s Pages of Hackney and The Gilded Acorn in Holborn.

Here are the other shortlist contenders spread across the UK:

Maldon Books (East England)
Bridge Books (Ireland)
The Heath Bookshop (Midlands)
Simply Books (North England)
The Book Nook (Scotland)
Medina Bookship (South-East England)
Storysmith (South-West England)
Griffin Books (Wales)

The overall winner from this cadre will be announced on May 12th, when The British Book Awards's big do takes place. £5000 will go to the winning shop, and they’ll go on to compete for the overall Best Book Retailer of the Year award.

“What links these indies is they are a vanguard, bold tastemakers who support authors and create bestsellers, often long before those books are glimmers in chain or online bookshops’ eyes,” says The Bookseller’s (which operates the British Book Awards) managing editor Tom Tivnan.

10 Korean fiction books everyone should read

Andrew Williams has written about all sorts of stuff for more than a decade — from tech and fitness to entertainment and fashion. He has written for a stack of magazines and websites including Wired, TrustedReviews, TechRadar and Stuff, enjoys going to gigs and painting in his spare time. He's also suspiciously good at poker.