Welcome
Heron Books took flight earlier this year from our original home in The Clifton Arcade.
Find us in our new heronry at 7a Regent Street, Clifton, Bristol, BS8 4HW.
Christmas: We are open every day as usual except for Christmas Day and Boxing Day. We’ll also open later on Saturday 13 and 20 December. Probably until about 7pm. Probably with a mug of mulled wine in hand too. For collection from the shop, we recommend ordering by 20 December. For delivery, we recommend ordering by 17 December. Any questions, do send us an email or give us a call.
The shop stocks a range of fiction, non-fiction and children’s books, 4000 of them in a carefully planned cosy space. Heron Books offers personal recommendations and the creation of bespoke gift lists for special occasions, and runs events, including a monthly poetry series and several book groups. Where not already on the shelves, books can be ordered for home delivery by Royal Mail and, if you live really nearby, staff can exceptionally cycle over to deliver them personally.
The shop is a welcoming space. We like nothing more than talking about books; if the book in question features a heron, all the better.
Opening Hours
Monday-Saturday: 9.30am-5.30pm
Sunday: 11am-4pm
7a Regent Street
Clifton, Bristol
BS8 4HW
0117 401 1717
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News
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Everything is Lists and Hats – 12 December 2025
We resisted for as long as possible. There remain plenty of days and nights of 2025 on which books will be read. Nevertheless, here they are: The Book of the Year (up to 11 December) Lists. Yes, there are many books we have read this year which aren’t on there and should be. Yes, we…
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Boundless Books – 5 December 2025
Recently I have been asked for recommendations for a book to read whilst on the treadmill (who is doing this?), a book for someone who doesn’t like to think (should my suggestion perpetuate or change this?) and something for someone who is ‘really into poison’ (there is a wealth of literature out there but perhaps…
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Is Penelope Lively? – 28 November 2025
I am writing this shortly before the Heron Books annual party. All being well I shall press send shortly after the Heron Books annual party. Chances that I am still dressed as a character from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland? High. Chances that all labels ordering, ‘Drink me’ were obeyed? I’d risk a monkey on it.…
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How To Tell A Story – 21 November 2025
Last week letters, this week diaries. Will our curiosity ever be satisfied? I hope not. Reading Helen Garner’s diaries, How to End a Story is utterly addictive. ‘Oh, just one more,’ I think, abandoning my bookmark. ‘Another won’t hurt,’ I say to the clock warning that it’s time to open the shop. ‘Actually, it makes…
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Herons Go Postal – 14 November 2025
This week’s newsletter is not intended as a paean to the postman on whom I definitely do not have a crush. That blush you observe as a bookseller sees him making his majestic way down Regent Street is a quite normal reaction to the excitement of receiving letters, publishers’ catalogues and advance copies of books.…
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Other Bookshops Are Available – 7 November 2025
Perhaps I ought to be careful recommending a book about a morose, cynical bookseller whose rage at customers conducting lengthy (and dull) phone conversations in his vicinity and asking for books of which he does not approve threatens to boil over into such a frenzy that he may actually throw The Power of Now at…