Paperback owls

Photo by Zou Zhongpin/China Daily

Although the first 24-hour bookstore on the mainland appeared in southern China's Shenzhen in 2006, Sanlian Taofen Bookstore has managed to attract more headlines in the national media.

More 24/7 bookstores are now opening in Zhejiang, Shandong, Shaanxi, Shanxi and Guangdong provinces. In addition to books, these shops also sell plants, handicrafts, films, music and clothes. They hold book-launch events and invite authors, scholars and artists to speak.

The Yue Lan Shu Bookstore in Hangzhou is not only the first 24-hour bookstore in Zhejiang province but also distinguishes itself in other ways. It offers readers thousands of books that can be easily accessed and provides a tranquil view of the lush greenery through its floor-to-ceiling windows.

Additionally, it brings in professional chefs to cook at its cafe.

"There are always customers at night since we started to keep the store open for 24 hours," says store manager Xu Yue. "We are happy that readers also put down their suggestions on our customer logs."

The bookstore aims to be a place to satisfy people's quest for knowledge and encourage them to be curious about reading, particularly when most Chinese fiddle with their smartphones instead of reading paper books, while waiting for public transport, according to Shen Yi, co-founder of the bookstore in Hangzhou.

Zhang, the manager of the Sanlian bookstore in Beijing, says that it is a good thing to have round-the-clock bookstores because Chinese people still love reading paper books.