Everything Had lots of great stuff. I will always recommend…read morestation 1 to everyone I know they are very friendly too...

I love this place. It may be small, but it is expertly curated. I stop by weekly to see what jazz…read morevinyl has come in and there's always something new. Joe, the owner is great to talk to and is always helpful. His grading on the vinyl is always spot on and the pricing is always fair.

I popped in Saturday March 11th for a look see. I had heard about them from a family member that…read morepasses through there every day. I generally go to The Record Exchange in Princeton, NJ or Double Decker Records in Allentown, PA for the selection and pricing. This store is tiny by those standards, but they had some titles that would normally be snatched up in a busier store. For that I was grateful. The owner is eager, but I fear that he might be stretching himself a bit thin carrying a couple of arcade machines, some stereo equipment, a listening station that takes up about 25% of his capacity, books, T-Shirts and cassettes. I wouldn't mess with half of that stuff if I were him. There were alot of records I could never get through because they were literally on the floor and my back doesn't care for that. The guitars and arcade machines have to go. Not enough space. He was having a dollar sale on several boxes of records, but many of them were too banged up to consider. I'd call it a day on 80% of them in his shoes. It's a decent space, but it's definitely out of the way for most folks. Belvidere is farm country, but they are on the main drag with a liquor store, a coffee shop, a CBD store and a bodega all within close proximity. Parking was decent. The prices were a little high, but I can forgive some of that due to his store size and relatively small selection. I found maybe 10 records I wanted at their price points and I got out of there for $120. Try doing that at those other stores I mentioned. One really cool thing is that the actual price tags peel right off the LP jackets without the need for Goo Gone or worrying about ripping the covers. Almost all of them were already in plastic sleeves which really classed up the joint. Keeps the fingerprints off the good ones. Most of actual vinyl I looked at was in fairly good shape. I found a smattering of $5-$7 records to buy so that was good. I would say there were another 5-7 records I would have bought if their prices were maybe $5 cheaper. A used record, unless it's very rare and or in extremely high demand, should never exceed $20 in my opinion. At that point you may as well buy a new one. I got the impression this guy was a rookie retailer, but he was extremely accommodating and even offered coffee to the folks shopping. Not a particularly good idea with the likelihood of one handed spillage high, but it spoke to his humanity. I was impressed. Their logo is very cool and I would have bought a jersey from them, but they didn't have my size. In summation, if you are around Central NJ, give this guy some love. He could use it. I'll definitely be back for sure.

My top-tier chum from the Kingdom of Sussex and I came here for Stop #2 of the 2nd Annual NJ…read moreBookstore Crawl (a 5-star extravaganza in and of itself) last Saturday morning. We hit up all three Sussex bookstores, and this was my chum's very clear favorite of the batch. I was a big fan too, even if ultimately it wasn't geared toward my literary demo. Our carefully planned itinerary suffered some issues with this one because Black Dog apparently moved fairly recently to more spacious accommodations further up 15. My chum frowned in confusion in a parking lot in the downtown Lafayette area for a few minutes before we got our bearings and retraced our steps north. I think that's on our Crawl Itinerary Expert but without context/knowledge of the move (which must have been at least KIND OF subtle since she lives within a few minutes of here and had no idea) an easy mistake to matter. No matter. Very easy to find once we had, you know, the actual address. And for the record, my chum said this was a HUGE upgrade over the prior location. All's well that ends well. I was REALLY hoping that someone took the name Black Dog Books literally, so it was an absolute delight to encounter a dark-tinted, wizened canine on the premises almost as soon as we walked in. Anya the chiweenie was a real trooper and an excellent addition to the festivities. I will say she's clearly an older pooch and didn't seem enormously thrilled by some of the younger human pups frantically taking selfies and whatnot (in my mild defense, I professionally took one tasteful photo and then gave her some space), but she handled it like a champ. I will say this for the record - every indie bookstore should have an accompanying canine chum. Apparently the Lambertville bookstore had a bloodhound, which is next level (massive FOMO but is what it is). But this was a good one. Thank you for your service, Anya. Unlike its literary counterpart in Branchville, Black Dog has much better lighting and much more space. It's no knock on them, but I just like the mild claustrophobia and overall personality that comes from having to get creative with the space you have and the massive amount of books to display. All due respect, this didn't feel as unique to me. I will say that out of the three bookstores we went to up here, Black Dog was the most enthusiastic about the Crawl, which is probably a huge reason my chum had the best experience here. They were giving away raffle prizes, naughtily had free wine(!) available before 11am and someone offering free fairy hair. I took her up on that generous offer but then belatedly realized it meant I had to stay still for more than five minutes. I just wasn't made to be an adult. My other slight issue with this bookstore (and again, this is me and I'm sure plenty of people have zero problem with it) is it just doesn't have the inventory that other places do - they leaned into presentation and more chairs and non-book products. And that's not necessarily a bad thing at all, but for me, it meant there was less overall space and options for the books I might potentially purchase. Also like a lot of bookstores in this day and age, a little too much chick lit for me; just not my thing. Very familiar with being a chick already; hashtag 1984 birth. The proprietors were VERY nice and accommodating. I didn't notice, but my chum said one of the employees was walking around giving customers recommendations based on their interests, which is a nice touch if welcome/slightly solicited. You felt good vibes throughout the store, which is important and should be a pre-requisite for any small business. (Truly love the Crawl for bringing stuff like this to my attention). Shameless judging books by their cover, I ended up purchasing Anthony Doerr's 2021 novel Cloud Cuckoo Land. Haven't gotten a chance to read it yet, but I selected this one because the design on the front was intriguing and it had stickers denoting it as a NY Times Notable Book and a National Book Award Finalist. We'll see if I agree with the powers that be. Pleasantly surprised at the abundant literary options up here in the Kingdom, and a solid stop on our adventures.

Great gem of a bookstore with the most helpful and engaged staff! Their selection of books and…read moregifts are top notch from a large used section, impressive new book features, classics, manga, sci-fi and a great romance section too plus the owner is a history PHD so her history section of the store is well done also. They also offer free coffee, tea and snacks which is quite a nice treat. Big plus is also the easy off street parking with a flat in handicap accessible entrance and bathroom. Highly recommend!

You'll need the right attitude for Flipside. The variety is immense (5 stars) which is why I'm…read moregoing back. But it feels like a hoarder's basement! The prices seemed high for playable records, I saw nothing under $20. All too many of the covers were badly worn or the records scratched, for these prices I think an album should be pretty outside & unscratched inside. Not everything is overpriced, there's also an enormous section of $1 albums, completely unsorted. The center rack is sorted by artist with sections for rock/pop, jazz and hard rock. But it's tough to get to that rack, all aisles are hopelessly cluttered with boxes of unsorted vinyl, packed so full that you cannot get past other people, stacked so tightly that you cannot reach the racks to flip thru, it's just unpleasant. If you're patient you may indeed find something you'll treasure. I bought a playable, non-collectible pressing of a 1985 rock album for $20, that was about the same as the fleabay price but here it was instant gratification and support of a local business. I was surprised this music business couldn't bother to play interesting tunes on a decent sound system, here it's just staticky radio through cheap speakers, meh.

Pretty cool store. I came across it by accident and I'm glad I did. It's pretty overwhelming at…read morefirst. Tons of stuff everywhere. Not easy to search through or get around but it's all about the dig. Pretty well organized as far as genre. I knocked a few things off my want list. Prices were pretty reasonable for the most part. I later found out there was a documentary about the store so I watched that and now I'm even more glad I stopped in. Seems like the store isn't doing great at the moment. I would hate to see it close so I will be making this a regular stop. If you're an old school collector, you'll enjoy it.

Great selection, VERY rare and valuable vinyl here. The owner is super knowledgeable and not pushy…read moreAT ALL. Highly recommended!!

Bruce is the man. Carries mostly VG+ rated records and anything less is clearly noted and priced…read moreaccordingly. Always open to negotiate and is always fair. You never have to worry when buying vinyl from Bruce.

I have been stopping at a board game shop in every town I have been visiting. This was the best one…read morenear Parsippany, NJ we were visiting for a convention. This was in Booton, NJ, on the way back to Syracuse, NY. The shop was a large room with tables for open gaming and tournaments, and the walls were lined with merchandise for sale--ranging from board games to trading cards. There was plenty of light, and the people playing Magic towards the back were very friendly and welcoming. The gentleman behind the counter was very nice! The coolest part is you can ask for the secret password, based on a quest posted outside the space down the road a little bit, and you can get into the Gaming Lounge addition. When you go in to the Gaming Lounge, it feels like you're stepping into some kind of hobbit hole, and the further back you go, the more space there is to play games with friends. There is even a fireplace! The space is super cozy and features a huge wall of games to play with friends. If I lived anywhere near by, I would go to this shop all the time! The cards they sold were even reasonably priced, so I also love that.

I felt welcomed, the place is clean, and for a Saturday afternoon during COVID, the place was…read morehopping! But I've definitely seen places with a bigger selection and more game knowledge. The shopkeeper listened intently while I told him what kind of gaming experience I was looking for. But it didn't go a lot farther than that. I wanted something narratively heavy, with less rule complexity and overhead than Lord of the Rings: Journeying through Middle Earth. He didn't really have an answer for me, and I felt I gave him a lot to work off of. To give you an idea how small this place is - the pictures in this review represent half the games in the store. There's one extra bookshelf that I didn't catch and there's a display case in front with CCG cards. Shopping experience aside, you can tell this place has a good community. There were four tables occupied in the back around 4 PM on a Saturday - maybe representing 10 people - and there's a big communal shelf you can draw from if you want to play in house. I'd come back to play and make new friends.

Love all the books and gifts they have. Great for shopping when you're looking for someone hard to…read morebuy for. Since they're in the short hills mall, value is better elsewhere but the assortment of items is great. They have unique gifts and lots of books. Fun to browse.

Just stopped at Jam Comics on Route 15 South in Lake Hopatcong NJ in the Dunkin Donuts parking lot…read moreearlier this afternoon...nice little store, quiet, the owner Jon is a very nice guy, the store's been open only a few months, has a couple of dollar comics boxes, back issues are reasonably priced, he buys sells and trades comics, good little store for building up your back issues and not killing your bank account....DEFINITELY worth visiting!