Best Cities in America for Book Lovers

What makes for the best cities is certainly in the eye of the beholder. What city offers the best steaks? The best veggie burger? The best schools and dog grooming parlors? We’re betting, though, that a lot of our readers will be interested in the top cities for book lovers. Livability looks at that one, too:

We may live in the age of the e-book, but we're taking things back to basics. Before Borders and Barnes and Noble, before the coming of the Kindle, there was the independent bookstore.

As they point out, though, one can not live by books alone.

That’s why the cities we picked offer a great quality of life, plenty of entertainment and awesome outdoor activities. After all, there's nothing worse than reading an inspiring novel and having nothing to do after closing the cover.

Livability’s final assessments consider not only the number of indies in the area, but also the authors who live and have lived there as well as a focus on one special local store.

So what do they come up with? Daedalus Books in Charlottesville, Virgina; Prairie Lights in Iowa City, Iowa; Hicklebee's Children's Bookstore in San Jose, California; Powell's City of Books in Portland, Oregon and six others. Not particularly scientific? Maybe. But certainly a lot of fun.

Would love to see lists like this compiled for other countries. Any takes?