The Portal Bookshop

Amazing!! Cannot emphasize how much quality representation and variety there is (history, YA, sci-fi, informative material, etc.)!! The coolest and most unique bookstore I ever been too!! It’s such a safe space and the cafe upstairs is so cute! It was so exciting and honestly emotional to see all of the representation- I feel so lucky that this exists here in York!!

Feels like an absolutely safe space. I asked for a book recommendation and the person behind the desk, gave me an excellent one called a Master of Djinn. I'm so glad bookshops like this exist, I felt like I was in heaven. So keen to come back to this gem. Inclusive in everywaybpossible and I hope more stores just like yours pop up

Wonderful community space with a fantastic book selection and lovely coffee shop upstairs. Lali is a fantastic curator who does brilliant recommendations

A fantastic LGBTQ+ indie bookshop in the heart of York. It has a wide variety of titles but it specialises in sci-fi/fantasy, YA and nonfiction. However, it stocks most contemporary queer themed titles, including translated fiction, eg I picked up a copy of Concerning My Daughter by Kim Hye-jin. It also has a lovely and welcoming cafe and a nice selection of queer themed souvenirs such as stickers and badges.

Lovely LGBT+ friendly book shop and cafe. Sells a great collection of books about the community, by the community as well as selling local LGBT artist's earrings, badges etc. The food in the cafe was great too. It made me emotional to visit as I have an LGBT safespace tattoo studio in Colchester Essex, and I am usually the person providing the safe space. Visiting somewhere that also has our community in mind is overwhelming. All staff are lovely and welcoming. Thank you!

What an incredibly special bookshop to have in York! This is the kind of bookshop I wish had existed when I was a teen. It is full to the brim with queer books, and even has pride flags inserted into the books so you can easily identify the representation included in them. I got some cute little stickers, and a lovely anthology of queer writing from here. I couldn't leave without buying something. There's so much to choose from, and they have lots of other pride-related stuff, and a noticeboard with events and some pay-it-forward schemes. Cannot recommend visiting highly enough if you are LGBTQ+ and in York.

A place I'll always recommend people to visit if in York, this bookshop is such a gem, a safe place for all queers and it's very inclusive.So you don't have to worry about being excluded for who you are or what labels you use!Plenty of books to choose from, truly is a huge selection and the staff will happily order a book for you if you haven't found the one you're looking for!The books are organised in typical sections, ranging from fiction to non-fiction which then further expands into their own genres, I absolutely love how many books there are about the queer community, for people wanting to know more about who we are to books made for younger children!The books are even further labelled with these cute bookmarks with queer flags to tag specific labels that are represented within the book!My favourite part of the bookshop is the middle, because there's all the hand crafted products, flags, stickers and more! I adore how much support this bookshop gives to small creators who wish to sell their queer crafts!TLDR; I love this place so much, unfortunately I've moved out of York as my studies have finished, but I'm so happy I found such a welcoming place, the staff are so kind and I've even had the chance to talk to other customers. A true safe place in York for us queers.Plus, there's dragons everywhere.

The loveliest small bookstore we went to in the city, packed with hard-to-find titles and with an amazing fantasy selection. Worth mentioning is the enthusiasm of the staff and the centre table filled with trinkets and zines. Highly recommend the upstairs cafe for a sweet treat.

Beautiful wee place with a nice selection of queer and LGBT books, friendly staff and fabulous frontage. Wish we had something like this near us.

Happened to accidentally stumble across this place whilst visiting York and it instantly felt like home. Such an great selection of books, badges, stickers and lots more. Lali is amazing and I’ve already finished (and loved) the books they recommended to me. Can’t wait to come back and visit again soon! :)