This bookstore aims to restore Hyderabad’s vibrant reading scene

Aiming to revive the culture back, Hyderabad-based Shilpa Sudhakar founded an independent bookstore named 'Luna' in the city

Hyderabad: The idea of books and bookstores has been impacted over the years. Aiming to revive the culture back, Hyderabad-based Shilpa Sudhakar founded an independent bookstore named ‘Luna’ in the city.

An avid reader, Shilpa says that the thought of starting a bookstore was never on the cards. “I browsed and bought books at all the old haunts. When the city’s bookstores started to close, I felt the absence of such spaces,” she says.

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“We wanted to bring back that experience, and hence Luna,” she adds. Belonging to a family of voracious readers, the 43-year-old previously spent 17 years in the investment and finance space.

In June last year, she decided to start a bookstore. “I did not want to lead my life in a city where there is a dearth of bookstores. My husband remarked that I should do something about it and that led me to start Luna,” Shilpa recalls.

Started around October last year along with her sister Sapna Sudhakar, the bookstore aims to highlight underrated writers. Curated by Shilpa herself, the bookstore is stacked with shelves of books and a plethora of genres within ample space to explore it.

“Luna is a space dedicated to books alone, we were experimenting on whether a pure bookstore would work and happily discovered it did. In the process, we also met many ardent readers from the city,” Shilpa says, expressing her desire for the return of the city’s vibrant reading scene.