Hares & Hyenas

Hares & Hyenas has a truly amazing range of books, magazines and DVDs for the queer reader. One of the best things about it is that their material doesn’t cover only queer topics, but their collated collection includes titles that will appeal regardless of queer content. That is to say, there is a huge range of camp and subcultural books alongside those that specifically cover queer topics. This makes it an awesome store to browse, I must say.
Their products include a range of books organised under usual categories (romance, scifi, mystery, etc), academic/​theory/​nonfiction, graphic novels, biography, short fiction, erotic, children’s, young adult.
The café area is in the front of the store (though the couch and mini stage at the back sometimes bears a coffee table, too), and the staff very friendly and laid back. Coffee is pretty good, and they stock bonsoy for soymilk drinkers.
Hares & Hyenas have recently (in the past year or so) gained a liquor license and serve cider, beer and wine at very reasonable prices during their evening events.
Events include various performances with queer themes and speakers, from poetry slams to spoken word to book launches. Bookshelves are moved around to put in a smallish amount of audience seating, and events are generally intimate and relaxed, with a very happy audience often cheerfully involving themselves in proceedings.

Thankfully there’s a comprehensive bookstore for the GLBT community, which also happens to be located in a convenient and relevant area. It also helps that the guys here are really friendly and helpful.

The gayest bookstore I’ve met. And DVD shop. And gift shop. And café. Yes, Hares & Hyenas does many things, and it does them all really gay.
I think it’s a bit of a shame that there’s always huge DNA magazine displays in the windows featuring bulked up bodies belonging on the other side of the river, because inside there’s a good range of decent books that cater to a wider gay market, from the ‘hipster gays’ to the macho and the, um, regular?
The girls get well represented too. I bought my friend a really cool imported 50s-​style calendar from Brooklyn from H&H for Christmas and she loved it — she lives in Brisbane and they don’t get nuthin like that up there.
Perhaps that’s what makes this place special: the fact that you know you’re shopping somewhere unique to Australia, you’re supporting a local queer business and you’re choosing from a range that’s not just for the Chapel St set.

Hares & Hyenas is a queer bookshop that sells all kinds of literature, art and photography books, coffee table books, magazines and DVD’s (it even has a children’s picture-​story book section).
The store maintains a pleasant, dignified look and feel to it, which is a bit of a feat for a place that sells titles such as ‘The Big Penis Book in 3D’. It also sells some really interesting texts on Queer Theory and Queer Philosophy, and popular queer culture magazine publications such as Butt Magazine.
There is also a small café section at the back (just a couple of couches really) that I’m yet to see anyone actually order coffee and sit at. It’s a little awkwardly placed and looks a bit too on display for my comfort, as it’s on a raised platform. But all in all, Hares & Hyenas is a cool place to drop by and flick through titles when you’re in the area, and has some perfect gift ideas for the gay who has it all.

Hares & Hyenas, known to some as «Melbourne’s Queer Bookshop» is such a great place to find some eccentric items for your aspiring collection.
You may think that you will not find something that interests you, lets be up front, it is a queer bookshop that does feature gay fiction and non-​fiction literature (which is great for the gay community) but H&H also stock great coffee table books, photography catalogues and sometimes even have art available from local designers.
H&H is a funky store that welcomes anyone into it’s doors, no matter your preference.
A friend and I went into the store a few weeks ago and i found a great book to read which indeed was gay themed (it’s so hard to find gay literature in you chain retailers!) and while I browsed, my friend found this amazing coffee table book that had amazing photography of celebrities in religious reenactments. I had never seen anything like it! Its constantly the talk of the table when im over for coffee.
Speaking of which, The lovely gentlemen at H&H make a great coffee, so if you’re not sure if that book is right for you, have a coffee, take a seat on the red plush arm-​chairs and read a chapter or two!