Six Detroit area bookstores to visit this holiday season

Along a busy road in North Rosedale Park, on Detroit’s west side, Pip, the bookstore cat, is who greets shoppers as they come in to Pages Bookshop. Across town, at 27th Letter Books on Michigan Avenue, titles are on the ground floor but walk down a flight of stairs and there’s a game shop tucked underneath. And, in Hamtramck, a 1920s building on the corner of Joseph Campau and Caniff was once a bank, restaurants and bars. Now, past its stately facade, shoppers will find books and a space for clubs to meet inside at Book Suey.

All across Detroit, Hamtramck and Highland Park, indie bookstores are finding ways to open and stay open, even though books don’t bring in a lot of money. What does make it work, say shop owners, is connection: They are making space for the community to gather and, at the basic level, are able to have conversations with shoppers and suggest reads they might like, things book lovers can’t easily do online.

“You can feel the books. You can smell them,” said John K. King, owner of John K. King Books, home to four floors of used books in downtown Detroit. It has been in its current location since the 1980s.

New bookstores have cropped up nearby over the past few years to join King, in East English Village and southwest Detroit. And, next spring, another bookshop and community space, Howard Family Bookstore, is slated to open on Detroit’s west side. 

Detroiter Jerjuan Howard grew up about six blocks from the building he’s renovating on Puritan Avenue, between Stansbury Avenue and Lesure Street. His great grandparents moved into the neighborhood in 1939. Howard, 26, sees the upcoming bookstore as a “legacy project.” It’s a way to reinvest in his city, he said.

When Howard graduated from Western Michigan University, where he studied criminal justice, in 2020, many of his peers didn’t want to come back to Detroit, but Howard saw the city’s potential. 

“I want this to become the cool thing — to come back to our areas — especially with Detroit changing right before our eyes,” he said. 

Howard said he wants to increase literacy and offer a space where people can meet up. Alongside books, the building will have an outdoor mural and rooftop seating and sell coffee, tea and juices, he said. 

Howard Family Bookstore, when it opens, will join more than a dozen other independent bookstores in Detroit, according to the Detroit Economic Growth Corp. Hamtramck has three, the city’s Downtown Development Authority said, and Highland Park has one.

Books make great gifts, sellers say. Ahead of the holidays and as Small Business Saturday approaches, here are six bookstores in Detroit and Hamtramck to visit: 

Book Suey 

Sabrina Balgamwalla, one of the member owners of Hamtramck’s co-op bookstore, Book Suey, calls herself a biblio-matchmaker, helping customers make personalized selections.

Book Suey’s curated inventory offers local and regional poetry, graphic novels, fiction and zines, independently made publications.  The bookstore also hosts clubs — from flash fiction to textile mending — and events. Book Suey was built to be a bank but, over the years, has housed cafes, a tap room, and more recently, a Chinese takeout restaurant before becoming the bookstore. 

Book Suey has 14 active member owners, including artists, teachers and librarians who work together to run the shop, everything from marketing to inventory to working with customers, Baglamwalla said. Balgamwalla is the director of the asylum and immigration clinic at Wayne State’s Law School. 

“For many of us, it’s an expression of our love of reading and books, the transformative power of reading and the vibrant role that bookstores play in the fabric of our communities … We all have day jobs and other things that keep us busy,” Balgamwalla said. “None of us actually draw a paycheck from working here but we keep coming back because we love talking with people about books. We love hosting writers and community events and we love spending time together and so it’s like being part of a community within a community.” 

Current bestseller: Detroit in 50 Maps by Alex B. Hill

Address and hours: 10345 Joseph Campau Ave., Hamtramck; 6 p.m.-9 p.m., Wednesday, Thursday and Friday; 2 p.m.-6 p.m., Saturday and Sunday. (Book Suey will be closed on Small Business Saturday) 

27th Letter Books 

Located on Michigan Avenue in southwest Detroit, 27th Letter Books opened its doors in 2021. It’s built on the educational model of mirrors, windows and sliding glass doors — the idea that literature can offer a reflection of readers’ own experiences and a glimpse and opportunity to enter other worlds. 

The bookstore’s name comes from how the ampersand was once considered the 27th letter of the alphabet and draws inspiration from the “expansiveness found in ‘and’,” by promoting various forms of narrative art, said Erin Pineda, one of the worker owners of 27th Letter Books. 

“We focus on literary narratives through the bookstore but also we like to embrace and celebrate narratives in all forms. So, we have visual artists that we’ve hosted in the space. We’ve hosted film screenings. We do all sorts of readings and events,” Pineda said.

27th Letter Books carries adult and children books and merchandise, including notebooks and pens. Opal Grove Games, a board game store, is located in the lower level of the building. 

Current bestseller: Good Dress by Brittany Rogers

Address and hours: 3546 Michigan Ave., Detroit; 1 p.m.-8 p.m., Wednesday through Friday; 10 a.m.- 7 p.m., Saturday; 12 p.m.-5 p.m., Sunday. 27th Letter Books will also be at the downtown Detroit winter markets in Cadillac Square, until Jan. 5. Generally, the hours are 11 a.m. -8 p.m., Wednesday and Thursday; 11 a.m. -11 p.m., Friday and Saturday, and 11 a.m.-7 p.m., Sunday. The winter markets have holiday hours. For more information, go to www.deckedoutdetroit.com/detroit-markets. 

Next Chapter Books 

Next Chapter Books opened its store in September 2023, along Detroit’s East Warren Avenue corridor.

In its first year, the business has seen growth and is looking forward to more foot traffic as restaurants and other retailers open up, said Sarah Williams, the co-owner of Next Chapter Books. It’s been an upstream swim, she said, as the bookstore vies for people’s attention away from screens and technology. 

“We thrive by connecting with people who love to read or who love to shop small, shop local,” Williams said. 

Next Chapter Books is “a bookstore and more,” she said, offering new and used titles for all ages, alongside Detroit-branded hats and scarves, puzzles, family board games and locally made soaps and candles. Books make for great gifts, Williams said. 

“You’re giving that person time to spend with themselves. You’re giving that person time to use their imagination. There are hours and hours inside of a book for a person to enjoy. You’re giving them the chance to see themselves perhaps in a character. You’re giving them the chance to escape technology and really just find enjoyment in storytelling,” she said.

If there’s one book Willaims herself would gift someone right now, it’d be the nonfiction World of Wonders: In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments by Aimee Nezhukumatathil. 

Current bestseller: The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates

Address and hours: 16555 E. Warren Ave., Detroit; 11 a.m.-6 p.m., Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday; 11 a.m.-5 p.m., Friday; 10 a.m.-5 p.m., Saturday. On Nov. 29, Next Chapter will have a 20% off used book sale from 11 a.m.-6 p.m. On Small Business Saturday, Next Chapter Books will open at 10 a.m. and host four neighboring small businesses. Patrons can buy coffee, baked goods, leather goods and lunch. 

Pages Bookshop

Susan Murphy picks every book that goes onto the shelves of Pages Bookshop in Detroit’s historic North Rosedale Park neighborhood — ranging from fiction and history to political science and biographies.

“Find a bookstore that curates and brings in the kind of books that a customer is interested in — that makes all the difference in the world,” Murphy, the owner, said. 

Pages Bookshop opened in 2015 to raise the profile of books and reach families in the community. Pip, a 10-year-old black and white cat, has been living in the store for about eight years, greeting customers. 

Current bestseller: Lovely One by Ketanji Brown Jackson, Intermezzo by Sally Rooney and James by Percival Everett

Address and hours: 19560 Grand River Ave., Detroit; 11 a.m.-5 p.m., Tuesday through Saturday. 

John K. King Used & Rare Books

Cinder blocks hold up some shelves and overhead fluorescent lights guide readers through the sprawling labyrinth that is John K. King Books. 

In its downtown Detroit location, the store has four floors dedicated to a collection of books, from religion and mystery to cooking and history. The store offers a rare book collection, accessible online. King bought the once abandoned Advance Glove Factory in the early 1980s but has been in the book business since he was a teenager in 1965, according to the business’ website. 

“It’s a community based business. I mean, we cater mostly to people in the area, even though we do get guests in from Europe and everywhere,” King said. 

Current bestseller: King said “better sellers,” as opposed to bestsellers, include Michigan history books, especially those that are out of print. People also buy a lot of fiction. 

Detroit location address and hours: 901 W. Lafayette Blvd, Detroit; 12 p.m.-4 p.m., Monday; 9:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturday

Source Booksellers

Source Booksellers, located in midtown Detroit, primarily carries nonfiction titles, from history and culture to health and the arts. The business has been around for 35 years and in its current neighborhood for more than two decades, Janet Webster Jones, founder and owner of Source Booksellers, said.

A book seller serves the needs of customers, she said. It’s like being fitted at a clothing store or buying shoes after getting measured, she said. 

Current bestseller: That’s hard to say because it depends on the day, Webster Jones said. The idea of a bestseller also comes down to a transaction and the number of books sold, whereas independent bookstores are more of a relationship between buyer and seller, she said. Address and hours: 4240 Cass Ave. #105, Detroit; 11 a.m.- 5 p.m., Monday to Saturday, 11 a.m.- 4 p.m., Sunday.