This Saturday’s a great excuse to patronize your favorite local bookstore — or adventure to one you’ve never been to — when Independent Book Store Day ushers in a host of goodies. For one thing, 28 Twin Cities stores are giving out Rain Taxi’s Twin Cities Independent Bookstore Passport 2024, illustrated by local artist Kevin Cannon. Gather 15 stamps and you can enter to win a Prize Pack, filled with gift cards and signed books. Get all 28 stamps and you can enter to win the grand prize: a $25 gift card to all 28 stores.
Besides that enticement, many of the stores are celebrating with their own unique programming. Birchbark Books and Native Arts, for instance, will have Fawkes Alley Coffee on hand and a performance by the Morris Dancers. Milkweed Books, meanwhile, will have treats and beverages, sales, and if you sign up to become a member, you can get a tote bag and a member discount. Big Hill Books puts all of its picture books at 40% off, with select home goods and non-book merchandise at 25% off.
Babycake’s Book Stack, the mobile children’s book store focused on languages, culture and diversity, will set up in the parking lot outside of Moon Palace Books, which in turn will have sales on audiobooks from libro.fm and free audiobook downloads of “The Hill We Climb” by Amanda Gorman.
libro.fm is an employee-owned social purpose corporation based on the west coast. A number of local bookstores— including Chapter One, Comma, a bookshop, Cream & Amber, Excelsior Bay Books, Wild Rumpus Books and Birchbark are teaming up with the company to hide “golden tickets” within their shelves. Find it to win 12 free audiobook credits, or sign up for a membership and get two bonus audiobooks.
Black Garnet Books hosts The Bookish Baker in its store, and will be holding a raffle, while Red Balloon Bookshop will present a local author game-show, arts activities, photo ops, and a dance party. Finnish author Antti Tuomainen, author of “The Beaver Theory” will visit Once Upon a Crime Bookstore for a reading, while Chapter One Books will feature readings by children’s book author Cori Doerrfeld and contemporary romance writer Megan Reinking.
Suffice to say it’s a book-lover’s heaven, but really it’s also just an opportunity to load up on your summer reading list and make sure your favorite local bookseller appreciates the love you have for it.
For info on Rain Taxi’s Independent Bookstore Passport 2024, check here for a list of participating stores. And here are the Minnesota stores doing the libro.fm giveaways.
Sheila Regan
Sheila Regan is a Twin Cities-based arts journalist. She writes MinnPost’s twice-weekly Artscape column. She can be reached at sregan@minnpost.com.