Independent Bookstore Day 2019

Harvard Book Store joins bookstores across the country for Independent Bookstore Day, a day for celebrating what makes indie bookstores special!

We'll be selling exclusively merchandise, showcasing special displays of bookseller-recommended books, collecting your love notes to bookstores, and releasing a brand new Harvard Book Store tote bag printed just in time for this year's Bookstore Day extravaganza.

Exclusive Merchandise

The following merchandise will be available in-store, in-person only, beginning at 9am on April 27th. Quantities are limited.

Fight Evil, Read Books Enamel Pin 
Show your reader pride and fight evil with this IBD-exclusive! $12.00 [image]

Women Talking Special Signed Edition
Exclusive edition signed by Miriam Toews with an Independent Bookstore Day–only cover $24.00 [image]

What to Eat with What You Read
A guide for book clubs and literary gatherings, featuring reading lists, recipes, and menu suggestions from 25 authors $16.99 [image]

Adjustment Day Special Signed Edition
This edition signed by Chuck Palahniuk with an exclusive new cover will pub three days before the official paperback release $15.95 [image]

Why Don't You Write My Eulogy Now So I Can Correct It? Special Signed Edition
The perfect Mother's Day gift: a collection of witty one-line advice Patricia Marx heard from her mother, accompanied by full-color illustrations by Roz Chast $20.00 [image]

The 2019 "Bad Citizen" Graffiti Stencil
This year's stencil features a timely quote from Susan Sontag: COURAGE IS AS CONTAGIOUS AS FEAR. $35.00 [image]

Literary Tea Towels
This year's flour sack tea towels feature two coffee-related literary quotes from Gertrude Stein and Louisa May Alcott. $22.00 [Stein] [Alcott]

Literary Luminary Pins
Show off your favorite authors with these laser-cut wooden pins of Margaret Atwood, James Baldwin, Neil Gaiman, and Toni Morrison. $5.00 each [Atwood] [Baldwin] [Gaiman] [Morrison]

On the Come Up Journal with bound-in author letter
In this full-color illustrated journal, start getting your own ideas down and find inspiration in a letter from Thomas and quotes from On the Come Up! $9.95 [image]

Maggie Stiefvater Signed Original Print
This signed print of original art by Maggie Stiefvater is based on the bestselling series The Raven Cycle. $5.99 [image]

Flora of Middle Earth postcard
A frame-worthy large postcard from The Flora of Middle Earth. Free [image]

The Girl Who Drank the Moon Exclusive Signed Edition
Special signed edition of the 2017 Newberry Award–winning middle-grade novel. This edition also includes a set of vinyl stickers. $9.95 [image]

Ada Twist and the Perilous Pants Exclusive Signed Edition
Signed by bestselling author Andrea Beaty and comes with a collectible embroidered iron-on patch of stellar scientist Ada Twist. $12.99 [image]

Wings of Fire Stories
This exclusive mini-book contains two short stories never before in print, and a letter from Tui T. Sutherland.  $7.99 [image]

Grandpa's Ghost Stories Sticker Sheets
Each package contains two sheets of stickers from James Flora’s beloved children’s classic Grandpa's Ghost Stories. Free [image]

Poems to Keep in Your Pocket
A hardcover mini-book of classic poems by Kipling, Wordsworth, Pope, Shakespeare, Dickinson, and more. Free [image]

Just what does Independent Bookstore Day celebrate?

Independent bookstores are not just stores, they’re community centers and local anchors run by passionate readers. They are entire universes of ideas that contain the possibility of real serendipity. They are lively performance spaces and quiet places where aimless perusal is a day well spent.

Indie bookstores, whether dusty and labyrinthine or clean and well-lighted, are not just stores, they are solutions. They hold the key to your love life, your career, and your passions. Walking the aisles of a good bookstore means stumbling upon a novel from India that expands your heart. It’s encountering an art book that changes the direction of your life. It’s the joy of having a perfect stranger steer you toward the perfect book.

In a world of tweets and algorithms and pageless digital downloads, bookstores are not a dying anachronism.  They are living, breathing organisms that continue to grow and expand. In fact, there are more of them this year than there were last year. And they are at your service.

“Consumers control the marketplace by deciding where to spend their money. If what a bookstore offers matters to you, then shop at a bookstore. If you feel that the experience of reading a book is valuable, then read the book. This is how we change the world: we grab hold of it. We change ourselves.” —Ann Patchett, bestselling author and co-owner of Parnassus Books