Book Riot Managing Editor Vanessa Diaz is a writer and former bookseller from San Diego, CA whose Spanish is even faster than her English. When not reading or writing, she enjoys dreaming up travel itineraries and drinking entirely too much tea. She is a regular co-host on the All the Books podcast who especially loves mysteries, gothic lit, mythology/folklore, and all things witchy. Vanessa can be found on Instagram at @BuenosDiazSD or taking pictures of pretty trees in Portland, OR, where she now resides.
Though I still sometimes feel like an imposter in “serious” book conversations, it’s also hard not to feel like I’ve lost some of the magic and awe I once felt for books and reading. This is a phenomenon that often occurs when you make your passion your profession, and it’s certainly been the case for me: there are days when I feel like I’ve book personed a little too close to the sun. The good news is I know what to do when I feel like I’ve lost that lovin’ feelin’: I head to my local independent bookstore.
I walk into an indie and I am healed. Is that a touch dramatic? Sure it is; have you met me? There really is something a little bit magical about spending time in an indie, even for a semi-jaded 40-year-old. The piles and piles of books, the smell of paper and possibility, the shelf talkers from excited book lovers telling me a book dehydrated them from crying or kept them up all night in terror. It’s those shelf talkers for staff picks that bring me out of my existential spiral. They allow me to forget I’m a professional book person and just let myself be swayed by good old-fashioned enthusiasm.
You of course don’t have to be a cranky reader like me to experience this magic. Indie bookstores are great like that: they have something for you whether you’re a seasoned consumer of books or someone newly getting into the game. I’m lucky enough to have several fantastic indies to choose from here in Portland, Oregon, so I’ve rounded up some staff picks from four of them today. If you’re participating in the 2025 Read Harder Challenge, each of these picks will satisfy Task #12: Read a staff pick from an indie bookstore (Preferably, from your local indie bookstore). These may not be local to you, but I won’t tell if you count them.
Powell’s Books
Ah, Powell’s, City of Books. It probably needs no introduction as the largest independent bookstore in the world. The flagship location spans four whole city blocks and is a must-see when in Portland, with two smaller locations in different parts of town. The picks I have from Powell’s are from their online staff picks and from shelf talkers at their Southeast Portland location on Hawthorne.
The Queer Revolt: Poetry for Revolution by Timothy Arliss OBrien
Nicholas Y. at Powell’s starts this recommendation by asking, “Need some queer anger?” and, well, yes! This pamphlet poetry collection is from the founder of The Poet Heroic, a podcast and small-press poetry publishing house. The format of this collection sounds so cool, including a mini-zine essay, poems in envelopes, and a pop-out waterfall poem. If you’ve been looking for some queer poetry to dive into for Pride, check this one out!
The Cozy Cosmic edited by Frances Lu Pai Ippolito and Mark Teppo
Jubel at the Hawthorne Powell’s has this to say about The Cozy Cosmic: “This is like one of those cozy mystery books for lovers of horror! Fun, bite-sized stories and poetry from 33 contributors. You won’t find this much fun along with the scares in any anthology in recent memory!” Cozy is really having a moment right now, and as a bit of a horror weenie, I’m very intrigued by a cozier approach to scares.
Book Riot Managing Editor Vanessa Diaz is a writer and former bookseller from San Diego, CA whose Spanish is even faster than her English. When not reading or writing, she enjoys dreaming up travel itineraries and drinking entirely too much tea. She is a regular co-host on the All the Books podcast who especially loves mysteries, gothic lit, mythology/folklore, and all things witchy. Vanessa can be found on Instagram at @BuenosDiazSD or taking pictures of pretty trees in Portland, OR, where she now resides.
Anoxia by Miguel Ángel Hernandez
Bookseller Oz really got me with this staff pick: “Remember the old practice of photographing the dead? What if those photographs could see more of the picture than we could alone? A grieving photographer gets commissioned for a death photography session and finds the veil to be thinner than she thought… This book was a creeping paranormal thrill and an aching picture of lingering grief.” Sold!
Broadway Books
Broadway Books is little gem offering books and more in Northeast Portland since 1992! These recommendations come courtesy of their online staff picks from Sally and Megan.
Fortune Favors the Dead: A Pentecost and Parker Mystery by Stephen Spotswood
Fortune Favors the Dead is the first in a historical mystery series set in the 1940s recommended by Sally and by yours truly. Will Parker is a circus runaway who’s picked up skills like lock-picking and knife-throwing in her life on the run, and the dapper, sophisticated Lillian Pentecost is New York’s most unorthodox private investigator. Lillian hires Will when Will saves her life on a job, and so begins a beautiful partnership. The case at hand in this first book is the locked-room mystery of a murdered matriarch at a swanky Halloween party. If you love historical mysteries, whip-smart lady sleuths, and stories with good ol’ boots-on-the-ground investigation (and related peril), you will love this entire series.
Shakespeare Was a Woman and Other Heresies: How Doubting the Bard Became the Biggest Taboo in Literature by Elizabeth Winkler
Based on this and the other selections Megan listed, maybe we should be friends? I love these kinds of history/culture deep dives, especially when the subject is ol’ Billy Shakes. This one investigates the long-running authorship question regarding the Bard, and that’s basically my personal brand of bookish catnip.
Grand Gesture Books
Grand Gesture Books is not only one of Portland’s newest bookstores, it’s our very first romance bookstore! It is Black queer woman-owned, and fun fact: the owner, Katherine Morgan, once managed the romance section at Powell’s.
I pulled these two books from Grand Gesture’s recent Instagram roundup of over 60 LGBTQIA+ books to read for Pride. Grand Gesture fulfills online orders through Bookshop.org, so consider grabbing each of these titles from their Bookshop page (or in person for all my Portland locals!).
An Island Princess Starts a Scandal by Adriana Herrera
An Island Princess Starts a Scandal is the second book in Herrera’s Las Leonas series. This installment features a sapphic pairing between Manuela, a Caribbean princess who will soon be forced to marry a man, and Cora, a business-savvy duchess with her eye on a piece of land Manuela swore she’d never sell. Manuela wants one last summer of freedom in Belle Epoque Paris before her marriage, so Cora makes her a deal: in exchange for that parcel of land, Cora will bring Manuela into her corner of Paris and give her a taste of the life she so craves. But after months of art by day and sexy sapphic fun times at night, neither one of them wants this arrangement to end.
All of the books in this historical romance series feature Afro-Latina women, a rare and refreshing example of diversity in the very white world of Regency romance. The conclusion to the series, A Tropical Rebel Gets the Duke, came out earlier this year, so you won’t have to wait to keep going!
One and Done by Frederick Smith
In this smart, sexy m/m romance set in San Francisco, Dr. Taylor James is a goal-driven and highly motivated university administrator working tirelessly to get his school accredited. Dustin McMillan is a successful project manager and consultant in town for a work assignment, a place full of memories from a painful past. A chance encounter leads to a passionate night they both know they should walk away from, no muss, no fuss. But can they leave it at (say it with me now!) one and done?
Always Here Bookstore
Always Here Bookstore is a queer and trans worker-owned bookstore that carries queer books for all ages and offers a third space for queer and trans people in service to the power of community. If you want more books in your life and also want to support the work they do, the shop offers monthly memberships that help sustain their mission.
These next two titles are from Always Here’s list of Staff Favorite Reads of 2024 on Bookshop.org. I’ve linked to the shop’s online store below, but you can also buy from their Bookshop page here.
Jasmine is Haunted by Mark Oshiro
A ghost has been haunting young Jasmine Garza ever since her Papi died, and what’s worse is her Mami won’t admit it even when there are clearly supernatural shenanigans afoot. Instead, Mami is moving them to a new apartment in a different part of town, and Jasmine decides this is her chance at a normal life. She makes two friends at her new middle school: Bea, whose parents are paranormal investigators, and Jorge, who wants to get over his fear of the nebulous beyond. Jorge and Bea not only believe Jasmine when she tells them about her ghosts: they’re excited! Together, the three set out to prove to everyone else that this haunting is real, and soon learn there are reasons Mami is so weird about ghosts.
The Chromatic Fantasy by H.A.
Jules is a trans man trapped in his life as a nun and makes a deal with the very devil his convent is supposed to guard. In exchange for lifelong possession, Jules gets a life do-over, escaping the convent and beginning a new life as a thief immune to all harm. He meets Casper, another trans man, and the pair quickly hit it off, running around town taking that “be gay, do crimes” mantra to heart. It’s all fun and games until they start to catch feelings, because the devil has something to say about that. All of this is told in graphic novel form resembling stained glass and illuminated manuscripts – gah!
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