In the Coffee and a Book Chick house, we prefer to participate in Small Business Saturday. The idea of competing with a gazillion other buyers at the larger franchise stores is just stressful. Instead, contributing to the growth in the economy by supporting locally-owned businesses is much more helpful, not to mention extremely fun! And as you can imagine, independent bookstores are a treat to shop at. To help you with your shopping efforts this season, I've compiled a snapshot of those I've been lucky enough to visit this year. Add your favorite independent bookstore in the comments to give them some word-of-mouth marketing! If you aren't familiar with one in your area, click the button on the sidebar to help navigate to one in your town.

The Book Mark

Neptune Beach, Florida

For six years, I lived in the North Florida area by Neptune Beach, outside of Jacksonville and was so thankful that The Book Mark was located in such a cute part of town right by the beach. Swing by and support Rona's shop! She and her team are extremely helpful and they always have phenomenal authors stopping by. On a recent trip to Florida, I purchased The Malice of Fortune and Shantaram (which I'm currently reading and the only thing I can share is WOW! Shantaram is amazing).

Prince Books
Norfolk, Virginia

Moving bak to the Virginia Beach area, I head into Norfolk when I can and shop at Prince Books. It's also attached to a great cafe.

Porter Square Books

Cambridge, Massachusetts

On a recent trip to Boston and Maine, my husband and I swung by Porter Square Books. In the blogging world, you all may be familiar with this wonderful bookstore because The Boston Bibliophile is one of their booksellers. She was on an envy-inducing vacation to beautiful Italy at the time we stopped in, but we still happily browsed and purchased a couple books to support the store. I bought Live by Night by Dennis Lehane (it's autographed!) and I can't wait to dive in.

Ninth Street Book Shop

Wilmington, Delaware

This was a recent and fantastic find! When I was in Delaware recently for business, I had an opportunity to swing by the Ninth Street Book Shop in Wilmington on the way home to Virginia. Meeting the owner Gemma was a delight; a nicer and more helpful person you will not find, I assure you. If ever in the Wilmington area, do make certain you swing by her store and support Gemma and Jack's new location. I bought Tana French's The Likeness which I can't wait to get into, considering how much I enjoyed her debut In the Woods.

I need motivation to "re-visit" the city I used to live in years ago.

Although I have lived in the Virginia Beach/Norfolk area (Hampton Roads) before, being away for almost six years made me look at it differently. I'm proud of this little spot in Southeast Virginia, and I wanted to reintroduce myself to all the fun and local sites.

So "A Walk About Town," a new feature here at Coffee and a Book Chick, was born. For December, I'd like to highlight each week a place I've visited. After the month, I'll evaluate and decide if it will continue. Since I also travel frequently for work, I might also want to do a quick recap of something about the city that I enjoyed. No boundaries here, you know?

And then I thought...about extending it out to anyone who may want to participate. So I've attached a Linky at the bottom of this post.

The Plan

1. For the month of December 2011, every Thursday (or Friday), I'll post about a place I've visited in the past week.
2. Whether it's a book store, a restaurant, a movie theater, or a new shop I've been meaning to visit, I want to document it.
3. The blog button in the sidebar is open for anyone who wants to participate.
4. Those who do participate, add your post to the Linky below.
5. You don't need to add a ton of pictures, or any at all. Do what you like.
6. You don't need to join every week. Whenever you like. Just post your link to my weekly post.

The picture above is actually of a street in Norfolk in front of Prince Books, an independent bookstore I'm featuring today.

So that's the plan. I hope you'll join me as I'd love to take a peek into your local town, or a city you've visited!

Prince Books, an Independent Bookstore in Norfolk, Virginia
Imagine my delight when I learned that Norfolk, Virginia had an independent bookstore. With its warm and inviting atmosphere, a lunchtime café and a great bookstore staff, I knew it was going to be *the* place to go to for author events.

Prince Books opened in 1982 and focuses on poetry, history, biography, boating, travel, and also features a children's section (along with YA titles). The books I bought were The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood, The Complete Fairy Tales by George MacDonald, and The Redbreast by Jo Nesbø. I cannot wait to attend the events they'll be hosting in 2012!

Look at all the Penguins...

The shopfront at night when we left

It's been a busy few weeks but the Thanksgiving holiday certainly brings it all back to a reset. There was a ton of food, and quite a ton of reading. I've been enjoying 11/22/63 by Stephen King and am ready to move onto the third installment of George R.R. Martin's The Song of Ice and Fire series with A Storm of Swords. I'm in a reading peak of happiness.

I also visited Prince Books in Norfolk, Virginia yesterday, and I cannot wait to post on this independent bookstore. While I wish we had an indie bookstore in Virginia Beach, I'm completely willing to drive the twenty-five minutes to this incredible shop. I can't wait to share with you! Question: How long do you have to drive to go to your favorite indie bookstore?

Also... as a reminder, the Wolf Hall Readalong commences today for reading (or before). Do. Not. Be. Scared. Let's read!

The first time to post on Parts 1 & 2 will be next Sunday, December 4th. I'm excited to co-host this with Nicole from Linus's Blanket, who has a wonderful blog, and a blogger I've been chatting with on Twitter about our similar reading interests. Check out her site, it's fantastic!

I'm also nervous about reading this book because I've heard a lot about it. Good and bad, but mostly all reviews stating that complete focus must be given when reading. Any distraction will result in leaving you lost and confused. Not that I drift a lot when I read a book, but we all know it can happen, and I don't want to miss a thing.

We have fourteen participants with blogs joining the readalong (including me and Nicole), and a few more without blogs who will also be joining either through posting comments on the blog, or on our Facebook sites (Coffee and a Book Chick or on Linus's Blanket). This is pretty exciting and I can't wait to see everyone's contributions. As I've been tweeting out there, "The more the merrier," or... "There is safety in numbers!"

I did receive an email asking if they could listen to the audiobook instead of reading it, and the answer is: Absolutely! Jump to the blog post by clicking here to read the introductory info and to post your intent to participate by either adding your blog link to the list, or by adding a comment if you don't have a blog. As you can see in that post, Nicole and I are completely flexible, there are no hard and fast rules at all, and it's so not a big deal on how you want to experience the reading, when you want to post, yada, yada. Let's just read this beast of a book together and commiserate on any questions or love we have for the story!

Happy Reading,
Natalie ~ the Coffee and a Book Chick