Plan a Booklover's Weekend in Tucson

From bookstores to book nooks, here’s a reader’s guide to Tucson.

Buy the Book

Reminiscent of its colorful hippie past, historic Fourth Avenue is the perfect setting for Antigone Books, which offers tomes on women’s studies, cultural issues and social justice topics. Inside the brick storefront, look also for books by Southwest authors, plus literature classics and new releases.

Down the street, The Book Stop smells comfortingly like a library — the old kind, with books, not computers. Used books in all genres, from fiction to architecture, line the shop’s walls from floor to ceiling, tower in piles around corners, and stack under chairs. Open since 1967, the store also carries rare and out-of-print books.

Sunshine fills the Littlest Bookshop, a new addition to Tucson and dedicated to serving children, from babies to young adult readers. Look for picture books, kids’ classics and popular series like The Baby-Sitters Club and The Last Kids on Earth. There’s also a section of bilingual books and titles addressing issues such as inclusivity and empathy from a child’s perspective.

Nearby, Mostly Books gives the appearance of a new bookstore, with today’s best-sellers displayed right upfront. But wander deeper and you’ll find shelves brimming with used paperbacks dating back decades in genres like romance, sci-fi and mystery. Open since 1988, the shop also hosts popular local book clubs.

Need a taxidermied coyote or an ornamental dagger? These oddities, plus musical instruments, vinyl records, CDs and gaming consoles, are just a few of the items for sale at Bookmans Entertainment Exchange — in addition to books, of course. Peruse thousands of used titles, including a collection of vintage magazines like Rolling Stone and Time.

Bury Your Nose in a Book

In search of a good reading spot? If it’s a nice day, head to the Rio Nuevo district where you’ll find MSA Annex, a shipping container compound filled with indie shops and restaurants. Grab a coffee or a bowl of ramen and plant yourself at an outdoor table for an hour or two.

Bring a blanket to enjoy more sunshine-filled reading at Gene C. Reid Park in central Tucson. Settle in by the duck pond and tall palms for shade.

Or tuck into a booth at downtown’s Cup Cafe, located at historic Hotel Congress. Fuel your reading with a slice of chocolate chestnut cream cake and the whiskey-based Dillinger Sidecar, named in honor of the gangster who was a hotel guest at the time of his 1934 arrest.

Celebrate Literature

Each March since 2009, the grassy campus of the University of Arizona becomes one enormous book bazaar during the Tucson Festival of Books, which features some 350 authors, more than 200 panels and workshops, book sales, entertainment and food, drawing more than 130,000 attendees. Past presenters have included acclaimed authors like Amy Tan, Larry McMurtry and T.C. Boyle, plus a sprinkling of celebs who have taken pen to paper, such as Linda Ronstadt and Bob Odenkirk.

Insider tip: Though the festival is free, plan to reserve a seat via the website for the more popular author panels.

Writers in Residence

Tucson has more than its share of writers who have called the city home at one time or another.

Edward Abbey: Legend has it that the iconic environmental activist was spirited away after his death by friends and buried in the remote desert outside the city. Abbey is best known for his books, The Monkey Wrench Gang and Desert Solitaire.
Charles Bowden: Bowden zeroed in on border issues and life in the Southwest with books like Frog Mountain Blues, Desierto: Memories of the Future and Down by the River.
J.A. Jance: After working as a school librarian on the Tohono O’odham reservation, Jance launched a career writing best-selling crime fiction series, with 60-some books that have sold 20 million copies.
Lydia Millet: A staff writer and editor at the Center for Biological Diversity, Millet has been been nominated for a National Book Award for A Children’s Bible and a Pulitzer Prize for Love in Infant Monkeys.
Leslie Marmon Silko: Her childhood near the Laguna Pueblo in New Mexico influenced Silko’s novels, such as Ceremony and Gardens in the Dunes, which track the uneasy balance between Native American traditions and the modern Southwest.