Push/Pull is more than just a zine and art retailer — it's a clubhouse for independent Seattle artists of all kinds, with affordable art classes, educational programming for teens and plenty of opportunities for new and longtime artists to get their work in front of adoring audiences.

In addition to being probably the single best children's bookstore in town, Secret Garden is also a full-service independent bookstore with recommendations for novels, non-fiction and comics for adults, too.

Based out of a gorgeously renovated home on 15th Avenue, Ada's Technical Books is a well-stocked neighborhood bookstore, a delicious cafe and a STEM student's dream of a shop. The store focuses on books about science and engineering, but it's also got a great sci-fi section and a fantastic kid's section.

For the comic-book lover in your life, Phoenix Comics stocks all the latest Marvel, DC and Image titles, along with a great kid's comic section and a special focus on LGBTQ+ comics. But Phoenix is also a one-stop-shop for role-playing games, board games and party games, with a large space available for game testing, tournaments and pick-up gaming sessions.

The first independent bookstore to open in the Chinatown International District in recent memory is intended to be a community hangout and a celebration of Seattle's Asian American community. The shop offers a selection of snacks and beverages, comfy seating and a great mix of Asian and Asian American fiction and nonfiction.

Founded by Vickie Williams in a Columbia City storefront over two decades ago, LEMS was the only Black-owned bookstore in Seattle for years. Now, Williams' family is keeping her legacy alive by experimenting with different uses for the space, including a coffee shop and hosting pop-up discussion groups and music events.

For over two decades, local indie publisher Chin Music Press has published fiction, children's books and nonfiction devoted to the culture and peoples of the Pacific Rim. Their showroom in the heart of Pike Place Market is a bookstore and working office for one of Seattle's most underrated small presses.

It's a contested title, but Pike Place Market's Golden Age Collectables makes a good case for the title of oldest comics shop in the world — after all, it's a full year older than the first appearance of Spider-Man. You can often watch nerdy tourists lose their minds with joy when they step inside this destination for superhero fans, and the aisles are chock-full of pop culture paraphernalia, graphic novels and rare old comics.

Located right at the main entrance of Pike Place Market since 1973, this collectively owned bookstore is unabashedly political, with plenty of anarchist and utopian polemics mixed in among contemporary sci-fi and fiction bestsellers.

If you ever need a cookbook recommendation, Fremont's Book Larder is your promised land. The shop has a working test kitchen and regularly hosts cooking demonstrations and classes.

One of Seattle's newest — and prettiest — bookstores specializes in LGBTQ+-themed books and community events. Inside the cozy Palm Springs-styled exterior, you can find fiction, cookbooks, kid's books, memoir and the most breathtakingly gorgeous bookstore bathroom in the greater Seattle area.

Fremont's LGBTQ+-friendly comics shop and nerd-forward fashion boutique has changed hands twice in recent years — first to a worker-owned co-op and then again to a single-owner model.

From Charles Schulz's "Peanuts" to the literary graphic novels of Dan Clowes, local publisher Fantagraphics is widely considered to publish the best comics in the United States. This Georgetown storefront serves as a showroom for Fantagraphics titles as well as other new and recent literary (read: no superheroes) graphic novels. Bonus tip: Be sure to visit the Damaged Room in the back, which offers overstock and lightly damaged (but perfectly readable) graphic novels for half-price.

Last Juneteenth, Sistah Scifi, the online retailer devoted to sharing and discussing the work of Black and Indigenous sci-fi and fantasy authors, opened a physical outpost in the Northwest African American Museum’s gift shop, in the form of beautiful and thoughtfully stocked book vending machines featuring local Black sci-fi authors and comics creators.

It's like a food truck, but for books. Blue Kettle Books drives a surprisingly packed selection of books all over the Greater Seattle region, setting up shop in farmers markets, street fairs, and other special events across the North and Eastside, and even as far south as Columbia City.

Though their storefront closed last year as part of a planned development, Drink Books continues to offer its signature mixture of literary fiction, essays and poetry, and a slate of organic wines, with pop-up wine-and-book clubs happening around Seattle.

You could count the number of poetry-only bookstores in America on one hand and still have some fingers left over to tap out a sonnet on your phone keyboard. Open Books is a world-famous stronghold of poetry, and its relatively new Pioneer Square location rents out spaces to read, write and celebrate poetry with writers, readers and celebrated practitioners of the form.

The reason why this bookstore has become an internationally beloved destination for design aficionados is neatly summed up in its name. Peter Miller will eagerly guide you through a whirlwind tour of the books, radios, fountain pens and other delights of his shop, and his enthusiasm and brilliance will leave you delighted with the art — and magic — of good design.

If you’ve never bought a book out of a vending machine, you should drop by Roosevelt’s sci-fi themed coffee shop and check out the latest vending machine from popular online bookseller Sistah Scifi, which celebrates science fiction and comic books by Black and Indigenous authors.

A few years ago, Destiny City Comics was rumored to be hovering near death's door. But after a change in ownership, Tacoma's self-described "Unapologetically Black and LGBTQ+ Friendly Comic Shop" is winning over comics fans from its prime location in a shared storefront with the great King's Books.