Address: 411 N 4th Ave, Tucson, AZ 85705
Nina Chu
When I first saw Back of Beyond Books in Moab, Utah, I was immediately drawn to the sunset-colored storefront, a welcoming oasis amidst the tiny town’s dry desert heat. A pitstop during a train trip from Salt Lake City to Denver, I hadn’t intended on buying a book there, but ended up spending at least an hour browsing the environmental literature shelves, an impressively large section that features Utah authors ranging from historic icons like Edward Abbey to modern luminaries like Terry Tempest Williams (who lives right around the corner).
Representing Utah’s unique literary legacy is a particular passion of owner David Everett, who worked in local politics until he purchased the store in 2022. “Probably the main thing that drew me to Moab in the first place was reading books by Edward Abbey, who was a [national park] ranger and artist for three years and wrote Desert Solitaire, which is really a seminal work on the history of the environmental movement,” he says. The nature writing that comes out of this part of the country is all “about exploring,” he adds. “Exploration is external, but it’s just as much internal—and it feels like the desert gives you room to do that.” —Hannah Towey, associate editor
Recommended reading: To stay up to speed with his well-traveled and well-read customer base, Abbey’s reading routine alternates between Utah’s “core curriculum” and popular best-sellers, he says. Right now, his bookshelf includes an epic western called Tom’s Crossing by Mark Z. Danielewski, set in a fictionalized Provo, Utah; The Correspondent by Virginia Evans; and speculative climate fiction novel The Deluge by Stephen Markley.
Address: 83 N Main St, Moab, UT 84532
Nina Chu
In an 1822 stone barn tucked into Pennsylvania’s picturesque Brandywine Valley, Baldwin’s Book Barn—named after its founding couple, William and Lilla Baldwin—feels less like a bookstore than a living archive, its labyrinthine stacks filled with used and rare books, manuscripts, maps, and other local antiquarian finds. “We were in touch at one point with Guinness [World Records] to say that we were the world’s largest used bookstore,” says manager Carol Pfaff Rauch. “They said, ‘Count them.’ I’m not about to do that! We have over 25,000 square feet and over 300,000 books.”
Rauch, 93, is herself part of the Book Barn’s mythology. She’s lived many lives, working in real estate and archeology, raising five children, and surviving colon cancer. She came to the store in 2010 as a volunteer before taking on the manager title. Today, she operates as something of a literary first responder for the region. Each week, she fields calls from families dealing with estates—collections amassed over lifetimes that now need new homes. On Saturdays, she and her daughter do house visits, selecting what can be saved and added to the Book Barn’s shelves. “We cherry pick the good books, and I tell them what to throw away,” says Rauch.
