The Book House in St. Louis was founded in 1986 and is the largest and oldest independent bookstore in the St. Louis area. We relocated to our new location in historic downtown Maplewood with two floors wall-to-wall of new, old, rare, and unusual books and print items.

We are an “old-school” bookstore with stacks of books in all subjects, winding aisles, chairs to sit and read, and nooks and crannies of treasures—a place to get lost in. But we are not outdated or old-fashioned by any means! We are an up-to-date community hub for new writers, artists, and musicians who frequently visit, read, and perform in our community space.

We carry many new and small press titles, ship all over the world, and love championing our local authors with regular read-out events and open mic nights. We are a general bookstore and carry books on almost any subject, specializing in art, literature, music, and all types of children’s books (both classic and frontlist) for all ages.

We also have especially large collections of history, cookbooks, philosophy, African American, science fiction, literary fiction, and graphic novels. Including our storage and backlist, we have over 300,000 books in stock and we can order just about anything. We love a good scavenger hunt!

Rumors of the demise of books and paper media have been greatly exaggerated as we revel and enjoy sharing and introducing the love of books to new audiences every day.