Northshire Bookstore Saratoga

Bookseller Kirstin & her adorable Christmas Tree sweater are here to tell you that our hours today, December 18th are 10 am to 6 pm. From December 19-23 we'll be open 10 am to 9 pm. On December 24 we'll be open from 10 am to 4 pm. We'll be closed on December 25th.... We are happy to do curbside pickup - give us a call at 518-682-4200.

Good snowy morning Saratoga! We've got a handful of intrepid booksellers who live in walking distance to the store, so we laced up our snow boots & are open this morning with a small team. If you're also in walking (or snowshoeing) distance, it's a good morning to have a very uncrowded visit. If you're further out & enjoying the luxury of cozy snowday reading, please tell us about it so we can live vicariously through you! Whatever you're up to today, please stay safe out the...re! Friendly reminder, we've adjusted our hours slightly, and will be open from 10 am to 6 pm today & tomorrow. December 19-23 we'll be open 10 am to 9 pm, and on December 24th we'll be open from 10-4. Quick addendum at noon: We've just heard from our friends & delivery partners at 9 Miles East that they're (understandably) not going to be able to do home delivery today. Any orders placed today for home delivery will be delivered on tomorrow's evening rounds.

Some of our staff have been exposed to a Covid positive person. While this occurred a week ago, we are closing at 4pm today, Monday, December 14th and will be closed all day Tuesday, December 15th in order to get our staff tested and to follow the other Saratoga County Health Department guidelines. We expect to re-open on Wednesday and will update our hours soon. Thank you for your support during this difficult time for us and all communities across the country.

Need help with book recommendations for yourself or for people on your holiday shopping list? Drop by our zoom bookseller office hours today & our experts will be happy to help! Reserve a free ticket on eventbrite to get the zoom link. https://www.eventbrite.com/e/130040463527

Need book suggestions? Come chat with us on zoom any time between 11 am & 1 pm today and our experts will give you personalized ideas! Rerserve a free ticket on eventbrite to get the zoom link.

After a short pause, we will be able to re-open the store on Wednesday, December 16th. Our temporary store hours on the 16th, 17th and 18th will be 10 am to 6 pm. We'll resume our expanded holiday hours on December 19th, and will be open from 10 am - 9 pm on the 19th-23rd.... We'll be open 10 am - 4 pm on December 24th, and closed on December 25th. Thank you for your patience as we re-open the store and our staff returns to work.

Happy Friday - & LAST DAY OF COMPLIMENTARY GIFT WRAPPING! We're open 10-9 tonight, so shop at northshire.com or in store & take advantage of this holiday service

A raffle to have the bookstore to yourself for an hour! The deadline is Monday and the proceeds are split with the Regional Food Bank. https://www.northshire.com//have-northshire-myself-raffle-

Need help with your holiday shopping? Drop by our bookseller office hours any time between 1 & 3 today & we'll do our best to give you personalized book suggestions for everyone on your list. Reserve a free ticket on eventbrite to get the zoom link: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/126308254389

#NewReleaseTuesday is in full swing this Election Day! Plus we have a giveaway for Marissa Meyer's new YA book, Instant Karma: first 15 customers to buy a copy of this book will receive a FREE pink tote & signed bookplates! Have you gone out to vote yet? Feel free to stop by after you've placed your ballot & browse through our new releases

Bobbie Ann Mason is a literary legend - we're so lucky to be hosting her for a virtual event later this week.

The beginning of November means the beginning of the holiday season! Please shop early & support your local stores through the final stretch of 2020. We will be providing our complimentary gift wrapping service up until December 11th. Stop in, give us a call or shop online to start your holiday shopping now! #northshirebookstore #northshiresaratoga #saratogasprings #shopsaratoga #shopindiebookstores #holidays2020 #saratogaliving #indiebookstore #neilgaiman #bookstagram #eatsleepread

On April 10th I wrote, For me, for today, my focus is on resilience. Vermont's governor just extended the shutdown until May, 15th. We have to be in this for the long-haul. Ha! Seems so quaint, so 19th century. But here we are at the beginning of November and the watchword is still resilience. Resilience is patience, is empathy, is maitri. Maitri is a Sanskrit word that Pema Chodron translates as unconditional friendliness to oneself and others. It is otherwise transl...ated as loving kindness. In other words, it is an encouragement to be nice to yourself - which also expands to everyone around you. I feel like we need to declare November Give Yourself a Break Month. Are you in? Part of resilience is also asking for help when you need it. The Northshire Bookstores need your help. November and December will be a very difficult juggling act for us. Our priority is to keep our staff and customers healthy, so we will need to limit access to the stores during what would normally be our busiest times. This could be very difficult financially. So, if you normally shop with us over the holidays, PLEASE help us out by shopping early. If you can, shop on weekdays rather than weekends. Our website is available 24/7. In select zip codes around Saratoga Springs we offer same day delivery. And starting today we are offering free delivery to Williamstown once a week to be picked up Friday-Sun from 11-3 at Images Cinema. This year is different - publishers will run out of books early, deliveries will be highly erratic, the prospect of a shutdown looms. Right now our selection is robust and there are no crowds. I hope to see you in the stores, and many thanks for your support. Chris Morrow

UPDATE 10/30 at 6:20 pm: Our phones are back up! We're closed for the evening, but it will be business as usual when we reopen at 10 tomorrow morning! Yikes! Our phones are out of service at the moment. The store is still open (until 6 pm tonight) - but we aren't receiving phone calls. We will update here as soon as they're back up and running - and meanwhile, we are SO sorry for the inconvenience!... If you've got friends you think might be trying to call us today, can you help out by letting them know?

We are so lucky to be hosting meditation expert, bestselling author and friend-of-Northshire Sharon Salzberg tonight at 5 eastern to discuss her new book "Real Change: Mindfulness to Heal Ourselves and the World" with our store's co-owner Chris Morrow. Tickets & full event information are available at:

We're SO excited for tonight's virtual event (at 5 pm eastern) with World Fantasy Award-Winner C.L. Polk discussing her gorgeous new novel "The Midnight Bargain" with Nebula Award-Winner Fran Wilde. Tickets & full event information are on our eventbrite here:

Happy Book #PubDay Saratoga! Store favorites like Group by Christie Tate & Memorial by Bryan Washington are in, along with a few other exciting new releases. Plus we're getting more & more holiday merch by the minute - shop early, shop local, shop now!

Tonight at 5 eastern time, we're hosting a virtual event with nature writer Ted Williams, about his gorgeous new book "Earth Almanac." Reserve your spot - and learn more - on eventbrite. As always, this event is free for those who purchase the book from us, pay-what-you-can for those not purchasing the book at this time.

https://www.nytimes.com//technol/holiday-shipageddon.html

Hello friends! Long (but important) post incoming. As we all know, these are tough times for local small businesses all over the country. You can help us - and the other local businesses you love - tremendously by choosing to shop local and shop EARLY for this holiday season. Our publishing partners are telling us to expect major supply chain issues for books this year - the two largest American printers have been facing shutdowns and reduced capacity, and warehouses and ship...ping companies have been greatly impacted as well. We work very hard to get you the books you want as quickly as possible, and that will never change. But this year, some popular titles may just not be available (anywhere!) for people who wait too long. The safety of our booksellers and our customers is also hugely important to us. We'll be expanding our hours in December to accommodate as many customers as possible without crowding. But again, early shoppers make a huge difference - if you shop now while the store is relatively empty, your "space" is available later for someone who didn't shop early. Because our giftwrap station becomes a major spot for crowding every year in the last weeks before Christmas, we will not be offering giftwrapping in the store after December 11. We appreciate you understanding this important safety measure, and we'll happily wrap for you any time between now and December 11. For those of you who would rather not come into the store, you can order from us at northshire.com any time! We offer curbside pickup, local delivery with 9 miles east, and free shipping on orders over $25. Our small staff works incredibly hard to fill those web orders (no robots here!) - and getting them in early makes it immeasurably easier and less stressful for us. In addition, we've planned several special events where you can zoom with our team for book recommendations for everyone on your shopping list. Check out our event calendar and join us for one of those - we LOVE the chance to tell you about all the great books we've been reading. Thank you, everyone who made it all the way through this long post. And, thank you, thank you, thank you, to all of you who have sustained us during these last months. It's been so tough, but your support has meant the world to us. All of us at Northshire feel so lucky to be a part of this community.

Tonight at 5 pm eastern time we're hosting Gretchen Sorin, author of "Driving While Black." Her riveting book was the inspiration for a documentary of the same title which aired recently on PBS stations nationwide. Tickets & full event information are available on eventbrite: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/122113844797

Not gonna lie, I got a little weepy reading this. We are so lucky to have Saratoga’s Broadway Deli as our neighbor (if you haven't visited before, you're in for a treat - my personal favorite lunch order is a knish and some soup). Thank you, friends. -Rachel