Looking for cozy bookshops to visit in Santa Fe? This article spotlights four independent bookstores in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

The floors in Santa Fe bookstores creak – not always, just sometimes. I hear a snappy sound, springy and echoey and hollow enough that I want to fill it in with the slow exhale of paperbacks released from a shelf tight with spines.

The creak forces me to pause, to recognize my own breaths, but I read to escape, to give away my Type-A hypervigilance to fantasy worlds and daydreams. So I ask booksellers for recs and get lost in little conversations about books.

Beastly Books

When I first heard of Beastly Books, a Santa Fe bookshop owned by George R.R. Martin (the author behind Game Of Thrones), I pictured a dungeon of dragon books and sci-fi stories and fantasy series so long they have to be split across multiple shelves. Beastly Books is exactly that: hardcore nerdcore with cinematic music orchestrating the perfect atmosphere for Martin’s signed first editions, his glass case of rare books, and a (definitely-not-for-sale) statue of The Iron Giant.

Twig Delujé is Beastly Book’s manager. They chat about the shop, brew a strong cup of coffee (Picacho Roasters), and help me find my next fantasy read. I admit to Delujé that as much as I love standalone fantasy novels, I’m intimidated by high fantasy series. So they tell me about an early Martin story (co-written with Lisa Tuttle), published over a decade before Martin began drafting A Song Of Fire And Ice. They mention Windhaven is underrated, and that word alone leads me to plop the novel near the register.  

Big Star Books & Music 

Then, there’s Big Star Books & Music, also in Santa Fe’s Railyard District. Big Star Books feels like an old home still in the midst of unpacking. Empty cardboard boxes teeter in a corner; musty books fill dusty shelves. Floppy travel paperbacks cram a closet. A spotlight falls on topics like hypnosis for beginners and crystal guides (woo-woo to some, Santa Fe-style spiritual to others). There are like-new books, thoroughly loved books, and books that are still library-bound because Big Star Books is one of the most welcoming little used bookstores in Santa Fe. 

Collected Works Bookstore & Coffee

Collected Works, one of the most popular bookshops in Santa Fe, is located downtown (on a corner where foot traffic flows freely) and coupled with a cafe that smells like espresso. 

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As Santa Fe’s oldest bookstore, Collected Works has had time to grow into a lit hub, to become a place that holds cookbooks and travel guides and new releases. I sip on a macchiato, feel the sharp hit of coffee grit behind my teeth, and overhear a barista chat about The New Yorker’s Tables For Two series and Daniel Mason’s North Woods.

Garcia Street Books

Yellow light slants down bookshelves at Garcia Street Books. More stories are laid out on tabletops like photo feeds; titles are easy to catch. On shelves, you’ll find art books, Southwestern books, queer books, indigenous books, and artsy Southwestern queer indigenous books (Garcia Street Books is the place to ask for a highly specific book rec).

Basket chairs (they creak – not always, just sometimes) are tucked into a corner. So settle in, flip through a bookseller rec (the staff slipped Shutter by Ramona Emerson into my hands, and it’s becoming a new favorite), and escape.

Which of these Santa Fe bookshops would you visit? What are your favorite bookstores in Santa Fe? Let me know in the comments below!