Mercer Street Books

Debbie Sarow, a veteran of Twice Sold Tales and the Pioneer Square antiquarian dealer Wessel and Lieberman, opened Mercer Street Books at 7 Mercer St in 2009, The Seattle Times reported in August 2022. The storefront had been home to Titlewave Books for more than two decades and then to a Twice Sold Tales outpost. Sarow hired longtime bookseller Jessica Hurst in 2016, died in August 2018, and Hurst officially became the owner on January 1, 2020, according to The Seattle Review of Books.

The Seattle Times compared the shop to the grand antiquarian bookstores of Paris and London, with its tall umber shelves, plants in the window and antique library card catalogs at the front filled with stationery, postcards and other small finds. In 2022 Hurst described an excellent children's section, plenty of current fiction and strong film, music and theater shelves, thanks to neighbors like SIFF and Seattle Center; in 2021 she called the LGBTQ section small but mighty. The store buys used books from the public, and in 2021 a cart out front sold books for fifty cents. Theatergoers, tourists and Uptown regulars all come through.