Owner Ashley Bailey at her new store, Heart & Soul Books
Tucked on the second floor of a Linglestown storefront is a cozy bookstore with a vintage flair and shelves of good reads.
Heart & Soul Books began as an online vendor in 2020, but will open a brick-and-mortar location this weekend on Linglestown Road.
“I’m excited,” said owner Ashley Bailey. “I want it to be a safe place. I want people to feel like they can get a book and see themselves in it.”
Representation is at the forefront of Bailey’s mind when she’s collecting new and used books to sell at the shop. She wants to make sure that people of color and those who aren’t always depicted in popular literature can find a reflection of themselves in the books she carries.
Bailey pointed out the wide range of genres that she stocks on the shelves, including books for adults, teens and children.
Books for sale
She began selling new and used books online after rediscovering her love for reading as an adult. She recalled how, as a kid, reading helped her get through her time spent in a juvenile detention center. Maya Angelou’s “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” impacted her, she said.
“Reading was therapeutic to me,” she said.
Eventually, Bailey hopes to incorporate a nonprofit aspect of her business to help people in similar shoes to those that she was in.
In addition to offering a calming place to read a book, Bailey plans to eventually provide classes, book clubs, spoken word performances and children’s story times. Her mom will teach a sign language course, as well.
Around the shop are touches of Bailey’s personality and family. Maya Angelou quotes hang on the walls alongside vibrant tapestries, her mom’s vintage furniture fills the rooms, and trinkets handmade by her daughter are for sale.
Bailey will happily share book recommendations and order you specific titles if she doesn’t have them in stock.
It’s a shop that’s easy to feel at home in, partly because it is an old house turned storefront, the bookstore occupying what must’ve been three bedrooms before. But it’s also Bailey’s warm personality that may make you feel like you’re at a friend’s house, browsing her book collection as she tells you about her favorites.
That’s something you can’t get at a big box store.
And while Bailey hopes it’s the books and the homey vibe that keep you coming back, there’s also a pot of coffee, which doesn’t hurt.
Heart & Soul Books opens this weekend on Feb 12 and 13, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. They are located at 5970 Linglestown Rd., Harrisburg, on the second floor. For more information or to order books online, visit their website or Facebook page.
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