After 24 years in the Lloyd Center area, Barnes & Noble closed its doors in May 2026. I have rather mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, I absolutely loved having a large bookstore only a couple of blocks from me. I enjoyed going over and reading a good book or magazine whenever I wanted. However, Lloyd Center has been, to put it politely, going through a few changes. We now know that Lloyd Center will close on August 8 to customers, with all remaining tenants to leave on August 30. Thus, it wasn’t a huge surprise to find out about Barnes & Noble’s closure. Frankly, it was one of the few reasons I even went to Lloyd Center any more.
To be blunt: It’s getting harder and harder to justify going shopping when you can order things from Amazon or other places. Bookstores are one of the few places I love to go to both for browsing and buying magazines and novels. As a writer, bookstores are my place of power, so it always hits hard when a store closes. Barnes & Noble originally opened where the Goodwill is now on 12th and Broadway and moved into the mall a few years later. I’ll miss it, but it also gives me an opportunity to check out other bookstores in the area that I haven’t gone to in years.
In my neighborhood alone, I have Broadway Books, which has been a staple in my immediate area for many years. In Downtown Portland there is the ubiquitous Powell’s City of Books. Powell’s, of course, has satellite stores in other areas including Hawthorne Boulevard, Cedar Hills Crossing in Beaverton, and a branch inside the Portland International Airport. Back on the east side, Future Dreams and Excalibur Comics have more than enough reasons to visit if you love comic books. Last but not least, Parallel Worlds Bookshop is Portland’s premiere science fiction and fantasy bookstore and outside of Powell’s Books has the largest selection of books in these genres.
In other words, there are options. And all of these places I’ve mentioned share one thing in common: They’re not national chains but rather local alternatives that in many cases offer broader selections than the corporate stores. And that’s rather important for a number of reasons. Supporting local bookstores means supporting people who might be experts in the fields that interest you. If you have a favorite topic or genre, it’s more than likely that the place you’re buying your books from has a person who’s also invested in that same subject and is more than willing to help you find what you’re looking for. That’s why those bookstores exist, after all. A satisfied customer keeps coming back for more, and that bookseller hopefully gets more positive word-of-mouth advertising from those customers.
The main thing that I loved about going to the Barnes & Noble in my neighborhood was that in some ways it felt more like a living room than a bookstore. It had a wonderful lived-in feeling where you could simply come in and browse to your heart’s content while snacking at the cafe or people watching as you read a periodical. Most of the independent bookstores may not have that luxury, but on the other hand, a neighborhood bookstore is where you get to know the people a little bit better. Yes, I’ll miss Lloyd Center and all its amenities. On the other hand, maybe it’s time to get out and enjoy some more of what the other neighborhoods have to offer, particularly if you’re a book lover.
Freedman on the Go 
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