Eighty-one booksellers got a special gift on Monday, just in time for the holidays. Bestselling author James Patterson sent out $473,000 in grants for the third, and final, round of his 2014 million-dollar campaign to invest in indies.

In February, Patterson began distributing grants to independent bookstores with children’s sections. The program has now delivered grants to 178 stores altogether, with the donation totaling $1,008,300.

“It will be like Christmas come early,” said Mary Williams, general manager of Skylight Books in Los Angeles, which asked for money to spruce up its children’s section. She plans to expand the children’s section, and replace some fixtures with more kid-friendly options.

A number of stores--including Kramerbooks & Afterwords in Washington, D.C., and Sherman’s Books in Bar Harbor, Maine--requested the money to fix up their physical space.

Younger stores, too, sought financial assistance for operations. Five-year-old Greenlight Books in Brooklyn, N.Y., will use the money to update its computer system.

Rona Sue London at the Ivy Bookshop in Baltimore wanted funding for a new children’s program coordinated with area schools that will allow local students to meet authors and get free books. “I’m a teacher by training,” says London, “so I know that the need is. I know a lot of kids don’t have a chance to be in a bookstore, or to own a book.”

Perhaps the most poignant request came from 57th Street Books in Chicago; it wanted to create a fund to reimburse the children’s manager, and other staffers, who have spent their own money buying books for poor children who visit the store. The grant will also enable the store to create an ongoing fund for children in need.

“Here’s to a joyful holiday season for booksellers everywhere,” said Patterson in a prepared statement. “Here’s to more parents and grandparents coming to their senses and giving their kids books—yes, books—for Christmas and other holidays. Here’s to local governments waking up to the fact that bookstores and libraries are essential to our way of life.”

Patterson, who recently launched the #SaveOurBooks campaign, to encourage the nation’s leaders to raise awareness about reading, plans to continue to support indie bookstores in 2015. He will also champion a new initiative centered on getting kids reading, and strengthening school libraries.


Bookstores Receiving Grants in the Third Round:
57th Street Books - Chicago, IL
Afterwords Books - Edwardsville, IL
Anderson’s Bookshop - Naperville, IL
Auntie’s Bookstore - Spokane, WA
Battenkill Books - Cambridge, NY
Bay Book Company - Half Moon Bay, CA
Bay Books - Coronado, CA
Bear Pond Books - Montpelier, VT
Best of Books - Edmond, OK
Blue Manatee Bookstore - Cincinnati, OH
Blue Marble Books - Fort Thomas, KY
Book Ends - Winchester, MA
Book Soup - Los Angeles, CA
BookPeople of Moscow - Moscow, ID
Books Inc. - San Francisco, CA
Books on the Common - Ridgefield, CT
Books on the Square - Providence, RI
Boulder Book Store - Boulder, CO
Bound To Be Read Books - Atlanta, GA
Broadway Books - Portland, OR
Buttonwood Books - Cohasset, MA
Chapter One Bookstore - Hamilton, MT
City Lights Bookstore - San Francisco, CA
Cloud & Leaf Bookstore - Manzanita, OR
Concord Bookshop - Concord, MA
Copperfield’s Books - Petaluma, CA
Eagle Eye Book Shop - Decatur, GA
Eagle Harbor Book Co. - Bainbridge Island, WA
Elephant’s Trunk Bookshop - Lexington, MA
Elliott Bay Book Company - Seattle, WA
Excelsior Bay Books - Excelsior , MN
Fiction Addiction - Greenville, SC
Fireside Books - Palmer, AK
Flintridge Bookstore - La Cañada, CA
Flyleaf Books - Chapel Hill, NC
Green Bean Books - Portland, OR
Greenlight Bookstore - Brooklyn, NY
Hub City Bookshop - Spartanburg, SC
Kramerbooks - Washington, DC
Left Bank Books - St. Louis, MO
Lift Bridge Book Shop - Brockport, NY
Linda’s Story Time - Monroe, CT
Linden Tree Children’s Books - Los Altos, CA
Litchfield Books - Pawleys Island, SC
McLean & Eakin Booksellers - Petoskey, MI
Monkey See, Monkey Do Bookstore - Clarence, NY
Mountain Bookshop - Sonora, CA
Mrs. Dalloway’s Bookstore - Berkeley, CA
Northtown Books - Arcata, CA
Once Upon a Time Bookstore - Montrose, CA
One More Page Books - Arlington, VA
Pages: A Bookstore - Manhattan Beach, CA
Palm Beach Book Store - Palm Beach, FL
Powell’s Books - Portland, OR
Regulator Bookshop - Durham, NC
RiverRun Bookstore - Portsmouth, NH
Sherman’s Books - Bar Harbor, ME
Skylight Books - Los Angeles, CA
Square Books - Oxford, MS
St. Mark’s Bookshop - New York, NY
Strand Book Store - New York, NY
The Avid Reader at Tower - Sacramento, CA
The Book Cellar - Chicago, IL
The Book Table - Oak Park, IL
The BookMark - Neptune Beach, FL
The Bookshelf - Thomasville, GA
The Bookshelf - Cincinnati, OH
The Golden Notebook - Woodstock, NY
The Ivy Bookshop - Baltimore, MD
The Reading Bug - San Carlo, CA
The River’s End Bookstore - Oswego, NY
The Toadstool Bookshop - Keene, NH
The Voracious Reader - Larchmont, NY
Third Place Books - Lake Forest Park, WA
Towne Center Books - Pleasanton, CA
Twig Book Shop - San Antonio, TX
Water Street Bookstore - Exeter, NH
Watermark Books - Wichita, KS
Women & Children First - Chicago, IL
WORD Bookstore - Brooklyn, NY
WordsWorth Books - Little Rock, AR