A new bookstore is coming to downtown Raleigh. Details on location, opening date

After nearly five hours inside Barnes & Nobles, the Miller family left the store with only a handful of children’s books featuring Black protagonists.

Langston, then 9, wanted to write and publish comic books featuring himself and his younger brother. Victoria Scott-Miller and her husband, Duane Miller, took their sons to the chain bookstore for some market research.

“We thought it was going to be a quick in-and-out trip, showing our boys how they could do anything they put their minds to, like publish comic books about little Black boys,” Scott-Miller told The News & Observer of their 2019 outing.

“But we left disappointed. My son said, ‘I’ll never sell my book here.’ And my husband and I looked at each other and said, ‘We can do better. We will do better.’”

Scott-Miller, a literacy advocate, author and business owner, began Liberation Station Bookstore the following month.

Liberation Station started in the trunk of a car, with Scott-Miller selling children’s books in churches, alleyways and school parking lots. The business, initially funded with only $200, hoped to show children full versions of themselves, give them tools to express their feelings and show them they are capable of anything they want to do.

“We looked for Black authors and illustrators who were writing narratives not based in trauma for Black children and children of color,” she said.

A few months later, The Durham Hotel reached out to Scott-Miller asking if she’d do a book reading. She said yes, expecting a few families to attend, but was met with nearly 100 attendees.

“Children were seeing themselves for the first time in a book,” she said. “That’s when we knew we were onto something.”

Pop-up bookstores, reading spaces

In partnership with Sarah P. Duke Gardens, The North Carolina Museum of Art and The Durham Hotel, the bookstore has expanded to include the Black Lit Library, a safe reading space for children of color.

Scott-Miller also began publishing children’s books, notably The Museum Lives in Me about the NC Museum of Art. Following its success, she signed a multi-book deal to write children’s stories about other museums around the nation.

The family expected to continue running their mobile, pop-up business around the Triangle, but a school shooting threat in their son’s middle school pushed the family to consider expanding to a brick-and-mortar location.

“We needed to create a space to give children hope and safety, free them from inadequacy and empower them to show up every day boundlessly. That was our goal, to create a boundless generation of children who are forced to live within the seesaw of extremes,” she said.

“It will always be a space that houses the narrative of Black children, Black creators, diasporic writers and illustrators. ... With our Raleigh location, we are allowing children to walk into a bookstore and learn about their history, their present and their future, and they can practice possibility.”

‘Powerful’ work within book banning discourse

The Miller family appeared on Good Morning America in summer 2020, during what she called “The Awakening” after George Floyd’s murder.

The message of Liberation Station’s pop up bookstore — highlighting the need for positive Black stories and preservation of Black history — was spread wide, reaching people across the country.

“Once we were broadcast, we got so much hate mail, even death threats, about carrying Black books and books for children of color,” Scott-Miller said.

“Especially having young children, we could have said, ‘This work is not something we’re capable of doing at this moment’ and stopped there. But I also realize because the work is so dangerous, that’s what makes it so powerful.”

Raleigh’s only Black-owned bookstore joins Black Main Street

Raleigh’s newest bookstore will be the only Black-owned bookstore in Raleigh, joining a small number of Black-owned bookstores in the state, including Durham’s Rofhiwa Book Café and Charlotte’s Shelves. It will be the first Black children’s bookstore in the Triangle.

And for many customers, Liberation Station will be the first Black-owned bookstore they’ve ever stepped foot in.

“Liberation Station was the first Black-owned bookstore we’d ever been to. As of today, we’re one of 155 Black-owned bookstores in the entire country,” Scott-Miller said.

The bookstore joins a small cluster of Black-owned businesses near Raleigh’s Black Main Street, an area of East Hargett Street from Fayetteville Street to Moore Square. The area was developed as a commercial district for Black businesses in the 1910s and 1920s.

The grand opening at the brick-and-mortar location is set for June 17, during the city’s Juneteenth festivities.

“We’re intentionally on Fayetteville Street, right across from the Capitol building, because we want to keep up with legislation impacting education spaces,” Scott-Miller said. “Our location is our power letter to say ‘We’re not going anywhere.’”

The 364-square foot space is small, but that’s OK.

“We’re coming from the trunk of a car, setting up our books on a six-foot table. And that six-foot table is so powerful to us, as we realized we don’t need a lot of space to make a big impact,” she said.

Over 1,000 titles will be packed into this space.

In March 2025, the first book by Langston Miller, now 12, written in partnership with his mother, will be added to the collection, joining the Black authors, illustrators and creators that bring the space to life.

More details on Liberation Station bookstore

Location: Liberation Station bookstore will be located at 208 Fayetteville St., Suite 201, Raleigh, NC.

Grand opening: Saturday, June 17

Updates: Find updates at liberationstationbookstore.com or on Instagram at @liberationstationbookstore.

Fundraiser: Donate to the bookstore’s opening by visiting thebullsofdurham.com/campaigns/liberation-stationed.

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