Obama Shops Bookstore on Small Business Saturday

Today is Small Business Saturday here in the States. Taking place every year on the Saturday that follows Thanksgiving, Small Business Saturday is a fairly new shopping holiday - it was started in November 2010. On Small Business Saturday, consumers are asked to shop at small businesses, which tend to be overlooked in favor of big chain stores, especially during the holiday shopping season.
 

U.S. President Barack Obama shopping at Politics & Prose on Small Business Saturday.
Image via http://theobamadiary.com

The president of the United States, Barack Obama, did his part to support Small Business Saturday today by shopping at an independent bookstore in Washington, DC. Joined by his daughters, Sasha and Malia, President Obama went to Politics & Prose, located in the Northwest neighborhood of the District. Founded in 1984, Politics & Prose Bookstore and Coffeeehouse is widely considered a significant part of the District's culture, attracting big names in the arts, literature, politics, and other fields. Earlier this year, First Lady Michelle Obama attracted a standing-room-only crowd to the bookstore, where she signed copies of her book American Grown: The Story of the White House Garden and Gardens Across America.
 

Politics & Prose Bookstore and Coffeehouse in Washington, DC.
Image via the Washington Post

Giving his patronage to Politics & Prose today, President Obama bought two shopping bags full of books, judging from press photos taken of his appearance at the bookstore. Bookalicious, a Tumblr blog that reports on "all manner of geekery surrounded around pop culture and literature," revealed precisely what books the president bought. The list of books, as officially reported by the White House and succinctly presented by Bookalicious, are:

• Half Brother, by Kenneth Oppel
• Heart of a Samurai, by Margi Preus
• Flora and Ulysses, by Kate DiCamillo
• Jinx, by Sage Blackwood
• Lulu and the Brontosaurus, by Judith Viorst and Lane Smith
• Ottoline and the Yellow Cat, by Chris Riddell
• Moonday, by Adam Rex
• Journey, by Aaron Becker
• The Lowland, by Jhumpa Lahiri
• Red Sparrow, by Jason Matthews
• Harold and the Purple Crayon, by Crockett Johnson
• A Constellation of Vital Phenomena, by Anthony Marra
• The Sports Gene, by David Epstein
• Collision Low Crossers, by Nicholas Dawidoff
• Ballad of the Sad Cafe, by Carson McCullers
• My Antonia, by Willa Cather
• Ragtime, by E.L. Doctorow
• The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini
• Buddha in the Attic, by Julie Otsuka
• All That Is, by James Salter
• Wild, by Cheryl Strayed

Today wasn't the first time that President Obama supported an independent bookstore on Small Business Saturday. In 2011, he shopped at Karmerbooks & Afterwords Cafe, located in the Dupont Circle neighborhood of Washington, DC. Last year, he took his daughters to One More Page Books, just across the river from DC, in Arlington, Virginia.