Greenlight Bookstore

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When a 2008 survey by the Fort Greene Association revealed that most residents felt the neighborhood was lacking a local bookstore, former bookshop employees Rebecca Fitting and Jessica Stockton Bagnulo quit their jobs to take up the cause. The pair landed a 2,000-square-foot space on a bustling stretch of Fulton, installing a maple floor and custom-built shelves by Dumbo artisan group deFT Projects. The shop opened in October 2009 to local fanfare; its second event, two weeks later, featured writers Jhumpa Lahiri, Matt Weiland, and L. J. Davis. The front window is devoted to New York, filled with guidebooks and photography tomes on Fort Greene and greater Brooklyn, while a nearby table displays fiction by local authors like Colson Whitehead and Jonathan Lethem. Other sections are stacked with graphic novels and young-adult lit, and the spacious children’s area in back is home to a rotating roster of Saturday-morning storytellers. Staff picks near the register are 15 percent off. — Lauren Salazar

Join the "Friends of Greenlight" frequent buyers program to receive books and other assorted merch when you spend $250.