From April 4-5, 2026, the third annual Austin Texas Book Trail (ATBT) took place. ATBT is an event that allows people to go on a “bar crawl” to local bookstores throughout Austin.
Thirty-six bookstores participated in the 2026 book trail. ATBT held a kickoff event at Mañana Dos, a coffee shop in downtown Austin, on April 4. There, they handed out trail maps, where participants could get specialized stamps from each of the stores that they visited. On April 5 they held an after party at Strangelove Coffee + Wine.
Bookshops along the trail had several different promotions, sales and author events. One of the participating bookstores, Birdhouse Books and Gifts, had a booth for debut authors towards the back of the shop. Ashley Peters, a new author, had held her launch party for her debut book “In Stasis” at Birdhouse earlier in the year, and returned to promote her book during the booktrail. Before being a part of the booktrail, she had previously toured it herself.
“I moved here three years ago,” Peters said. “I knew some of the bookstores, but a lot of them were new to me, which was a nice exposure to some new places.”
Peters did not reach out to the organizers of ATBT, as they are not responsible for the specific events each of the bookstores hold for the trail. Instead she reached out to the owner of Birdhouse, Abby Strite in hopes of finding a way to get involved with the trail.
“I was optimistic that I could do something as an author, and we already had a relationship from the launch of my book,” Peters said.
Not only is the booktrail an opportunity for authors to get their name out there, it also can increase the flow of customers towards bookstores.
“It helps raise our brand.” stated Co-Founder of Black Pearl Books, Katrina Brooks.
The book trail also coincides with other important days for bookstores such as independent bookstore day which encourages people to support locally owned stores rather than stopping by major chains such as Barnes and Noble.
“It’s interesting because independent bookstore day is also in April, so you get these two kinds of crowds of people,” Brooks said.
Black Pearl Books has participated with the book trail since its inception three years ago.
“They [ATBT] reached out to all the booksellers and [asked] if we were interested in participating.” Brooks stated.
Jackie Rangel and Michelle Zhang are the founders of ATBT. Zhang has a special connection to McCallum. This year she and the McCallum librarian, Mr Z, celebrated their engagement. Rangel and Zhang were inspired by a similar bookstore crawl that existed from 2017 to 2019. Originally, this crawl only lasted a day. ATBT had the idea to extend it to a full weekend.
Since then, ATBT’s list of participating stores has grown.
“There’s been new bookstores every year,” a representative from the trail stated.
Even with this growing list, ATBT does their best to stay hands-off in what the stores choose to do with the crowd.
“Since we have our two flagship events bookending the weekend [the opening and closing parties] we try to let the bookstores decide their own special pop ups during the weekend.” ATBT said.
They did state, however, that they act as a source of connection for bookstores to reach out to authors or vendors.
“There’s a strong sense of community among local book-lovers,” ATBT said.