The grand opening was August 9.
SAN ANTONIO — A line of people wrapped around a downtown street waited patiently as a new spooky bookshop opened its doors in San Antonio.
As readers enter Ghoulish Books, they’ll notice a distinct vibe of paranormal, creepy and wonderfully weird. And the owners who work there relish in the aesthetic.
Max Booth III and his wife Lori, recently opened the bookshop in Southtown within the King William Historic District but the duo has been around, promoting spooky books for years.
“We began as a small publishing company back in 2012 called Perpetual Motion Machine Publishing, it had a different name, but eventually we changed it to Ghoulish Books because we decided we published more spooky stuff than anything else,” Max said.
“The press began growing in size and we were operating basically out of the kitchen of our little house, tripping over boxes and envelopes that needed to be shipped.”
The couple looked for an office space and found a spot in Selma that happened to be a bookstore that was closing its doors – a closure that sparked an idea.
“We always wanted to do a bookshop anyway. Why don’t we just do it? We’ll have half of the publishing company in this office and half of a spooky bookshop, so we began doing that and it began taking off,” Max said.
Ghoulish Books operated in Selma for a while until a lease opened up in the Alamo City.
Max said the new San Antonio location on south St Mary’s Street was perfect because just two blocks away is the Hermann Sons building – where the Booth’s host their annual Ghoulish Book Fest – a massive 3-day book festival that occurs every spring.
“People come from all around the planet, basically we have had people traveling from Canada, Australia, Romania. It’s been really cool. So, it’s nice that we can just kind of walk to that venue as well. But also this is a great spot because there’s so much foot traffic, everyone’s around and San Antonio is just a really spooky city,” Max said.
The grand opening of Ghoulish Books was August 9 at noon. And as Max and Lori arrived at 10 a.m. to prepare for the day they were greeted by people who had been waiting for the shop to open since 7 a.m.
“It’s cool to see people come out and like get joyous about reading especially spooky books,” Max said.
And new or recurring customers will find all sorts of weird media like novels, comics and merchandise – not typically sold at regular bookstores.
“There’s a lot of authors out there. There’s a lot of indie authors that people have never heard of that are just phenomenal. And, sadly they’ll get overlooked by mainstream just because people don’t hear of them. So, we try to promote their voices just as much as mainstream authors,” Lori said.
Max said he’s always been drawn to all things spooky and weird and credits “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre” film with affecting his early years – introducing him to the gore and bloodshed.
“You know it’s one of those movies I saw as a child and I was watching it alone and I thought I should not be watching this,” Max said laughing.
But Lori’s interest in the supernatural came from a more emotional part of her life.
“I would say my main interest in horror came around when my son was in the hospital. He was a cancer child [doing] three and a half years of chemotherapy starting when he was four. And horror was an escape for me because I could read horror and if I got too scared, I can put the book down, but I couldn’t get away from the fact that we were in a hospital and I was watching him die,” Lori said.
Thankfully her son is now in remission and doing well.
Some of Lori’s favorite authors that help her escape from the real world include her husband, Max, along with Stephen King and Jessica McHugh while Max’s favorites depend on his mood. Currently he favors “John Dies at the End” by Jason Pargin or “Negative Space” by B. R. Yeager and “Tell Me I’m Worthless” by Alison Rumfitt
So, no matter your background, age group, or aesthetic, everyone is welcome at Ghoulish Books.
“I want them to feel at home no matter who they are and we want to be all inclusive. We want to be spooky but fun,” Lori said. “It’s been even more exciting than our expectations, just people walking by going, ‘wow, this is perfect, we’ve been looking for this our whole life.”
For more about Ghoulish Books, click here.
