Ordering and Shipping

A note about ordering books from us via our website, in-store, on the phone, or via email: we handle your orders individually and with care. We have many thousands of books in stock but will very often need to order your books in; this is a major part of what we do each day. We place orders almost every day from our suppliers and publisher vendors. When the books arrive, we will notify you and then handle the order accordingly, preparing it for in-store pickup, delivery for homebound Moscow residents, or shipping.

A note about preorders: When a title shows a release date for a title, those dates are target release dates but, as noted below, many circumstances can prevent a book from arriving at our store on time for that release date. Do not assume that a release date is always the day that we will have your preorder ready for you to pick up. We always do our best and submit orders well in advance of release dates, but cannot guarantee the publisher and shipping companies will meet that target release date in our store. The fact that some retailers have that title out for sale does not mean that the publisher provided us with the book also, and furthermore, some unscrupulous retailers will put books out for sale BEFORE they are legally allowed to do so, knowing that their size allows them to do so without penalty. We are not allowed to break the release date agreements imposed upon us small businesses by the publishers, and we depend upon your orders and your loyalty to stay in business.

When you look at a title on our website and it offers an arrival estimate, that is generally good reliable information, but circumstances out of our control can always affect a book's arrival speed.  The books' arrival speed to our store depends on their availability and location and other factors such as warehouse staffing issues and supply chain hangups such as a shortage of truck drivers that are out of our control. Sometimes nation-wide demand for certain books is so high that publishers have to reprint titles within weeks of their original release and everyone, even the big guys, has to wait for the reprint for weeks before the books can be shipped. Sometimes the truck from the warehouse breaks down. Sometimes out of print books are only available used from other book dealers. Books that are in our supplier's West Coast warehouses normally arrive within a couple of days via UPS and a Spokane ground freight company; books that must come from other book dealers or from our supplier's East Coast warehouse normally take around ten to fourteen days to arrive via FedEx ground. If an order you are submitting is very time sensitive, please contact us by phone or in person to check for more details about arrival times. We are always happy to look up the tracking when available for your books if you are concerned; please just ask.

Our shipping options for delivering books to other locations/recipients, shown in the checkout process on this website, list average, estimated delivery speeds starting from when we ship the books out from our store to you or the intended recipient, not from when you place your order. Usually, we have to receive the books from the warehouse first, process them to fulfill your order, and then package and ship them out. These delivery estimates are based on the best information available from the USPS but again, are out of our control. When we ship books from our store to you or a gift recipient, we provide tracking info to you at the time the books are shipped.

If your book order contains several books to be shipped, we will ship them together once they have all arrived. If some of the books take longer to arrive than others, we will hold the order until it is complete before it is shipped, and will notify you of any unexpected delays and figure out how best to handle this with you. If you are picking your books up in the store or they are being delivered locally, partial orders are no problem; you can pick up or we can deliver whatever has arrived. If you are concerned about your order to be shipped being delayed because of one book taking too long to arrive, we can help you by splitting the order up for an extra shipping fee. Or, you can divide the order yourself. For instance, if you are ordering a book that has a future publication date, and also want to order items to be shipped ASAP to your friend, do the preorder separately to avoid delays. Thank you!