A Conversation with Liberation Station Bookstore
by Ally Hendricks
During the 2025 Petersberg Book Fest, hosted by Resist Booksellers, I got a chance to sit down with Victoria Scott-Miller, owner of Liberation Station Bookstore; the first Black-owned children’s bookstore in North Carolina. The bookstore has been through many iterations: it started as a pop-up in 2019, moved to a physical location in 2024, was forced to close due to online and local threats shortly after, and is now re-opening in Raleigh, NC in December of this year.
Victoria Scott-Miller at the previous physical site.
Liberation Station Bookstore focuses on providing a refuge for Black children and the Black community that surrounds them. To Scott-Miller, having this representation in literature means everything.
“When [Black children] go into a bookstore and they don't see books that represent them, what it's saying is that my very existence is optional, that it can or cannot be on the shelf, that it is or is not a standard, and it's not consistent. And so that psychological wound shows up in the way that they show up in the world. It's important to cultivate a space for which all children can be seen and feel valued…”
While at its roots the bookstore is for children, there are many ways that Scott-Miller paves the way for intergenerational participation. To start, every book housed in the store is read by all members of her immediate family: herself, her husband, and her two sons. Having these distinct perspectives and experience about the books on the shelves helps give customers a more personal experience.
“When you go to a major chain and you ask for a particular book, you could easily go on the computer and, you know, say, hey, this will fit within what you're looking for. But it's another thing to be met with real-time stories about what the work felt like, right. I think about a moment when you drink something and you remember how it felt going down. I think that is the approach we take to the books. It's very important that we understand how it made us feel when we initially interacted with it. Did it actually make us feel good? And being able to have an opinion about that revelation with the people that are coming into our space, that's really important to me, that we have authentic interactions with every book that we put on our shelves.”
On top of her feelings about representation and the books Scott-Miller’s family reads, she has authored two books herself, At Night They Danced, and Miss Edmonia’s Class of Wildfires. Both children’s books highlight Black children and diverse communities.
Liberation Station Bookstore’s previous physical location was in downtown Raleigh, a conscious choice and a political statement, as Black people were once unable to check out books from the downtown library location. Scott-Miller was forced to shut down the location, however, after receiving threats to her family’s safety. While Scott-Miller faces the uneasiness of reopening, she acknowledges the importance of safe spaces for Black children.
“I just felt that the time had to be now. The spaces of refuge for Black children, specifically, are getting smaller and smaller. And I know what our offering has done for the community… Thinking about what our children are carrying based on the conversations that they're experiencing, we need a place of refuge. Even if it's just to sit silently near the window in the corner while the light shines on you, on a cool summer day, like, that is what you need. And so that's what we hope to bring.”
When the store reopens on December 29th, it will be at Washington Terrace, one mile away. The political statement is still there, just shifted, as the new location is a historically Black shopping center, in a historically Black neighborhood, with a rich history of Black-owned businesses, success, and community. It also is close to the Richard B. Harrison Library, which was once the only place Black people could check out books.
The store will now be surrounded by Black-owned businesses such as White’s Barbershop and Juiced, providing a place for conversation surrounding health, wellness, and community. Community is a big focus for Victoria Scott-Miller, and the drive behind Liberation Station Bookstore.
“[Community means] agency. It means freedom. It means imaginative possibility. I mean community, the very act of being communal, is a form of rest because it says that we're not going to be doing this thing alone, or by ourselves. There's a cost to liberation and it often is a form of laboring. And I felt that initially when we opened, but once I kind of laid it out on the altar of possibility and said, I'm going to let my community in so that we can collectively do this work. The burden became lighter, and it became clearer.”
The reopening is being funded in part by a focus on community efforts; the GoFundMe already has surpassed $30,000, and is well over 50% of the goal. The physical store itself is also being decorated with community in mind, and Scott-Miller has provided opportunities for the public to come and discuss what they would like to see at the store. And there is a plan in place for the space to become the refuge that she intends it to be: there will be sensory-friendly seating, a Braille affirmation wall, a podcast studio where the community can come to record thoughts and experiences, a mural, and more.
“If we want to keep what we have, we build it on our own. And what better time to do that with a 100% community funded bookstore, community loved bookstore. And when I say community loved, it means that we are making every consideration with our community; down to the color… But the community has driven what this next version of Liberation Station would be.”
Like every decision Scott-Miller makes, the day of reopening the store is intentional. December 29th is the fourth day of Kwanzaa, the day of Ujamaa, and celebrates cooperative economics. It is the understanding that a community has a commitment to each other to share social wealth and share the workload to sustain itself. Ujamaa also focuses on the generosity of others, extending that generosity as a commitment to social justice.
Of course, Liberation Station Bookstore is not just taking from the community, but is an active participant in giving back as well. The store has many “activation sites” in the Triangle area where children can receive free books, some of which have been around since 2019. One of these sites is Duke Garden’ Black Lit Library, where diversity is recognized and uplifted.
“We started our Black Lit Library inside of the classroom pairing nature with books that were written about Black children in nature to actually see themselves from a holistic perspective about their contribution, being as necessary as being a bee. And that actually grew through grant funding to a permanently housed space in the Storytime Garden. So we have a Black Lit library that's permanently housed in the Storytime Garden.”
A storytime event held at Duke Gardens’ Black Lit Library
During my conversation with Victoria Scott-Miller, her love and passion for community radiated throughout. To see a thriving sense of community, one where cooperation and doing the work is shared by all, is an important way to see the world. From just listening to Scott-Miller’s story and everything she has accomplished, it is easy to feel inspired.
“I am all mother, all Black woman, artist and activist, community member. And looking at the time, you think about what can I offer in a particular space that's within my realm of either influence or possibility. And you have to say, what will be my contribution?”
