Est. 1973 · Terrell → Mesquite → Dallas
Fifty years of recycled reading
Three names, a handful of moves, one unchanged idea: good books deserve more than one reader.
The long read
How we got here
John and Marquetta have run these bookstores through five decades — here’s the short version of a long, good story.
Saturday Books
John and Marquetta open a one-day-a-week bookshop in 300 square feet of Earl’s corrugated-iron warehouse in Terrell, Texas — Saturdays only.
Paperbacks Plus
With $500 in cash, $500 on a credit card and Earl building the shelves, the first full-time bookstore opens in downtown Mesquite — 850 square feet at $100 a month.
Growing roots
They buy the bigger building next door at 108 E. Davis — the stores' first long-term home — and open the Lakewood store on Abrams Road in Dallas.
Lucky Dog Books
The Dallas shops take the Lucky Dog name after 38 years as Paperbacks Plus — and the Oak Cliff store opens on West Jefferson the same year.
10534 Garland Rd
After the Lochwood years and a stop at Casa Linda Plaza, the East Dallas store lands at its current home on Garland Road.
Still recycling books
50+ years in, the mission hasn’t changed: keep good books moving through Dallas at prices anyone can afford.
The origin trade
It started with 1,100 paperbacks and a soft-drink box
In 1973, John and Marquetta opened Saturday Books in 300 square feet of a corrugated-iron warehouse in Terrell, Texas — a building John’s father Earl had built in the mid-’50s. It was open Saturdays only.
Part of the opening inventory: 1,100 paperbacks that John got from Ken Gjemre of Half Price Books — traded for an old horizontal-style soft-drink box. A year later, with $500 in cash, $500 on a credit card and Earl’s help building shelves, Paperbacks Plus opened full-time in downtown Mesquite, in 850 square feet renting for $100 a month.
That name carried the stores for 46 years. In 2012 the Dallas shops became Lucky Dog Books — and the Oak Cliff store opened the same year.
Why “Lucky Dog”?
The name on the sign
“He was so happy because he was a Lucky Dog. He had found the particular book he came for, quite against the odds… It’s happened so many times that I have taken someone to the stacks to look for a particular title with no real reasonable expectation of having it, only to walk back exclaiming on what a Lucky Dog the seeker was today. One of our bigger pleasures.”
The stores have wandered — Lakewood, Lochwood, Casa Linda Plaza, and since 2018 the current East Dallas home at 10534 Garland Rd — and at one point there were four at once. The Mesquite original was passed on in early 2021 to a younger couple, who carried it forward as The Book Co.
Badges of honor
Three names, fifty-plus years
Saturday Books
One year, one day a week, in Earl’s warehouse on Roberts Street, Terrell.
Paperbacks Plus
46 years of used books & music, from downtown Mesquite across Dallas.
Lucky Dog Books
Keep on bookin’ — East Dallas and Oak Cliff, open every single day.
In the papers (and on the air)
Dallas has noticed
The Dallas Morning News
A Sunday feature on the long-running East Dallas bookstore riding out the changes — September 8, 2013, photos by Kye R. Lee.
Read the storyKERA 90.1 FM
Featured among Dallas’s local bookstores on KERA’s “Local Bookmarks” radio segment, June 9, 2014.
Listen at KERAThe Mesquite News
Covered the stores’ 40th-anniversary celebration in Mesquite, June 2014 — story by Kenny Green.
From the archiveA thank-you, on the record
To Poor David’s Pub
We’d like to thank David Card of Poor David’s Pub for being so supportive over the last many years, helping us get through some really tough spots with the bookstores.
We’ve been hearing great live music at his places since he was on McKinney Avenue back in the ’70s — check out his lineup and sample some of his performers. There are sure to be some you’ll enjoy.
The philosophy
A service for the neighborhood
In the owners’ own words: “We look at what we do in our stores as a service for the neighborhood within which we operate… our reason for being is not to extract every possible dollar from our customers.”
That’s why there’s a free pile out front, trade credit you can bank for later, cookies at the counter and couches nobody rushes you off of. Come be part of the next chapter.
Visit the stores