Bookseller
| Bookseller | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Type | Location |
| Address | Across the town's river, above JojaMart |
The Bookseller is a travelling shop rather than a building. Marcello sets up his stall on the rise above JojaMart twice a season, on days picked at random from a short list, and a balloon on the calendar warns which ones. He sells books, and in Stardew Valley books are permanent upgrades: faster running, better artifact prices, extra loot from monsters, double wood from felled trees. He also takes books back, trading duplicates for stacks of useful goods. For a farmer with gold piling up, the Bookseller is the best money sink in the valley, because every purchase changes how the rest of the save plays.
Area
The stall stands on the eastern side of Pelican Town, up and behind the JojaMart building, which later becomes the Movie Theater. A small sign above Pierre's General Store hints at the spot, and a flight of steps leads up to it. Those steps are often buried under wood and stone, so the first trip usually needs an axe and a pickaxe before the farmer can get through.
Marcello's hot air balloon is parked beside the stall, which is the giveaway about who he is: he is the balloon pilot from Harvey's ten-heart scene.
Shops
The stall opens all day on the days he visits, and a notice in the corner of the screen on waking says he is in town. The calendar outside Pierre's General Store marks his two days each season with a balloon, and the possible dates sit in a fixed pool: in spring the 11th, 12th, 21st, 22nd and 25th, in summer the 9th, 12th, 18th, 25th and 27th, in fall a longer run from the 4th through to the 25th, and in winter the 5th, 11th, 12th, 19th, 22nd and 24th.
A handful of books are always on the shelf. Way Of The Wind pt. 1 makes the farmer run faster, and pt. 2 appears once the first has been read and stacks on top of it. Horse: The Book speeds up riding, Ol' Slitherlegs clears the drag out of grass and crops, and the Price Catalogue puts item values into every tooltip, which for three thousand gold is the cheapest quality-of-life purchase in the game.
The rest of the stock is random. Skill books that hand over a lump of experience in one skill rotate through, and they get cheaper the deeper the stock list goes, so the same book can cost ten thousand gold on one visit and five thousand on another. Book Of Stars is the standout, because it spreads its experience across every skill at once. The power books, the ones that change a rule rather than a number, only start appearing from a third year: The Art O' Crabbing doubles Crab Pot yields a quarter of the time, Woody's Secret occasionally doubles wood from a tree, Monster Compendium doubles Monster Loot now and then, Treasure Appraisal Guide raises artifact prices, Friendship 101 speeds up friendships, and Mapping Cave Systems halves Marlon's item recovery fee. Once a hundred Golden Walnuts have been found, the Queen Of Sauce Cookbook turns up and teaches every Queen Of Sauce recipe the farmer has missed.
Notes
Books found in the wild are worth keeping rather than reading twice. Once a book's power has been absorbed, a duplicate can be traded at the stall for goods, and the exchange rates are generous: Woodcutter's Weekly buys a hundred Wood, Mining Monthly twenty Coal, Bait And Bobber thirty Deluxe Bait, Woody's Secret twenty Hardwood, Book Of Stars eight Fairy Dust, and Monster Compendium a Slime Incubator or a Slime Egg-Press.
Some trades are better value than the gold price of the book itself. Book Of Mysteries turns into a stack of Mystery Boxes, Jewels Of The Sea into three jellies, and Treasure Appraisal Guide into Spicy Eels or Artifact Troves, which is a tidy way to turn a shelf of read books into equipment.
All Shops
Every entry in this group, with its key details.
| Name | Image | Open Hours |
|---|---|---|
| Abandoned House | 
|
All Day |
| Adventurer's Guild | 
|
2:00pm to 2:00am |
| Blacksmith | 
|
9:00am to 4:00pm |
| Bookseller | 
|
- |
| Carpenter's Shop | 
|
9:00am to 5:00pm |
| Casino | 
|
9:00am to 11:50pm |
| Desert Trader | 
|
Always |
| Fish Shop | 
|
9am to 5pm |
| Giant Stump | 
|
- |
| Harvey's Clinic | 
|
9:00am to 3:00pm |
| Ice Cream Stand | 
|
1pm to 5pm during Summer |
| Island Trader | 
|
Always |
| JojaMart | 
|
9:00am to 11:00pm |
| Marnie's Ranch | 
|
9:00am to 4:00pm; (Building open 9am to 6pm) |
| Oasis | 
|
9:00am to 11:50pm |
| Pierre's General Store | 
|
Shop: 9am to 5pm; Building: 9am to 9pm |
| Qi's Walnut Room | 
|
Always |
| The Stardrop Saloon | 
|
12:00pm to 12:00am |
| Traveling Cart | 
|
6:00am to 8:00pm Friday and Sunday; 5:00pm to 2:00am during Night Market; 12:00pm to 2:00am during Desert Festival |
| Volcano Dungeon | - | - |
| Wizard's Tower | 
|
6:00am to 11:00pm |