Seemingly Out of Nowhere, Illinois Getting 4 Big New Bookstores

If you had asked me at the beginning of the year if Illinois would see a rash of new bookstores opening, I would have said you were crazy. Shows you what I know as the Land of Lincoln is indeed getting 4 big new bookstores seemingly out of nowhere and they're opening soon.

Finance Buzz broke the news that Barnes & Noble had plans to open 58 new book store locations and 4 of those 58 are in Illinois. Most appear to be opening in October, too. Here are the new incoming bookstores:

Barnes & Noble, Clark and Diversey, Chicago

Barnes & Noble, Northbrook, Illinois

Barnes & Noble, Oswego, Illinois

Barnes & Noble, Wicker Park, Chicago

With the advent of books on devices, I figured that physical paper books were going the way of the dinosaur. I was thankfully very wrong. It appears there's an embrace from the younger generation of physical media again with things like vinyl records seeing a resurgence. There's something unique about being able to have physical ownership of an album, movie or book that the download on a device will never be able to replicate.

Are these 4 new Illinois bookstore locations the sign of a turnaround? Time will tell if this is just a fad or really a new long-term appreciation of physical media over the digital.