The Obamas Bought A Ton Of Great Books To Promote 'Small Business Saturday'

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In what has become a Thanksgiving tradition for the First Family, President Obama took Sasha and Malia book shopping this weekend to promote Small Business Saturday, a day created by American Express in 2010 to help boost mom-and-pop stores that can't compete with big box stores on Black Friday or online retail giants on Cyber Monday.

The Obamas have shown support for the initiative over the years by patronizing local bookstores in and around D.C. and encouraging others to do the same.

This year the Obamas chose Politics & Prose, a tiny independent bookstore in Northwest DC, for their book-buying spree. The Huffington Post reports that Politics & Prose was also where First Lady Michelle Obama signed copies of her book "American Grown: The Story of the White House Kitchen Garden and Gardens Across America" in May 2013. Other bookstores that have received a presidential visit in the past include Kramer Books in Dupont Circle and One More Page Books in Arlington, VA.

The trip was well-documented on the White House twitter account, which included a tweet written by Obama himself encouraging Americans to join him in supporting their local stores:

According to American Express, Americans spent $5.5 billion at independent businesses in 2012.

The Obamas spent about half an hour at Politics & Prose, browsing bookshelves and chatting with camera-phone wielding customers before eventually buying 21 titles, Reuters reports. "It's a long list," Obama told reporters while paying. He didn't note which books would be given as gifts this season and which the Obamas would keep for themselves, only stating, "I've got books for every age group, from 5 to 52."

Here are the books that made it into the Obamas' shopping cart.

1. The Lowland by Jhumpa Lahiri: Never one to disappoint, Lahiri has delivered another extraordinary tale of brotherhood, culture, and revolution in her latest novel, 'The Lowland." The story begins in 1960s Calcutta but soon transcends decades and continents as a brotherly bond is tested by a social revolution shaking India and the promises of a better life in America. The San Francisco Chronicle calls Lahiri "one of our most beautiful chroniclers of the aching disjunctions of emigration and family."

2. Flora and Ulysses: The Illuminated Adventures by Kate DiCamillo: From #1 best-selling New York Times author DiCamillo comes a superhero, laugh-out-loud story about self-described cynic Flora Belle Buckman, a squirrel, and a vacuum cleaner. The novel is interspersed with comic-style graphic sequences and full-page illustrations, making it a guaranteed hit with readers ages 8-12.

3. Red Sparrow by Jason Matthews: Veteran CIA officer Jason Matthews spins a tale of post-Cold War espionage, seduction, and cyberwarfare in this explosive John le Carré-style spy novel about a beautiful Russian intelligence officer assigned to operate against a young CIA agent.

4. Lulu and the Brontosaurus by Judith Viorst and Lane Smith: Viorst and Smith deliver a lighthearted chapter book about a spoiled young lady who wants a brontosaurus for her birthday. Rebuffed by her parents, she marches off into the forest to find her pet, but soon discovers the error of her ways when the brontosaurus she meets wants to make a pet out of her.

5. Ragtime by E.L. Doctorow: Written in 1975 and added to TIME's list of 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century in 1988, "Ragtime" is an American classic that has been adapted into a movie and a highly successful Broadway show. Set at the turn of the 20th century, "Ragtime" employs fictionalized and historical characters to capture the racist, classist, romantic and wildly disruptive spirit of the American 'melting pot.'

6. Journey by Aaron Becker: Author-illustrator Becker pays homage to the great "Harold and the Purple Crayon' (also on this list) in his wordless story about a lonely girl who uses a red marker to draw her way into a magical adventure. Beckers' finely detailed pen-and-ink line drawings are combined with luminous washes of watercolor that will captivate the attention of even the most fidgety preschooler.

7. The Buddha in the Attic by Julie Otsuka: Winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award For Fiction, 'The Buddha in the Attic' tells the story of a group of young women brought from Japan to San Francisco as "picture brides" in the early 1900s. The New York Times Book Review calls Otsuka's "incantatory style" "close to poetry" as she gives voice to the lonely, confusing, and at times terrifying experiences of thousands of Japanese women.

8. Harold and the Purple Crayon by Crockett Johnson: Harold and his magical purple crayon have been delighting preschoolers since 1955 (and inspiring doodling on walls for just as long). The curious 4-year-old protagonist draws his surroundings to fit his whimsy in the ultimate expression of childhood imagination.

9. A Constellation of Vital Phenomena by Anthony Marra: In this 400-page novel of love and courage set in wartime Chechnya, two doctors risk everything to save a child being hunted by the same people who murdered her family. Marra's narrative moves fluidly between past and present to contextualize the little girl's ordeal within Chechnya's long history of devastating civil wars.

10. The Sports Gene: Inside the Science of Extraordinary Athletic Performance by David Epstein: Sports Illustrated senior writer David Epstein wades into the burgeoning science of training regimens and genetic sequencing to determine whether the Serena Williams and Usain Bolts of the world are products of their environments or their DNA. Epstein doesn't shy away from controversy and instead explores the research behind gender and racial stereotypes in sports, producing a fascinating and thought-provoking look at why top athletes excel.

11. Collision Low Crossers: A Year Inside the Turbulent World of NFL Football by Nicholas Dawidoff: Dawidoff spends a year with the New York Jets and delivers an intelligent and original inside-look at a sport that has already been covered obsessively from every possible angle. Pulitzer Prize-winning author Thomas Powers ("The Killing of Crazy Horse") writes that 'Collision Low Crossers' is "closely and boldly observed, frankly reported, ferociously written with both humor and humanity" and "one of the best books ever written about sports."

12. Wild by Cheryl Strayed: At age 26, following her mother's death, a divorce, and a string of reckless behavior, Strayed finds herself on the Pacific Crest Trail, alone and determined to rescue herself from her own demons. "Wild" documents Strayed's emotional, grueling, and at times perilous journey through California and Oregon as she grapples with unbelievable loss and attempts to find the strength to keep living.

13. All That Is by James Salter: Born in 1925, Salter has won literary awards across the decades for his novels, screenplays, and short stories that Edward Hirsch once described as "wholly distinctive, beautiful and implacable." In his latest work, Salter - who served as an Army Air Force pilot between 1945 and 1957 - uses a WWII naval officer returning home from war as a canvas on which to explore the conflicting and contradictory archetypes of the 1950s American male. It is a story not to be missed.

14. Half Brother by Kenneth Oppel: The only child of two eccentric behavioral scientists, 13-year-old Ben is an unhappy kid who soon finds his solitude disrupted when his mother brings home a baby chimpanzee for research. Printz Honor-winning author Oppel presents his readers with tough ethical questions as Ben's brotherly bond with the chimp gets in the way of his parents' experiments.

15. Heart of a Samurai by Margi Preus: Preus' first novel for young readers hit it out of the park, becoming a 2011 Newbery Honor Book, an ALSC Notable Book and a recipient of the Asian Pacific American Award for Children's Literature. "Heart of a Samurai" tells the true story of a 14-year-old Japanese boy, Manjiro, who is rescued by Americans when his fishing boat sinks in 1841 and taken to America. The captivating and heartwarming story is illustrated with Manjiro's own pencil drawings in addition to other archival material.

16. My Ántonia by Willa Cather: Cather achieved a well-deserved place in literary history for her 'prairie trilogy,' of which "My Ántonia" (1918) is the last (and best). The trilogy, which includes "O Pioneers!" and "The Song of the Lark," brought the American West to life and promoted regional American stories as a valid part of mainstream literature.

17. The Ballad of the Sad Cafe by Carson McCullers: This collection of short stories assembles McCullers' best work into a charming and at times haunting novella that includes "Wunderkind," an autobiographical piece published in 1936 when McCullers was just 17.

18. Jinx by Sage Blackwood: The first in a fantasy series geared toward middle schoolers, "Jinx" tells the familiar tale of an abandoned but highly gifted orphan who must make his way through a magical forest in search of a counterspell for his wizard friend. Booklist calls it a "literary cut above Eoin Colfer's 'Artemis Fowl'" with the same fast-paced action and comedic hijinks.

19. The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini: Hosseini's unforgettable literary debut in 2004 introduced Americans to a complicated, beautiful, and entirely human side of Afghanistan at a time when the hunt for Bin Laden was all anyone knew about that distant and mountainous land. Hosseini's tragic and yet wonderfully humorous story of a doomed friendship between two boys of different social classes has become an instant classic and permanent addition to every "must-read" list.

20. Ottoline and the Yellow Cat by Chris Riddell: Young Ottoline, who lives in an elaborate apartment in Big City with her best friend and guardian Mr. Monroe, is a feisty mix of Eloise and Nancy Drew, solving mysteries by day and wishing her parents would come home from their travels by night. Riddell uses red to accent otherwise black and white illustrations, and the text-to-picture ratio is perfect for especially reluctant readers.

21. Moonday by Adam Rex: One night the Moon lowers itself into a family's backyard and the little girl finds a way to return the moon to its place in the sky. Rex pens a beautiful, quiet ode to the magic of nighttime in this picture book lullaby.