But the New Atlantic Independent Booksellers Association, a regional trade group with 300 members, has just one member in Newark (New Jersey Books); Buffalo, population 292,000, has 6 member bookstores, while Pittsburgh, with 334,000 people, has 19.  A glance at the local Yellow Pages would suggest that Newark has about a dozen stores that sell books. They are an eclectic lot, some housed in churches or in shops that sell other things (you can have a picture framed at Source of Knowledge, on Broad Street).  There is Hudson Books at the train station, and Borders outposts in Terminals A and C at Newark Liberty International Airport. Religious bookstores like Shaddai Christian and Vida Jesus dot the city. And there are a handful of smaller shops like Fortress of Solitude downtown, which brags of the largest collection of old comic books in the state, and Central do Brasil, in the Ironbound neighborhood, where about 100 Portuguese-language books are on sale between the children’s flip-flops and canned hearts of palm.  But it can be difficult to buy, say, a book about Newark in Newark.  A local literary treasure hunt turned up a book about the 1967 riots at the Rutgers bookstore, some blank stares at the train station and frustration at the New Jersey Historical Society, which said it had sold out of John T. Cunningham’s “Newark,” a history that the society had published itself, but that was currently out of print. Finally, on a small shelf in the cavernous New Jersey Books downtown, there were a pictorial history of the city, a book about Newark’s vanished Little Italy, and one remaining copy of Mr. Cunningham’s “Newark,” all 408 pages, for $39.  But the benches in the store are often empty. The last book reading by an author was four years ago (Michael Baisden). The manager, Allen Roth, said that most of the store’s revenue came from selling textbooks to college students. Holding a used copy of “Macbeth,” priced to move at $1, Mr. Roth said many city residents simply could not afford to buy books, adding, “We send a lot of people to the library.”  About a mile away, opposite Newark’s new arena, is Source of Knowledge, whose owner, Dexter George, 43, has been running little bookstores here for much of his adult life. The most popular titles, he said, include books by the author Al-Saadiq Banks, a Newark native.  “Cashmere has just been released from federal prison,” reads a summary on the back of Mr. Banks’s “Block Party,” which is part of the “True 2 Life” series. “After serving seven years, he has finally paid the government the debt he owed them. Now he wants what the streets owe him.”  Mr. George, who is originally from Tobago, said that some of his customers “relate to these books, because they tells stories about their lives.” But books alone cannot keep the small store afloat; Mr. George also sells masks from Ghana and sculptures from Zimbabwe.  Frank Murphy, 65, helped his wife run independent bookstores for years, including the small one in Newark’s Pennsylvania Station, where, he said, he tried to create a neighborhood-bookstore feel in a place that people dashed through. Now Mr. Murphy, a fan of the Spanish novelist Arturo Pérez-Reverte, helps students with their textbooks at the N.J.I.T. bookstore, which also sells candy, sweatshirts and best sellers  But he is pessimistic about the chances for a thriving bookstore culture in Newark. “We’re just a community that’s used to malls,” Mr. Murphy said. “Downtown is not where it’s at.”  And yet Fortress of Solitude, that trove of old comics, has survived in Newark for 23 years. Set on an out-of-the-way stretch of Broad Street, the store is a destination for comic-lovers from all over New Jersey and New York, who come for new titles as well as issues that date to the 1970s. “Secret Invasion,” a new comic series that features shape-shifting aliens known as Skrulls, is a brisk seller, along with Manga cartoons.  “My young readers keep me in the know,” said Johanna Ramirez, the 31-year-old owner.  At the Shaddai Bookstores, on Bloomfield Avenue, inspirational and religious books in Spanish and English fly off the shelves, and more personal advice is available from behind the counter.  “If someone comes here with any problem, like alcohol or drugs, we send them to different churches,” explained Juan Vasquez, the owner’s son-in-law. “We only sell books that give positive vibes.”  Albert Greco, a professor at Fordham University and the author of the “The Book Publishing Industry” (Routledge, 2005), said that in a city like Newark, without a branch of a national bookstore chain, a college campus was the most likely location for a general-interest bookstore.  Stefan Pryor, Newark’s deputy mayor for economic development, said the city was pursuing exactly that option, and working with one or more of the local universities to lure a large bookstore.  One possibility, he said, was to house such a bookstore in a new residence hall that Seton Hall’s law school is considering building.  Dr. Diner, the Rutgers chancellor, said he envisioned a “megastore” on Broad Street selling books, college apparel and coffee, operated, like an increasing number of campus stores, by a Barnes & Noble or Borders.  The 35,000 students who attend universities in Newark would provide a healthy portion of the business, Mr. Diner said. But to make a bookstore work, the readers of Newark would have to stop by, too.  A version of this article appears in print on , on Page B1 of the New York edition with the headline: Any Book Can Be a Rare Book in Bookstore-Hungry Newark. Order Reprints| Today's Paper|Subscribe
In 2007, Newark ranked last among the nation’s 69 largest cities in the number of bookstores per capita, with 15 stores for 281,000 people.