Sydni Kreps fills the shelves of her bookstore, More Than Words, with the best new fiction and nonfiction, as well as classics. Her store is located in the Center North strip mall next to the old parking ramp. (Photo/Nancy Hanson.)

Sydni Kreps likes talking about books nearly as much as she loves reading them. That’s the spirit that welcomes customers to her new bookshop, More Than Words.
She is the kind of woman to whom friends turn for book recommendations. She devours book reviews and announcements of new releases. She’s a regular in online book-lovers groups and Booktube, the corner of Youtube devoted to volumes. If you’re looking for ideas of what to read next, look no farther: Sydni is bursting with well-honed recommendations.
In an era when smart minds once forecast the end of ink-and-paper publications, Sydni says her five-month-old enterprise is thriving. Located at 40 Fourth St. N. in the commercial strip known as the North Center Mall, her shop has been welcoming a steady stream of customers whose ages and interests come as something of a surprise.
“I’ve been pleasantly surprised,” she confesses. “I expected most of my customers would be about my age, plus or minus ten years, the kind who are very active on Instagram. “They have turned out to also be a nice mix of older people, families and younger kids. From the start, my goal has been to have a little bit of something for everybody.”
The Davies High School and Concordia College graduate had dreamed of opening her own bookstore since she was very young. “If you’d asked me as a kid, that’s what I would have told you,” she reports. “I’m very enmeshed in the book world – an avid reader to a fault.”
But her route to the bookshop was roundabout. She graduated from Concordia in 2016 with a degree in mixed-media communications and spent her first year as communications coordinator at Trinity Lutheran Church. Drawn to education, she went on to earn a master’s in education at North Dakota State University in 2019. She landed a teaching job at Cheney Middle School in West Fargo. But just as she was about to begin, her father Mark Kreps died in a traffic accident.
She moved on the next year to West Fargo High School. “But halfway through, the grief caught up with me,” she remembers. “I had gotten a tattoo of something he always said to me – ‘I love you more than words.’ I looked at it and had an epiphany moment. I needed some joy.”
The answer? The bookshop that bears her father’s words of love.
The pieces, she says, began falling in place. She found her perfect location in the small strip mall built by her dad’s grandfather, Bert Kvamme. She learned about bookstore operation from (what else?) a book, attended the Midwest Booksellers Association convention, and connected with other independent booksellers online. “In the early months, I found it was more challenging than I thought,” she admits. But she persevered, and on July 9 – 18 months or so after beginning her project – she opened the doors to More Than Words.
The bookshop carries what’s newest and most highly regarded in the book world, including the latest winners of the National Book Awards, the New York Times “best books of 2023,” her own favorite reads, and categories like “bookish books for book lovers.”
Like other indie booksellers, Sydni concedes that online megaseller Amazon may be her biggest competition. But unlike many of her peers, she has done something about it. Working with an online seller called Bookshop.org, she offers customers an equally convenient way to browse and order books without leaving their homes.
Her own website – www.MoreThanWordsFM.com – links to the Bookshop.org site, which fulfills the orders by mail, it shares profits from those online orders with More Than Words.
“Books are not going anywhere,” she asserts, “though they may come in different forms nowadays.” In January, she will begin offering their digital counterparts herself, with e-books and audiobooks available from her website. “You’ll be able to use them on any device, just like Amazon,” she says. “But you’ll be supporting your favorite independent bookstore.”
Her website lays out Sydni’s vision for her shop: “We’re a community space for readers — both avid and soon-to-be — where you can browse the shelves and mull over the unexpected. A space where you can connect with a neighbor to talk books and big ideas. An opportunity to quench your thirst and have a snack while you chew over what it means to be more than words.”
More Than Words is open from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and from 10 to 4 Saturday. It’s also open Sunday from noon to 4 p.m. through the end of December.