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The Postiest postcard sets feature landscapes, exteriors, and architecture from across the world. Each postcard image is accompanied by a story: details about the featured place, plus a recommended book pairing (accessible on this site, via a QR code printed on the back of the card). The sets are perfect for book enthusiasts, history buffs, and travel lovers. Snail mail lovers unite!The back of each postcard helps you capture your moment: there's a dedicated space to record location, temperature, and weather from your sending location. (And for Postcrossing enthusiasts, a designated area next to the addressee lines is perfect for your Postcard ID!)Our postcards are printed on 4"x6", 16-17pt matte cardstock, durable for domestic and international mailing.Keep in touch with a story.
Click your image to get the story.
Click your image to get the story.
Click your image to get the story.
Click your image to get the story.
Click your image to get the story.
Cherry Blossom Coral, Great Barrier Reef (2019).You're looking at a branch of cherry blossom coral (Siphonogorgia godeffroyi) in Sea Country, off the coast of Port Douglas, Australia. The Great Barrier Reef, which was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1981, has been home to human and ecological communities for millennia. See how Sea Country's Traditional Owners are working to ensure traditional knowledge can protect, care for, and strengthen the health of the Reef.Recommended book pairing:
The Reef: A Passionate History
Iain McCalman's exploration of the Great Barrier Reef's human, political, and ecological history, delivered through twenty interconnected biographies.Available as part of the UNESCO World Heritage and Creatures Big and Small postcard sets.
Building Facade, East Dallas, Texas (2019).You're looking at the Cantegral Street facade of 2700 Swiss Ave. The building dates to 1925.Recommended book pairing:
Standing: One Man's Odyssey During the Turbulent '60s
Memoir written by Dallas civil rights activist, teacher, and healer Ernest McMillan.Available as part of the Texas in Focus postcard set.
Horses in sunset at a ranch just outside Palo Duro Canyon, Texas (2020).Palo Duro Canyon is the United States's second largest canyon. It sits in the Texas panhandle, about 30 miles southeast of Amarillo. Now a state park, the canyon was the site of the final battle of the Red River War, which culminated in the Comanche exile to and detention at Fort Sill, and the end of Comanchería.Recommended book pairing:
Now I Surrender
Álvaro Enrigue's epic set in Comanchería; interwoven historical fiction, fiction, and memoir bringing to life the borderlands between Mexico and the United States in the mid-1800s. This is the book version of watching a show set in the past, which suddenly cuts to a documentary giving context about the wider world influencing the story, which then cuts to a travelogue that shows you what the place looks like and feels like in real life. A really special way to inhabit the past.Available as part of the Sunsets, Texas in Focus, and Creatures Big and Small postcard sets.
Crab Spider on giant zinna, Dallas, Texas (2023).
You're looking at a crab spider laying in wait for lunch on a giant zinna flower in Dallas, Texas. Crab spiders, which are ambush predators, hunt for insects with their pinchers instead of webs. They come in various colors and shapes. Some, like this one, prefer to hunt on flowers. Some female flower crab spiders can even change color to hide better against their floral backdrops.Recommended book pairing:
Death of the Author
Nnedi Okorafor's story-within-a story about identity and disability and control, featuring post-human robots (including Udide, a giant robot spider).Available as part of the Creatures Big and Small postcard set.
Il Duomo, Siena, Italy (2008).You're looking at the iconic stripes of the Duomo (officially, the Santa Maria Assunta Cathedral) in Siena. It's as clean an example of Italian gothic architecture as they come, begun in the early 1100s and completed in 1382, and covered inside and outside with major artistic works by Pisano, Antonio Federghi, Donatello, Pinturicchio, Michelangelo, and Bernini.Recommended book pairing:
Artemesia
Art historian Anna Banti's (née Lucia Lopresti) second novel, which imagines the life of Artemisia Gentileschi, born in 1598 to the daughter of an esteemed painter, and who taught art in Naples and painted women of Roman and biblical history. Don't miss the edition with Susan Sontag's introduction.
Port Douglas, Australia (2019).Recommended book pairing:
Birds of Opulence
Palau de les Arts (Opera House) at the Ciudad de las Artes y las Ciencias (City of Arts and Sciences), Valencia, Spain (2008).Day is turning to night over Valencia's Opera House. The City of Arts and Sciences complex, designed by architect Santiago Calatrava, is a recent contribution to Valencia's long history, which pre-dates Roman occupation, and includes Visigoth and Moorish periods. When this moment was captured in March 2008, the air smelled of gardenia and orange blossom.Recommended book pairing:
The Dream Hotel
By Pulitizer Prize finalist Laila Lalami, a novel about a woman in the near-future who is preemptively detained for dangerous, postpartum dreams she had about her husband during her baby's infancy. A book about motherhood, the surveillance state, and mass incarceration.Available as part of the Sunsets postcard set.
Anzac Park, Port Douglas, Australia (2019).
Sydney Opera House, Australia (2019).Recommended book pairing:
The Fetishist
A darkly comic novel centered on Alma, a Korean American cello prodigy, her daughter, and her past love(r). A book about family stories, about adoration versus love, and about the existential crisis of feeling truly known while living in a society that caricatures something fundamental to your identity.Available as part of the Unexpected Angles postcard set.
Surfside Beach, Texas, USA (2021).You're looking at sanderlings grabbing dinner on the pedestrian beach of Surfside Beach, about forty miles down the Bluewater Highway from Galveston. This area of the Gulf of Mexico, historically the home of the Karankawa people, is part of a chain of barrier islands spanning over 234 miles.Recommended book pairing:
On Juneteenth
Annette Gordon-Reed's interwoven memoir and history chronicling, from the earliest presence of Black people in Texas to the day in Galveston on June 19, 1865, when Major General Gordon Granger announced the end of legalized slavery, the integral role of African-Americans in Texas's history.Available as part of the Sunsets, Texas in Focus, and Coastlines postcard sets.
La Chiesa di Santa Maria Assunta, Positano, Italy (2018).You're looking out over the cupola of Positano's Church of Santa Maria Assunta onto the Tyrrhenian Sea. Its name comes from a 12th-century Byzantine icon of the Virgin Mary (one of the so-called "Black Madonnas," represented with darker skin). The church is a cultural gathering place for the Amalfi Coast village and UNESCO World Heritage site, including the annual, multi-week celebrations of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary every August. Buried below are the recently excavated remains of a first-century BCE Roman dining room, whose bright colored frescoes were buried by the 79 CE eruption of Mount Vesuvius (which more famously buried Pompeii and Herculaneum).Recommended book pairing:
Heavens on Earth
Carmen Boullosa's story-wtihin-a-story-within-a-story, set in a future where society is paring down language in an attempt to break from a harmful past, told by a translator and historian trying to preserve a 1500's personal history, subsequently preserved by a modern-day historian. A profound meditation on language, on history, and on what it means to be human.Available as part of the UNESCO World Heritage and Cathedrals postcard sets
Bailey, Colorado (2022).
You're looking at the sun rising over snowcapped trees in the Rocky Mountains from a point in Bailey, Colorado. This is the historic land of the Ute people and their ancestors, who hunted and traveled the Rocky Mountains as part of their seasonal movements throughout the region. Check out this ten-minute 2023 documentary about a Ute elder mentoring youth in self-love, acceptance, and embracing life through ice climbing.Recommended book pairing:
Moon of the Crusted Snow
The first book in Waubgeshig Rice's apocalypse and post-apocalypse duology set in snow-encrusted Anishinaabe land (in Northern Canada), exploring how we fall apart and how we come back together at the end of the world.Available as part of the Sunsets postcard set.
Parroquia de San Agustín, Ciudad de México, Mexico (2023).Recommended book pairing:
You Dreamed of Empires
Álvaro Enrigue's alternative history set in Tenochtitlan (modern-day Mexico City) in which Moctezuma and Cortés's first encounter results in Spanish defeat.Available as part of the Cathedrals and Unexpected Angles postcard sets.
Positano, Campania, Italy (2018).You're looking at the cemetery of Positano, which is nestled in Positano's Santa Croce neighborhood. Compared to the town itself, which was settled at least since the first century BCE, the cemetery--built in 1852--is a relatively recent addition to the Amalfi Coast landscape. Take a virtual tour.Recommended book pairing:
Swim Home to the Vanished
Magical realism rooted in Diné creation story exploring grief and finding life after loss. Written by poet Brendan Shay Basham in gorgeous prose.Available as part of the Sunsets postcard set.
Sentiero degli Dei, Agerola, Italy (2018).You're peeking over terraced farmland on the Path of the Gods, which treks from Nocelle through the collective of villages called Agerola on the Amalfi Coast. The path gets its name from the seventh canto of Homer's Odyssey: the site where Aphrodite and her fellow immortals ran to reach Odysseus's ship as his sailors (protected by the wax stuffed in their ears) navigated past the trecherous waters of the sirens. These terraces, which were first carved from the mountainside around 1000 CE, are home to lemon orchards, vineyards, olive and chestnut groves, and kitchen gardens, maintained by farmers and skilled craftsmen, whose work to preserve the terraces protects the region from landslides and ecological disaster.Recommended book pairing:
The Book of (More) Delights
Poet Ross Gay's self-described contribution to the gorgeous genre of "shortish or fragmentary essaypoemthings," a celebration of the everyday joys that, individually and collectively, make life worth living.Available as part of the Coastlines postcard set.
Villa of Mysteries, Pompeii, Italy (2016).Recommended book pairing:
My Name is RedAvailable as part of the UNESCO World Heritage and Unexpected Angles postcard sets.
Vík í Mýrdal, Iceland (2018).You're looking at Icelandic sheep grazing on Reynisfjall Mountain in Vík í Mýrdal on Iceland's southern coast. Sheep have been a fixture on the island since the Vikings settled there in the late ninth century CE and are a frequent feature in the Sagas (Iceland's collection of medieval literature), where the action often "takes place in a context of sheep-herding, horse-breeding" and other agricultural work.Recommended book pairing
Oraefi: The Wasteland
Ófeigur Sigurðsson's fever dream of a novel, featuring a doctor's investigation of a hiker's expedition on Vatnajökull Glacier, which comes to a grisly end after a wild sheep bite. Set around ninety miles east of Vík, it's a different kind of exploration of Southern Iceland's history and culture.Available as part of the Creatures Big and Small and Coastlines postcard sets.
Thórsmörk, Iceland (2018).You're looking down into the Forest of Thor--Thórsmörk or Þórsmörk--from the viewpoint at Valahnúkur. It is a valley between three glaciers, formed by volcanic eruptions and meltwaters from the Eyjafjallajökull glacier and the Mýrdalsjökull ice cap. The meltwaters braid into the the Krossá river, which you can see here winding through the valley's black volcanic silt floor. This is a land of abrupt change: forest to moss to meadow; sun to wind to hail.Recommended book pairing:
The River Has Roots
Amal El-Mohtar's adult fairytale novella, where the setting is as alive as the characters. The physical book is complemented by Kathleen Neely's illustrations; the audiobook by harp, flute, and vocal music performed by El-Mohtar and her sister, Dounya.
Stykkishólmur, Iceland (2018).Recommended book pairing:
Weather
Reminiscent of Maggie Nelson's Bluets in style, Jenny Offill's meditation on living through the present political and ecological reality as an American. A perfect time capsule of the existential angst of this moment.Available as part of the Cathedrals and Coastlines postcard sets.
Stykkishólmur, Iceland (2018).
Piccolomini Library, Siena, Italy (2024).You're looking at floor tiles in the Piccolomini Library in the Duomo of Siena. These rhombuses are 19th-century replacements for the original triangular tiles of similar design. The Library, which was completed in 1492 to satisfy then-Cardinal Francesco Piccolomini's desire for a place to protect his rich book collection, is ornately covered on its walls and ceiling by Pinturicchio's frescoes.Recommended book pairing:
Bluets
Maggie Nelson's meditation on the color blue, love, and loss. Written in the space between poetry and prose.Available as part of the UNESCO World Heritage and Cathedrals postcard sets
Street view of Il Duomo, Siena, Italy (2024).You're peeking at the cupola of Siena's Cathedral of Santa Maria Assunta through its unfinished expansion, abandoned back in the 1300s. The New Cathedral, which would have doubled the Duomo's footprint, was nixed only twenty years after its commission: a casualty of the Black Death in 1348, which killed between half and two-thirds of the city's people and which had profound effects on art and cultural projects throughout the region. In 1357, the structurally unsound parts of the New Cathedral were demolished, leaving behind various portions of the unfinished facade, side walls, north aisles, and some of the south aisle, supported with brick infill, including the one you see here.Recommended book pairing:
The Scribe of Siena
Melodie Winawer's time-travel historical fiction, set in Siena on the precipice of the Black Death.Available as part of the Cathedrals and Unexpected Angles postcard sets.
Siena, Italy (2024).
Real Jardín Botánico, Madrid (2017).
Real Alcázar de Sevilla (Seville), Spain (2017).
Recommended book pairing:
She Who Became the Sun
Borgia Apartments, Vatican City, Italy (2016).
Daintree Rainforest, Australia (2019).Recommended book pairing:
A Psalm for the Wild-Built
Becky Chambers's novella set in a future with fully sentient robots, in which humans have given the earth to the robots to steward and confine themselves to cities. This is a profound book about what it means to be alive.Available as part of the UNESCO World Heritage and Coastlines postcard sets.
Port Douglas, Australia (2019).Recommended book pairing:
The God of Small ThingsAvailable as part of the Creatures Big and Small postcard set.
Building facade, the Cedars, Dallas, Texas (2017).You're looking at a building in the Dallas neighborhood of the Cedars, taken during the 2017 Cedars Open Studio Tour, an annual event opening the homes, studios, and collective art spaces of creatives.Recommended Book Pairing:
Texas: The Great Theft
Carmen Boullosa's lyrical fiction, published in English by Dallas' literature-in-translation press, Deep Vellum; set in fictional border cities in the Rio Grande Valley and loosely based on the 1859 First Cortina War in Brownsville, Texas.Available as part of the Texas in Focus postcard set.
Lubbock, Texas (2019).Not paired book pairing
Recommended book pairing:
Babel
R.F. Kuang's delightful novel about language, power, and colonialism, set in a magical Oxford.
Caddo Lake, Texas USA (2026).Recommended Book Pairing:
Hasinai: A Traditional History of the Caddo Confederacy
A mostly oral (and partly archival) history of the Caddo people, told through the story of ceremonial song and dances, which reenact Hasinai tribal history. Written by Vynola Beaver Newkumet, a Caddoan historian, and Howard L. Meredith, a professor of American Indian Studies.Available as part of the Sunsets and Texas in Focus postcard sets.
Klyde Warren Park, Dallas, Texas USA (2025).Recommended Book Pairing:
Sky Full of Elephants
Set in a near-future where all of the white people have died by walking into bodies of water and drowning, a book about re-imagining a new world, the wounds of white supremacy that persist, and what choices we might make for liberation. Written by poet Cebo Campbell in gorgeous prose.Available as part of the Texas in Focus and Unexpected Angles postcard sets.