← From the Front Porch
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- [00:02]
Annie Jones
Welcome to from the Front Porch, a conversational podcast about books, small business, and life in the South.
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But none of that matters. All that matters is that it's Christmas and we're family. This might be a weird Christmas, but that's okay because Christmas is unruinable. Kerry Winfrey Faking Christmas I'm Annie Jones, owner of the Bookshelf and Independent Bookstore in beautiful downtown Thomasville, Georgia, and this week I'm recommending some of my favorite holiday books for cozy reading. Do you love listening to from the Front Porch? Every week you can spread the word by leaving a review on Apple Podcasts. All you have to do is open up the podcast app on your phone. Look for from the Front Porch, scroll down until you see, Write a review, then tell us what you think. Here's a recent review from Meredith New and hooked. From the sound of the squeaky chain on the porch swing to Annie's voice to what she's saying about books and life in a small town, I love inhabiting this podcast. It feels like a conversation, albeit one sided. I like to think of this podcast as a conversation too. Meredith, thank you so much for sharing your review. And thank you to all of the reviewers who've left kind and thoughtful reviews for our show. We're so grateful anytime you share from the Front Porch with your friends. Thanks to you for spreading the word about our podcast and our bookstore. Now back to the show. This episode is part of a series called Annie Recommends. We've also done Shop Dad Recommends in this format, but basically we like to talk about a kind of book stack of books that I would hand sell you if you were in the store. We've done this several times so you can go back. There are links in the show notes, but episodes 4634-734814-98504, 511, 516, 550, 555 we've done this a lot. It's in the show notes. But we've done this for audiobooks. We've done it for spooky reads. We've done it for campus novels, rom coms. So sometimes all you want is a good book list. We know this because customers come in the store or email Keela all the time asking for recommendations based on a specific genre or criteria. A bookseller's favorite task, at least in my experience, is to go around the shop and put together a stack of books for a customer who's on the hunt. Even if they don't buy every book, we pick the fun is in the discovery. I do this all the time. I don't get to work on the floor as much anymore. But I really do love when somebody comes in and they say, oh, I just finished this. What should I read next? Or you know, what should I add to my list? And I like giving them a stack truly of about four or five books. And then I tell them, whatever you don't want, I'll put back. I did this recently for a customer, hi Karen, who had just read Kathryn Newman, and I think I found a couple of books for her. It was trickier for Karen because she's read so much. And then I did it for another customer who was shopping for somebody who had been through a grieving season. She wound up going with the boy, the mole, the fox, and the horse. But anyway, I love doing this. To me, it's one of the most fun parts of the job. So that is exactly what we're trying to mimic on these episodes of from the Front Porch. Every so often I'll put together a book stack around a certain theme. This month, since we're smack dab in the middle of the holiday season now, I've got books to cozy up with for the holidays. I've made a short list of some of my favorite current and backlist titles. And just like I wouldn't overwhelm customers with a towering stack of books, I'm not going to overwhelm you either. I just want to give you five books I think you'd love, whether you're a regular reader of cozy lit or you're just just trying to get through the holidays. First up is the book A Home for the Holidays. This is by Taylor Hahn. I am pretty sure that this was my December shelf subscription selection last year. I should have looked before I started recording, but this was my holiday book last year. I feel like I typically find at least one great book each Christmas holiday season. So a few years ago it was Flight by Lynn Stager Strong, which was kind of more literary fiction. A few years ago it was the young adult novel Ten Blind Dates, which I still, I think I referenced on the last episode. I referenced my Mount Rushmore of holiday rom coms or holiday books and I certainly think that one would be included. Like I still have a print copy, I still flip through it sometimes. I even thought about downloading the audiobook this season, but there are so many that release every year and you never really know which ones are going to hit. I think Kathryn Walsh is a really great go to author. Anyway, I digress point is, last year I was looking for my holiday book and I especially struggle with December shelf subscription selections because not a lot of books come out in December. And I think I really struggle just by nature of there's not a lot to choose from. I think I really struggle knowing what to pick. But I loved this book and it was releasing in hardback. It is still only available in hardback, which is something I find a little bit odd. But it is reminiscent of my two or two of my favorite Christmas movies, While you Were Sleeping and the Family Stone. The main character is Mel. She's a wedding singer in Chicago who is grieving the unexpected death of her mother. I think you'll fall in love with Mel and she actually kind of develops this unconventional friendship relationship with her mother's former best friend. There's a multi generational sense to this novel that I think I really like around the holiday time because I'm dealing with a lot of my family and my family is multi generational, obviously. And so I do really like that she has this relationship with her mother's former best friend. There is a small romantic plot line, but I would never categorize this one as a rom com personally. To me, this is more a story about mothers and daughters. It's about grief, it's about moving forward. And there are moments when you think, oh, this is going to take a turn, or oh, this is going to be too schmaltzy. Which is often the case with holiday titles. But I feel like Taylor Hahn really knows how to rein it in this also, one thing that I'm always looking for in a book that I read during the holiday season is if it's set over a particular time frame. So this book is set over the course of two weeks in December, kind of leading up to Christmas. So you could read the book in real time if you wanted to. I think I'm giving you enough time potentially to do that. So I think that would be truly fun. That's not how I got to read it, but I would love if you got to read it that way. If you liked the book, this. Didn't this come out this year? Yes, the Griffin Sisters Greatest Hits. If you liked that. I think you will love A Home for the Holidays because there's also this element of music. Because Mel is a musician, we learn a little bit more about her mother, about the mother's relationship with her best friend. There was a lot going on here, but it was all handled really well. And like I said, it definitely has that dysfunctional multi generational family element. But it also has a slight romance and I found it to be very realistic, which is not always the case again in some of your holiday books. I will tell you that I personally as Annie B. Jones, I do skew more family stone while you were sleeping than I do Hallmark movies and so my choices are probably going to reflect that. My stack would would reflect that. But I loved this book, loved the COVID Think it would be very fun to have out and decorate with to decorate with during the holiday season. It is a Home for the Holidays by Taylor Hahn. Next in your stack, I would put the new book Before I Forget by Tori Henwood Hoenn. This released this week. And speaking of covers, this one is so great. It has a loon on the front. I just love it. It's got like this hot pink font text. I love this cover. It vaguely reminds me of the oh gosh y', all. What was that book called? The C.J. hauser Book? Because that book had ducks. I think that book had mallards on the front. Anyway, I read this one this summer and it is very much a wintry book. But I had a copy of the Arc. Again, I was looking for a December shelf subscription. I am going to go ahead and spoil for you that this is it. Too late. No, it is what it is. It's a spoiler. This is my December shelf subscription selection for this year. I read it this summer after reading Carly Fortune's One Golden Summer, which I don't always love Carly Fortune's books. I don't always think that they're for me. But one thing I do love about them is their setting. And I actually really liked One Golden Summer. I really did. I enjoyed that one quite a bit. And to me this book is a great, weirdly a great companion book to One Golden Summer. So if you read Carley Fortune's One Golden Summer a few months ago and now you're kind of looking for the wintry version, I would suggest to you that you pick up Before I Forget by Tori Henwood Hoen. This book is set in the heart of the Adirondacks, where Cricket, the main character, unexpectedly finds herself caring for her father as he grapples with early onset Alzheimer's. The book handles Cricket's quarter life crisis and her father's health with a light hand. Like the book deals with a lot of this with humor. Like based on the description I just gave you, you might think, well, Annie, that that doesn't sound like a good time. That doesn't sound cozy. But Cricket's relationship with her dad is really special and I think the portrayal of dementia is accurate. And yet you won't be drowning in grief while reading about it because again, there's a sense of humor here. The character Cricket is really, in my opinion, pretty funny. Perhaps because of her naivete, she moves back home to take care of her dad because this is like their family's lake house and she doesn't want to get rid of it and the only way to not get rid of it is to become the caregiver for her dad. The story here also takes a lot of twists and turns, including some that I was a little bit head scratchy over like wait. What? You'll see. I don't want to spoil it because it was not spoiled for me, but there is a twist that this book kind of takes that was not expected. And again, I was pretty skeptical but ultimately found it really charming. There is like in A Home for the Holidays, there is a slight romantic storyline, but that is not what is moving this book forward. This is about coming to terms with our childhoods, finding our families, and forgiving things that happened in the past. I really liked this book a lot. I was delighted to discover it and I think it'll be a fun sell this holiday season. It is not specifically Christmas and so that is one of the reasons I also wanted to include it. I know not everybody celebrates Christmas and so if you just are looking for cozy wintry books, I think this is for you. The setting is fabulous. It made me want to go to the Adirondacks. I always want to go there. I always want to go there. It doesn't take much, but I thought the setting was really good. It's what reminded me of the Carly Fortune books.
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Hey friends, it's Annie. If you're looking for another bookish show to add to your listening cue, check out the Webby Award winning daily podcast Totally Booked with Zibby. It's hosted by my fellow independent bookstore owner Zibby Owens, who's been dubbed New York City's most powerful book fluencer by Vulture. Every weekday on Totally Booked, she sits down with the best and buzziest authors to share work that's truly worth your time. And that's not all. Season two of Totally Booked Live is here. This time around, you're invited to be part of the live studio audience in New York for 16 incredible interviews with stars like Dani Shapiro and Susan Orlean. Every conversation will be released on the podcast feed after, so don't miss out. Follow Totally Booked with Zibby wherever you're listening now.
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Okay, Speaking of books that are not necessarily Christmassy, eight Heartbreaks of Hanukkah is by Jean Meltzer. The reason I'm mentioning this one is because it's new in paperback, just came out. But I adored Gene Meltzer's book, the Matzo Ball. Loved it. It would probably be in my Mount Rushmore of holiday books. This one is a second chance romance. The main character is Evelyn. She's got the perfect Hanukkah planned. She's going to spend the eight days producing the live action televised musical of A Christmas Carol. So there is. Well, you'll see, there is a little bit of. I don't know, is magical realism the right word? There is a little bit of that here. So Evelyn kind of ditches her family. She doesn't have to focus on her family as long as she focuses on her work. Does sound like the plot of a Hallmark movie, doesn't it? But then an accident on the set lands her in a medical bay with her chronic migraines. This is something Gene Meltzer writes really well about. It's one of the things I liked about the Matzo Ball was that the main character dealt with some chronic illness issues. And I think it was handled really well. I believe, if I remember right, there's like an author's note in that book. And Gene Meltzer deals with some of that and so is writing about something she knows pretty intimately. So when she wakes up, she discovers that the doctor taking care of her is her ex husband, David. David left Evelyn because Evelyn was addicted to work and puts work above everything else. So then next thing you know, Evelyn starts hallucinating ghosts tied to her past heartbreaks. And then every single one leads to David. There's great chemistry in this book. I like Gene Meltzer a lot. And if you've already read the Matzo Ball, I think this is a solid follow up. I've heard good things from my friends who are booksellers, and I wanted to include it because it's new out in paperback. Great Second chance romance. If you like Slow Dance by Rainbow Roll, something like that, I think you will like Eight Heartbreaks of Hanukkah by Jean Meltzer. Also in my Mount Rushmore of Christmas books is Faking Christmas by Kerry Winfrey. This is a backlist title from 2023. You know, I love Kerry Winfrey, but I also really love Christmas in Connecticut, which is what this novel is kind of loosely based on or inspired by. And I feel like not enough people have watched Christmas In Connecticut. It's a great movie, you guys. One of the. One of the sorrows of my life. That's a joke. One of the light sorrows of my life. The light heartbreaks. Is that our cable package stopped carrying Turner Classic Movies? Perhaps you're thinking, Annie, why do you still have cable? Well, I don't. Don't worry, we got rid of it. But that meant we also like. I don't know how to watch Turner Classic Movies anymore. I guess you need a membership. Maybe I should ask for one for Christmas. Anyway, I love Turner Classic Movies, and I especially love them around this time of year. I love the introductions. It's like the one thing from childhood that still is exactly the same. Like, it feels exactly the same. The people introducing those films, you could fool me. They could have been around for 40 years and I wouldn't know the difference. Watch Christmas in Connecticut. It's lovely. It's charming, actually. This is going to be so weird, but if you watch Ivy Odom, she is the. She's a Southern living lifestyle editor, but most people know her for her recipe videos. If you watch or follow Ivy Odom, I don't know why, but I think you will really like Christmas in Connecticut. And I think, therefore, you will also like Faking Christmas. So I read Faking Christmas right when I needed it in 2023. Whenever we are decorating the bookshelf for Christmas, it always feels slightly anti climactic. Like, often it's still hot outside. It's not even Thanksgiving. In my past life, I definitely waited to decorate for the holidays until after Thanksgiving. But alas, I now work retail. It has to before. And so I needed a book to help me get in the spirit of things. And Faking Christmas did it. Carrie Winfrey worked magic, as she always does. To me, this book, like I said, it goes on my Mount Rushmore. It's right up there with the matzo ball. And 10 blind dates is one of my favorite holiday reads. And I think it has great re readability, which is not something I often say. Laurel is the main character and she is. And Carrie Winfrey put it perfectly. She, I think she said. Did she say this in person? Did she say it on a podcast? But she basically could not believe she was watching Christmas in Connecticut one year and she couldn't believe nobody had been inspired to remake it because it lends itself so much to, like, Instagram influencer culture. In the original movie, the main character is like a magazine writer and she's talking about, you know, her life on her farm. And how she cooks and bakes and all these things. And, you know, it turns out she's single, living in a high rise in New York, and so she has to fake this world that she's created for herself. And the same is true of Laurel, who is just the most messy character. And then her boss, Gilbert is, oh, ideal. Just absolutely ideal. My favorite tropes are present in this novel, right down to the sharing of a bed. This will, I think I said in my original review, and I stick by this, that Faking Christmas will draw obvious comparisons to Hallmark movies. But Hallmark wishes it was this good and that is true. Hallmark only wishes they could do something like this. I don't know why Netflix isn't making content based on the books we already love. I mean, I know they are. I know we're gonna get that Emily Henry adaptation in January, but if we could just start not trying to reinvent the wheel and like invent the wheel already given to us, I think we would make better content. Faking Christmas would be a great movie because Christmas in Connecticut is a great movie. I loved this one because in our previous two books you get these kind of quirky families home for the holidays and before I forget, and in this one you get kind of some found family too because of the co worker or the boss relationship. He reminded me a little bit of the boss in or did Kerry Winfrey tell me this and now I've never been able to forget it. I don't know. But the boss in. Oh, that musical show. Oh no, with that woman. What is it? Crazy ex girlfriend. Now that I'm saying that out loud, I'm pretty sure that's not an original thought. I'm pretty sure Kerry Winfrey said that somewhere. I don't know, you guys. It's good. You should read it. I loved it and I'm going to reread it this holiday season. That is Faking Christmas by Carrie Winfrey. It would definitely be in my stack of cozy reads.
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Annie Jones
And then last but not least is another new book. So this one released in October, it got a coveted starred review in Kirkus and I finished the audiobook A couple weeks ago. It is Grace and Henry's Holiday Movie Marathon by Matthew Norman. I talked about this one on the podcast last week. Matthew Norman wrote the book Charm City Rocks. So speaking of some books with really good settings, this one is set in Baltimore. Clearly, Matthew Norman loves Baltimore, lives in Baltimore. He talks about it with such fondness. This book is great. Maybe I should just make my Mount Rushmore. This book is the one I will hand sell the most or I will try to hand sell the most this holiday season. Yes, you will especially enjoy it if you like holiday movies, particularly if you like Charlie Brown, the Christmas Story. The Christmas Story, Love, actually, Christmas Vacation, Die Hard. Like all of these holiday movies are referenced in this book. I thought it was going to maybe go one direction and instead I felt like the movie part never felt cheesy. So basically, Grace and Henry are both people who have lost their spouses and now it's a year later and they're dealing with their first holiday season since their losses and their moms have like put together this scheme to matchmake them. This is such a great friendship novel and I think a pretty realistic look about. A realistic look at what grief must look like, particularly around the holiday season. Grace and her two children are really trying to figure out how to celebrate these two kids. Kids in adult books can be obnoxious, which I think is a bummer because I don't think kids are obnoxious. And sometimes it's just like adults don't know how to write kids or something. I'm not sure I have said before, I've been on the record about this many times that Annabelle Monaghan knows how to write kids. The kids in Nora Goes Off Script Live free in my brain Live free in my brain they live rent free. You know what I was saying? These kids are equally lovely, Ian and Bella. I think they are just precocious enough. They're just standoffish enough as they try to figure out, you know, how to move on after the loss of their dad. Then Grace and Henry, they develop this friendship and they start watching holiday movies together. I thought that that would be maybe the lead, the lead of this book, but instead it's just like a subtle backdrop. Matthew Norman does not beat you over the head with all of these kind of movie references and instead they're just kind of subtly there as these characters grow to be more fond of each other and as they kind of navigate the holiday season. This one takes place, as I recall, from Thanksgiving to Christmas. I thought it was, oh, just really well Written, really well, narrated. Loved the audiobook experience. I think that's kind of one of my holiday hacks is I.
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I'm kind of a harried person around the holidays and maybe listen. You're probably listening to this and saying, yeah, me too. No duh. Well, I also work retail and so some days are really fun. And I mean, you can't deny that the bookshelf is a fun place to be during the holiday season. It's really magical feeling in there, but also it is retail. And so like, I come home exhausted and sometimes it can feel like I'm missing the holidays, like I'm not actually enjoying them. And so one of my holiday hacks is to have a holiday audiobook going. It's just kind of a nice way to like remind myself that this the season exists and hear what some other people are doing during the season. So I loved the audiobook version of this. I thought it was fantastic. There's also a great small business in the book. It's called Edgar Allan Poe's. It's Grace's bar that she owns. I thought that that was very fun. If you like Baltimore, I have some friends who grew up in Baltimore. Betsy Courtney, if you're listening. You guys would love this book. Yeah, this was outstanding. Deserving of the starred review in Kirkus, Grace and Henry's Holiday Movie Marathon by Matthew Norman. I did just want to. That would be my stack. Those are the five books. That would be the stack I gave you. I did just want to mention a couple other titles that I might stick in the stack. If I could tell you were not happy with my original five. One of those would be the YA novel Recommended for your by Laura Silverman. If you wanted something deeper and you weren't looking for a romance, I would do Time of the Child by Niall Williams or Small Things like these by Claire Keegan. And then you already have heard how much I love 10 blind dates by Ashley Elston. It really depends on what your holiday vibe is. Maybe we should develop a quiz. It's like, what holiday book are you. But that would be my original stack. And then if you looked at me askance, I would give you a couple of those other ones. So again, the stack is A Home for the Holidays by Taylor Hahn, Before I Forget by Tori Henwood Hohen. Those both are hardbacks. Eight Heartbreaks of Hanukkah by Gene Meltzer. That's a paperback. Faking Christmas by Kerry Winfrey. Backlist paperback. And Grace and Henry's Holiday Movie Marathon by Matthew Norman. Front list Paperback. That's it. That's my stack. Happy Holiday Reading. I hope you find the perfect book to get you through this holiday season.
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This week I'm listening to Light breakers by Asia Gable.
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From the Front Porch is a weekly podcast production of the Bookshelf, an independent bookstore in Thomasville, Georgia. You can follow the Bookshelf's daily happenings on Instagram at Bookshelf Tvill and on. All the books from today's Episode can be purchased online through our store website, bookshelf thomasville.com a full transcript of today's podcast episode can be found at. From the frontporchpodcast.com Special thanks to Studio D Podcast Production for production of from the Front Porch and for our theme music, which sets the perfect warm and friendly tone for our Thursday conversations. Our executive producers of Today's Episode are Cami Tidwell, Jamie Treadwell, Linda Lee Drost Jean Queens Martha Stephanie Dean Beth Ashley Farrell, Amanda Wickham, Nicole Marcy Wendy Jenkins. Thank you all for your support of from the Front Porch. If you'd like to support from the Front Porch, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Your input helps us make more the show even better and helps us reach new listeners. All you have to do is open up the podcast app on your phone, look for from the Front Porch, scroll down until you see, write a review and tell us what you think. Or, if you're so inclined, support us. Over on Patreon, where we have three levels of support. Each level has an amazing number of benefits like bonus content, access to live events, discounts and giveaways. Just go to patreon.com from the front Porch. We're so grateful for you and we look forward to meeting back here next week.