Episode 389 || Back to School Book Flights

This week on From the Front Porch, Bookseller Keila joins Annie and Olivia for a new kind of episode - Back to School Book Flights! They’ll be talking about book flights, where you pair three or more books around a certain theme or topic. Today, they’re pairing books around all things back-to-school.

To purchase the books mentioned in this episode, visit our website:

Annie’s book flight:

The World Cannot Give by Tara Isabella Burton

Admissions by Kendra James

Edinburgh by Alexander Chee

Purchase Annie's Book Flight

Olivia’s book flight:

Babel by R.F. Kuang

Black Chalk by Christopher Yates

Never Saw Me Coming by Vera Kurian (paperback releasing 9/20)

Purchase Olivia's Book Flight

Keila’s book flight:

Transcendent Kingdom by Yaa Gyasi

The Hawthorne School by Sylvie Perry

Catherine House by Elisabeth Thomas

Purchase Keila's Book Flight

From the Front Porch is a weekly podcast production of The Bookshelf, an independent bookstore in South Georgia. You can follow The Bookshelf’s daily happenings on Instagram at @bookshelftville, and all the books from today’s episode can be purchased online through our store website, www.bookshelfthomasville.com. 

A full transcript of today’s episode can be found below.

Special thanks to Dylan and his team at Studio D Podcast Production for sound and editing and for our theme music, which sets the perfect warm and friendly tone for our Thursday conversations. 

This week Annie is reading Heretic by Jeanna Kadlec. Olivia is reading Babel by R.F. Kuang. Keila is reading Dead Flip by Sara Farizan.

If you liked what you heard in today’s episode, tell us by leaving a review on iTunes. Or, if you’re so inclined, support us on Patreon, where you can hear our staff’s weekly New Release Tuesday conversations, read full book reviews in our monthly Shelf Life newsletter and follow along as Hunter and I conquer a classic. Just go to patreon.com/fromthefrontporch.

We’re so grateful for you, and we look forward to meeting back here next week.

Our Executive Producers are...Donna Hetchler, Angie Erickson, Cammy Tidwell, Chantalle C, Nicole Marsee, Wendi Jenkins, Laurie Johnson, and Kate Johnston Tucker.

Transcript:

Annie [00:00:01] Welcome to From the Front Porch, a conversational podcast about books, small business and life in the South.  

[00:00:24] "It's not that Laura thinks Isabel is right, exactly. It's just that she can't figure out how exactly Isabel is wrong. It can't be true, of course-- God, how could she stand it if it were true!-- if all the things Laura loves are somehow already irredeemably broken, if her love for them makes her heedless at best; at worst selfish and cruel, the way Isabel says. It's just that when Isabel says things, Laura believes them. And when Virginia says things, Laura believes them, too. It's just that Laura knows she is so soft. Soft enough that anyone can shape her. And she knows enough to know this softness makes her weak. Tara Isabella Burton. The world cannot give.  

[00:01:16] I'm Annie Jones, owner of The Bookshelf, an independent bookstore in beautiful downtown Thomasville, Georgia. And this week, we're trying a new episode format all about back to school book flights. I'll be joined in conversation by bookshelf retail floor manager Olivia Schaffer and bookseller Keila Cone. Before we get started, as most of you know, one of our main goals for 2022 is to grow the show to 10,000 listeners. Right now we are a community of almost 8000, which is amazing. And the best way to grow the show is to have our listeners leave 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' and then tell us what you think. This week's review comes from Bennysmom123.  

[00:02:07] "This podcast is like cozying up in a warm blanket with a good book or having coffee with wise, funny, and genuine friends. Annie covers books, business owning, life in the South, pop culture and more with grace and humor. I adore everyone she has on as guests as well. As a longtime listener. I finally had a chance to visit the bookshelf last fall, and it was pure magic. Thank you, Annie, for the goodness you put into the world through your shop and this podcast."  

[00:02:35] Thank you Beannysmom. And thank you to all of our listeners who have left reviews for the show over the last few months. We can definitely see a difference in the show's reach, and with every new listener, we get closer to reaching our goal and to growing our small business, so thank you. Now, back to the show. This week, we're talking book flights. This is the concept of pairing three or more books together around certain themes and topics. Kind of like a beer flight. So since September means back to school for most of the country. We thought it would be fun to chat about some back to school book flights. And I thought, who better to join me than some of our bookselling staff. You're familiar, of course, with Olivia. Hi, Olivia.  

Olivia [00:03:15]  Hi.  

Annie [00:03:15] And Keila is new to the show, though not new to The Bookshelf. Hi, Keila. 

Keila [00:03:21]  Hey.  

Annie [00:03:22] I'm so glad you are joining us today. Keila, tell listeners how long you've been a bookseller at The Bookshelf and maybe your favorite genre of literature, the books that you love to read.  

Keila [00:03:35] Okay, so I have been a bookseller at The Bookshelf for a little over a year now, and some of my favorite book genres are I love any type of fiction. It's very broadly ranged out there, but mostly I like horror. I like a good spook or spooky book.  

Annie [00:03:56] You do like a spooky book. So I thought it would be a good idea to have Kayla on this episode specifically because so much of academic literature or boarding school literature is a little spooky and is a little dark. So I thought Keila might have some books that could contribute to that. But I am curious, did you guys grow up listening or reading, paying attention to books, TV shows, movies set in school? Like, is this something you have always liked, Olivia, tell me about your history with-- I don't know, it's not even dark academia. It's just academic lit. I don't know.  

Olivia [00:04:38] Yeah. I think I kind of always been drawn to it, at least a little bit. I think there's always a dark coming through that academi a world specifically, but I have always been drawn to that. I think I also think campus novels need more like a tight setting and a setting that you can easily picture, which is something that I'm super drawn to you. And I just love when you get to meet those personalities that you can associate with real people in your life, which you also often find in campus novel 

Annie [00:05:13] I love that point about campus novels being in one setting. That then is so easy.  I think I can speak for all three of us that none of us went to boarding school, but I immediately can picture that so vividly in my brain. And it does just kind of set the tone and immediately put me there. Keila, have you always liked campus novels or dark academia?  

Keila [00:05:38] I think so, yeah. Even just like what you said, that setting just is always something that was interesting. And I think there's always like a small part of me that wanted to go to like a weird campus or something for school. But, yeah, it's always been fun. Even movies like Cadet Kelly, she went to military school. Which would have been a horrible decision on my part, but it still just sounded like so much fun.  

Annie [00:06:11] Cadet Kelly. Man, that is a great example.  

Olivia [00:06:17] I never saw that reference coming.  

Keila [00:06:21] It was just like the school being like far away or whatever. It just sounded like some fun to get away.  

Annie [00:06:29] Yeah, I don't know what that is. I think I've talked about this on the podcast before, but I fell in love with the book Bloomability by Sharon Creech, which Olivia I know now you have read because we read it through Young Adult Book Club last year. Or did we? Am I making that up?  

Olivia [00:06:45] No.  

Annie [00:06:48] We didn't. Am I making that up?  

Olivia [00:06:52] We read the moon one.   

Annie [00:06:55] Walk to Moon. Yeah. Oh, my gosh, guys, you've got to read Bloomability. Okay, I'm sorry. I completely forgot. I made it up.  

Olivia [00:07:00] I know I did when I was younger.  

Annie [00:07:02] So I read that book when I was older. I was in high school. That book is probably for middle grade, but you'll have to remember, I grew up in a time where young adult literature did not exist, and so it was either grown up books or middle grade books, really well written middle grade books. And they're just happened to be really beautiful middle grade books by Sharon Creech. And so I read this book called Broomability. It was set at the American school in Switzerland, which is a real boarding school in Switzerland. And after I read that book-- this was the early days of the Internet and I probably Ask Jeeves it, I'm pretty sure Google did not exist. Found the American school in Switzerland's website and then sent off for information because I just wanted to see if my parents would be game. I obviously had no concept of finances. I just assumed scholarships would cover it. Anyway, my parents thought it was hilarious. I got brochures from the American school in Switzerland and the American School in London. I believe they also have location there. And then I told all my friends that I was going to the American school in Switzerland. I knew I wasn't. It was a joke. I wanted to see if they would believe me. They did believe me. I lied. I did not go to boarding school, but man, did I want to. And let me tell you, when this quirky anecdote falls flat is when you move to Thomasville, Georgia, and you share it in a setting with really lovely, wonderful women, two or three of whom actually went to boarding school and you realize boarding school is not just a far off dream for those of us who watched Cadet Kelly, it's a reality for people who [Inaudible].  

Olivia [00:08:42] Well, I studied my summer at ballet camp, which would be like we would travel to go stay at these college universities and then we take class with my ballet school. And that was like the closest I ever came to being in a boarding school setting. And it was like me living my greatest life, going off to these ballet camps.  

Annie [00:09:06] Oh, there is something about it I love so much. I really do. And I feel like fall is the perfect time to read these books. So what we each have done is created a book flight. So Olivia's got a book flight. I have a book flight. Keila has a book flight of three books, all kind of campus dark academia, these rich settings that we're talking about. And we're going to round robin this just like we do on our New Release Round Up episodes or Run Down episodes, who knows? And then you listeners can, if you want, buy these book flights from the bookshelf. I do think book flights would be a fun thing to do for the fall. We're going to do one of these this month for Back to School and then we're going to do another one in October for Spooky Reads. And so it gives you a chance to then get three books to get you through the month of September or three books to get you through the month of October. So that's kind of the way we designed this. I think each of us have a similar or have a theme or throughline that kind of connects the three books we're going to be talking about. So we're going to do it round robin and then at the end we will recap the books in our flights so listeners can really grasp which is which. And, of course, you can find these online at www.bookshelfthomasville.com.  

[00:10:24] Okay, I'll kick us off. I'm going to start with a book that I have started but not finished. It is called Admissions by Kendra James. I wanted to include this because I don't think often when we think about campus lit, we think about true stories. So this is a memoir by Kendra James. She is a black woman living in Connecticut. She was someone who went to this elite, predominantly white boarding school, I think it was the Taft School. And so this is her memoir about her three years at Taft. But she went on to become an admissions counselor for kind of elite private boarding schools, like the one she attended. And she's kind of grappling with the role she's playing in this inequitable educational system. And so she's thinking through her role as an admissions counselor and then also looking back on her years at Taft. She was the first black legacy student at Taft. So a legacy student is somebody whose-- I kind of knew this, but I really didn't. So a legacy student is someone whose parents or grandparents have graduated from the school previously. So her father had been a scholarship recipient and had attended Taft. She kind of always knew it was inevitable that she was going to go to Taft. But there were other black students who had gone to Taft, but their children did not go. Like it did not become a legacy thing for them. And that is because, as Kindra James writes, this was not a school that was really open to students of color.  

[00:12:04] And she talks a lot about how students of color are treated. The opening few pages are a literal glossary of terms, which the nerd in me really loves. Like, a glossary of these private school terms, these  kind of almost coded language that they used at school, this kind of private language that all these students spoke. And it kind of lets you into that world and also lets you know that this world is so elite that it has a language on its own, which I thought the glossary actually really perfectly set the tone. The book was well reviewed by the New York Times. It is a memoir, but it also functions as an examination of the education system. She, Kindra James, was I think a part of the class of 2006. So I was class of 2004. So I like that we're around the same age and we're kind of dealing with the same pop culture references, the same kind of trends. She makes a lot of pop culture references throughout the book, many of which I immediately understood, which was kind of gratifying and nice. This reminds me a lot of You'll Never Believe What Happened to Lacey, which was by Lacey Lamar and Amber Ruffin. And they were talking about kind of the racist experiences that Lacey has endured over her life and just in predominantly white spaces. And so this is a book that I think is for anyone, but I think it especially is for people who feel out of place, particularly people of color who exist in white spaces and who then experience all the inequities that that results in. So it is called admissions by Kendra James. It has this really great cover. It's literally a picture of her boarding school class. And then all of their faces are kind of blocked out except for hers. I think this is fascinating. Again, I like that it's a true story. I find that really different and unique among campus lit. So Admissions by Kendra James.  

Olivia [00:13:51] Okay. My book I am also currently reading and really loving as well. And this is Babel by R F Kuang. Actually, the full title is Babel: Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators Revolution.  

Annie [00:14:11] Olivia, that sounds so smart.  

Olivia [00:14:14] I feel so smart while reading this book.  

Annie [00:14:18] It just sounds so intelligent.  

Olivia [00:14:23] Yeah. So this came out in August and I am just reading it now from a recommendation from one of our customers. And she was just like you have to read this. It's right up your alley. You're going to love it.  

Annie [00:14:37] Who Recommend it?  

Olivia [00:14:38] Holly, of course.  

Annie [00:14:42] Of course yes.  

Olivia [00:14:42] My, like, soulmate reader. But she was like, this book is perfect for you, because she knows how I love a good campus setting, a good academia, a well thought out plot. Like, I love when you can tell how much effort the author putting to not only the research for the book, but just the construction and the writing of it as well. And [Inaudible] this is such a great book. This is set at Oxford University in the 1800s. So it's kind of like you're watching the up and coming of Oxford University. I do also appreciate that the author put a note at the very beginning of the book and they're just like, listen, I know a lot of people went to this university. Do you realize this is a fictional novel about this university?  

Annie [00:15:34] I love that. Just go ahead and set the tone right now.  

Olivia [00:15:37] Yes. Because sometimes it's necessary.  

Annie [00:15:40] It is.  

Olivia [00:15:41] But you start by meeting this boy, Robin. That's his American name. He's from-- I don't know, I forgot the name of the city in China, but I kind of knew it when I heard it. And now I'm [Inaudible]. But Robin gets picked up by this man when there is like a flu going through. I think it's the cholera epidemic going through his town and he gets rescued by this man who brings him to England and starts to teach him in all these different languages, basically prepping him to go to Oxford University and be in the translators division, which is this tower called Babel. But in this tower-- and this is the only fantastical part of this book, so everyone just hang on there with me-- they do what's called silver working. And so this is one of the best parts of this novel, though, because the author does such a great job of they take these bars of silver, and on the one side they will have one word, and on the other side they will have another word in another language. And the way these two words interact creates different forms of magic. So there's a lot of words that are English that cannot be directly translated into English. So it's kind of like this play on how the definition of these words interact is what they make the silver do. I don't know if I'm explaining that well, but everything linguistically in this book is just so well done. It has like footnotes that at some point I was just like, is this real? Is this real? But deep down, at the heart of this novel, is Robin trying to figure out if what this university is doing is corrupt or not, and what side of that line is he supposed to be standing on? Because if he stays with the university, he gets the backing of the university and his so-called foster father. But if he leaves the university and goes to the other side, then he kind of stands up for a more just side of things. But he's all on his own. So it's a real conundrum. But it is so well done. And I think you get so many different perspectives in this book about language and corruption of governments and corporate corporations that own things. It was really, really, good.  

Annie [00:18:15] Oh, it sounds really good. And the nice kind of mixture of genres within the campus novel, like a little bit of historical fiction, a little bit of magic.  

Olivia [00:18:23] Yeah, exactly. But you still have this dark campus feeling of, like, something bad is going on here, but I can't put my finger on it quite yet.  

Annie [00:18:34] Good job, Holly.  

Olivia [00:18:35] Yeah, nailed it.  

Annie [00:18:38] Nailed it. Keila, what's your first book?  

Keila [00:18:40] Okay. So my first book is Transcendent Kingdom by Yaa Gyasi. I think I pronounce that right. I'm not sure.  

Annie [00:18:49] I did look it up.  It's "Gessie". Isn't that interesting? I did look that up.  

Keila [00:18:53] Oh.  

Annie [00:18:54] From back when I talked about this book. Yes.  

Keila [00:18:57] Okay. So Transcendent Kingdom follows Gifty a candidate in neuroscience at Stanford School of Medicine. When she was a child, her older brother died of a heroin overdose after he had become addicted when he got hooked on OxyContin after a knee injury. And now her mother is depressed and like suicidal and living in her bed. And Gifty is just determined to find scientific answers to all of the suffering going on around her. And she does that by studying reward seeking behavior in mice and how depression and addiction are connected through all of that. But so even though she's turned to science all these years, she's also found herself hungering for her childhood faith and struggling with the evangelical church that she was raised in and that was so important to her Ghanaian parents. And this was such an incredibly powerful book, and I loved how much detail was put into Gifty research that was such a big component of the book. It was just really interesting in the social work side of me that like studied like all the brain stuff and was just like so interested in it, and how she overcame so much by being not only like one of the only women, but only one of the only women of color in her program was just she was an amazing character.  

Annie [00:20:28] Gifty is one of the most memorable characters I think of the last few years. Like, I just love her as a protagonist. And you and I talked briefly yesterday and I thought, gosh, I guess Transcendent Kingdom really is like this academic-- or, again, dark academia just is not the right word, just plain old academia. It really falls into that category. But I hadn't considered it before. But she does do all of this research on campus. And I think, if I recall, there are also flashbacks to her school that she went to in Alabama and the things that she kind of endured while there. So this was a good pick that I wouldn't have predicted. Okay. My next one is a book that I loved, my book club hate it.  Olivia, I think you could like it. Like, I feel like it's almost an Annie Olivia mashup. So this is called The World Cannot Give. It's by Tara Isabella Burton. This is a book that's set in Maine. Two of my books actually are set in Maine. When I think of campus lit, I think of the Northeast and a place I've always wanted to live because of the weather, because they actually get seasons up there. And so two of my books are actually set in Maine. This one is set at a fictional academy called Saint Dunstan's. Laura is a young woman who kind of becomes obsessed-- she's a junior in high school. She's become obsessed with this work written by a dead poet. And that dead poet went to Saint Dunstan's. And so immediately the book opens with kind of this depiction of Laura and this obsession that she has with this book and this poet and how much she wants to go to the school. And I immediately thought, yes, I feel like a lot of us have been there where we were teenagers, we became obsessed with this thing that brought a lot of meaning to our lives. And we immediately wanted to kind of proselytize to everybody and tell them all about it.  

[00:22:30] And so Laura gets to go to this school in Maine where this dead poet was also a student. So she goes to Saint Dunstan's. And while she's there, when she's there, she immediately meets Virginia. And Virginia is like this alpha female. I almost picture a Regina George type character except, twist, she's hyper religious. She's a recent convert to Christianity, and she kind of wields her religion a little bit like a sword. And she is the leader of the choir. And the choir is made up of these four or five boys, maybe more, but I think it's around four or five boys who all are completely devoted to Virginia. It's almost like this little cult on campus. And Laura happens to have a pretty decent voice through a series of events. She winds up joining the choir and it's like this little clique culty thing on campus and more completely becomes enamored with Virginia and just in all of her confidence in her self-assuredness. And the book is dark and gritty. There are a couple of plot twists and turns that I did not see coming. I saw a couple of them coming. If you've read enough dark academia literature, then you know. So some of it I did see coming, but I think the author, Tara Isabel Burton, also knew it was coming. Like, those were intentional references. And so I think Tara Isabella Burton is kind of messing with the genre a little bit. And kind of not poking fun at, not at all, but kind of showing you that she's in on these plot twists and turns and ends at the same time. I found the book to be really shocking, really thoughtful about faith, which is something that I do like reading about in literature when it's well done. And all of the characters-- I think this was one of my book club struggles. None of the characters are necessarily root worthy? Is that the right phrase?  

[00:24:33] My book club did not find many of these characters to be super likable. Anyone who listens to this podcast knows I don't need likable characters in my fiction. But what I do need is interesting characters, and I thought these characters were really interesting and nuanced. And Laura kind of is the reader guiding the reader through all of this. I think it's also incredibly prescient. Is that the right word? I think it's incredibly timely and of the moment. I liked Tara Isabella Burton's former book called Social Creature. Olivia and I both read that and really liked it. There are certainly elements of that here. You can kind of see that. And then Burton is also a religious writer. She writes about religion for I can't remember which publication, but it's almost like this is the natural progression of her work. If she's doing that and then also writing this fiction about female relationships and friendships and what those look like, this is the next thing. So it is called The World Cannot Give by Tara Isabella Burton. It came out earlier this year. I cannot believe I did not read it when it first came out. So now I want to fix it for everyone else and make everybody else read it. I really, really, loved this one a lot. Hunter did too. So if you typically like my tastes or Hunter's tastes, I do think you'll like this one. And I think it's just the right mix of plot driven fiction and character driven fiction. There's a lot happening in this book and you're never going to be bored, but it's also a lot about character development, so it's a nice kind of mash up of those two.  

Olivia [00:25:58] I have been wanting to read that one because you talked about it vaguely, but just from the quote at the beginning of this episode, I was like, yeah, I love it. I feel like that author does toxic friendships so well.  

Annie [00:26:13] So well. I was trying to explain to my book club, I was like, no, this totally makes sense. Because her first book was almost kind of single white female kind of stuff and it definitely is more thriller suspense than this is. But she writes about messy, complicated, yes toxic female friendships so beautifully. Wasn't that paragraph so good? I had to read the whole thing because I was like--  

Keila [00:26:38] It was so good.  

Annie [00:26:40] Good. Thank you. I'm glad you thought so, too. I read that paragraph aloud at Book Club and my friend Courtney who is in my book club, she was like, maybe I did like this book. And I was like, Yes, [Inaudible] it's really good.  

Olivia [00:26:53] And there's something about a campus setting that a toxic friendship just goes so perfectly into that setting. Yeah, everyone's lost. They don't know who they are. And if they're confident enough to think they know who they are, there's probably something wrong.  

Annie [00:27:06] That's exactly right. There's a little bit of humor throughout the book, too. But again, it's really dark. But one of the roommate of Laura, the main character, is like an Instagram influencer for prep schools. And so she, like, poses in her uniform. Like, it's very-- Did you guys ever see-- Keila, I bet you did. Did you ever see the movie Saved with Mandy Moore?  

Olivia [00:27:31] Oh, I didn't see that coming.  

Keila [00:27:33] So sorry to disappoint.   

Annie [00:27:37] I did not. Keila, that seemed up your alley. I am a little disappointed. It's a little older than you, I will say. But there are elements of saved in this book for sure.  

Olivia [00:27:46] Oh, man. Hunter and I recently watched that.  

Annie [00:27:52] Oh, I loved that movie.  

Olivia [00:27:54] It was a long time rewatch for me. That would be why I really also like that movie.  

Annie [00:27:59] Does it hold up?  

Olivia [00:28:00] Yes, it absolutely does.  

Annie [00:28:00] Okay. Maybe I'll rewatch. I watched it in high school and it was, you know, fairly controversial  to like it. It was a controversial opinion for me to like that movie, but I did. I really liked it a lot.  

Olivia [00:28:13] Oh, yeah, Mike's going to love that movie.  

Annie [00:28:15] How funny.  

Olivia [00:28:16] Continuing on the Dark Academia theme, my next book is Black Chalk by Christopher J. Yates. I don't know if either of you have heard of this book. It came out like 2015, 2014.  

Annie [00:28:29] No.  

Olivia [00:28:29] Okay.  

Keila [00:28:31] I haven't heard of it.  

Olivia [00:28:32] I picked up this book after I finished rereading is The Secret History for like the second or third time. And I was just like, I just want something like that. I didn't want to read anything else. I just wanted The Secret History. And so I Googled what books are like that and this was one of the ones that came up, and one of the only ones that the Strand had in stock at the moment. So I picked it up and I devoured it. The author, Christopher Yates, is an Oxford University alumni, and this is set again at Oxford University. That is not my overarching theme [Inaudible] everyone. So just prepare yourself for the third one.   

Annie [00:29:13] I wish it was. I love Oxford University. I wish I was smart enough to go there.  

Olivia [00:29:16] I do too. It's a dream. Just like going to a boarding school. It's fine.  

Annie [00:29:23] It's okay. We're fine.  

Olivia [00:29:23] Things that'll never. It's too late.  

Annie [00:29:25] We're fine. It's too late.  

Olivia [00:29:29] But this is about this group of six students who are all friends kind of, who are all together at college. And they started this game late one night, when they were all just hanging about doing things that college students do. And it's a game of dares. So, like, one person dares another person to do something and they have to do it otherwise there's like a big consequence. I can't remember the consequences.  I read this back in 2015, but it has stuck with me since then. And so 14 years later after this game, because the dares are getting more and more personal and more and more malicious, because if one person dares you to do something they know you're going to hate, the next time they get a chance, they're going to dare you to do something even worse that they know you are going to hate. And so it's just turned into this really toxic environment. And 14 years later, it's like time for the final round of this game. And there's only so many people [Inaudible]. And you meet this guy at the start of the 14 years later point, and you kind of just realize that like, I don't know if he's losing it or if he's already lost it or if he's perfectly sane and I'm losing it.  I vividly remember the scene in the book, he has these glasses of water all over this house reminding him to stay hydrated. Something I also do around my house. I'm going to start leaving glasses of water around The Bookshelf. But he, like, keeps getting confused because he'll go to a glass of water that he knows he hasn't sipped from yet and it's empty. And then he's like, oh, am I actually drinking enough? But he is not. Here's the thing. This is one of those creepy books where you're just, like, I feel like I actually know what's happening, but in the end, you really don't know what's happening or you didn't see it coming. But it's just so well-done. And it has those characters that I connected with in Secret History, but in this whole new novel where I'm just like, oh, these people are terrible for each other. But you can't look away, so you just have to know what happens. It is so good. The premise of it is great and I think anyone who enjoyed The Secret History would enjoy this one as well. The characters of The Secret History would enjoy this one.  

Annie [00:32:08] Okay. I looked at your list today and I was like, what has she been doing? I don't know any of these books. I knew the last one, but I was like wait a minute. Why have -- because you always share. You're very good about telling what you're reading and describing it, I was like, I haven't heard about these.  

Olivia [00:32:26] Well, currently reading Babel. Read Black Chalk before I even worked here.  

[00:32:30] Okay, fine. I guess that's a good enough excuse, because I just thought why? She normally tells me what she's reading. Keila, what's your next one.  

Keila [00:32:39] This is one that Olivia recommended to me. Hawthorne School by Sylivie Perry. And this one is just super creepy, and I loved it. So it's like a psychological suspense for anybody that likes dark and dark academia and cults. It's about a woman named Claudia who is struggling to find an affordable preschool that can accommodate her son, who can be a little difficult at times. And that's when she finds this possibly too good to be true Hawthorne School. So before the school, she is a massage therapist and then to help pay for the tuition, she volunteers there. And everything seems to be going well at first, but then she starts seeing less and less of her son and things start getting weird. And there's this weird like T and it gets real creepy real fast. And she gets down to business, she becomes mama bear. And it's just so good. And I don't want to give away too much because there's just so much that happens in the book. But it was so well done. And Claudia, she kind of reminded me of Reba a little bit, Reba mcEntire, because she's like a single mom who works two jobs and loves her kid but never stops. Yeah. Gentle hands, harsh therapist, and the heart of a fighter. She's a survivor. Yeah.  

Annie [00:34:20] It's perfect. Reba, where are you? You can star in the film adaptation. 

Keila [00:34:22] I hope so. That would be awesome.  

Annie [00:34:26] Y'all have both read this. I think I would like this, actually. And I'm intrigued. It sounds just dark.  

Olivia [00:34:32] I think you would like it, too. It was good. It's fast paced. I want to say the chapters were short, but I can't really remember. But I know I flew through it.  

Keila [00:34:42] Yeah, I listened to it. I think and it was only a few days because I just couldn't stop listening to it.  

Annie [00:34:50]  I'm getting excited listening to you guys talk about because it's starting to get to be, yeah, like dark spooky book season which I do love. Okay, my next one is dark though not spooky. So this is Edinburgh by Alexander Chee. If you follow Hunter, our dear friend at Shelf by Shelf, you will have heard him rave about this book. He and I talked about this book at length. It is literally at The Bookshelf. I'm going to read it because our conversation led me to including it here and I want to read this one so badly. So this was Alexander Chee's debut novel. It came out back in 2001. So this is the only backlist title in my flight. Hunter has told me that I would love this forever, and I do trust him implicitly. So Brandon Taylor, who wrote the book Real Life, he calls this one of the great queer novels of our time. The main character, Fee, is a Korean-American, and there is a lot actually of beautiful writing about his relationship with his grandparents and their spirituality and the book opens with these really great depictions of that. But Fee winds up going to this boarding school in Maine, so different from Saint Dunstan's just another boarding school in Maine. Actually, sidenote, I wonder if Maine has a lot of boarding schools because Maine does not have your typical public school system because it's so rural. Did y'all know that? It's like they don't have enough schools really for all kids to go to public schools. So they often will allow people to attend private schools. Anyway, I don't know if that's why.  

Olivia [00:36:28] That hurts me because I was so close.  

Keila [00:36:30] You should have moved to Maine.   

Annie [00:36:35] You should have go to Maine. So, anyway, this book is also set in Maine. Fee goes to the school. He becomes immediately like a soprano in the choir. And I'm sorry, there are lots of trigger warnings here for sensitive readers. So the three witnesses some things that his choir director does and maybe even perhaps is a victim himself, but he chooses to remain silent. And because or he thinks because he chooses to remain silent, other young boys are victimized by this predator on their campus. And so Fee as an adult is kind of looking back, thinking about why he remained silent and the losses that resulted, including the loss of his friend Peter by suicide. Then Fee is an adult person, he's grappling with trauma but he ultimately becomes a teacher at a private school. And one of his students looks just like Peter, his deceased friend, but turns out he is the son of the choir director. I was waiting for gasps.  

Olivia [00:37:46] Gasp! No way.   

Annie [00:37:52] Thanks guys. So he's really having to deal with the aftereffects of his own trauma, his own guilt, then he's also literally face to face with this person that really upended and ruined so many lives. Obviously, all kinds of content warnings for pedophilia, drugs, trauma. But Alexander Chee is a beautiful writer and writes about all of these things with grace.  I was so pleased because I asked Hunter do we think this is kind of like a Little Life meets-- there's this really good short story collection by Adam Johnson called Fortune Smiles. But there is a story there. Hunter could tell the name of it, but there is a story in that collection about a pedophile that has stuck with me for years. It's deeply unsettling. And so if you like literary fiction that's dealing with dark, difficult subject matter, but it also has this underlying setting that we've been talking about on a campus dealing with these characters that all of us have probably sadly encountered or are familiar with, then I think you'll appreciate this book. So it's Edinburgh by Alexander Chee, and this is a backlist title, so it's out in paperback.  

Olivia [00:39:06] I've been wanting to read that one too.  

Annie [00:39:08] Doesn't it sound so good?  

Olivia [00:39:11] Okay. My next one was actually one of my Shelf Subscription titles. This is Never Saw Me Coming By Vera Kurian. And this is, if anyone knows my reading, he's right up my alley. This is about Chloe Sevre who is a psychopath.  

Annie [00:39:33] The way you said that was so calm. She is a psychopath.  

Olivia [00:39:38] She's currently seeking help for it. No.  

Annie [00:39:42] Kind of.  

Olivia [00:39:45]  Okay, first off, the opening line to this book is so well done.  I don't have the book in front of me, but it's something like Chloe Sevre is out to kill Will Bachman. The first sentence you know it. She is going to this college for the sole purpose of killing this kid named Will Bachman. And then  you found out he did do some wrongdoings to Chloe in the past, trigger warning, for sexual assault. But Chloe is a part of this clinical study at the school for Psychopaths. So I think there are seven total in the program. And they all wear these smart watches that track their location, their heart rates, just all the information that they can get out of a smart watch to kind of keep track of these seven psychopaths that they just invited to the school. They do. But you soon come to learn that one of the psychopaths was murdered. Also, just to note that none of the psychopaths know who the other psychopaths are. Their classes are not together. They have separate meeting times with their professors, so they really try hard not to let them befriend each other, know about each other. We can all see how that was [Crosstalk].  

Keila [00:41:09] Sure, sure. Yeah.  

Olivia [00:41:12] But then one of them is murdered in the school campus, and it obviously starts the suspect list that it's just the other psychopaths in that clinical setting. But the great thing about this book is not that they're seven different psychopaths, but that at first you're just like, wow, Chloe is a terrible person. And then you realize that Chloe is the only person you're really following in this book. And at some point, she's in danger herself. So you're relying on a psychopath, which is something that we know not to do, but you have no choice in this book but to trust her. And then you start rooting for her because you're just like, Chloe, don't die. And then the end just really throws you for a loop. But the author of this book, Vera, she has a Ph.D in social psychology. So she really knows what she's talking about and doing in this book. And I just thought it was so well-done. It's one that, like, you're on the edge of your seat the entire time. But the characters are so fascinating because you know they're psychopaths. I don't know. I just loved it so much. I thought it was so well done. And I love an author that, again, has done their research into what they're doing, and they are the experts in the field that they're writing.  

Annie [00:42:43] I am shocked no one has turned this into like a Netflix original. It seems like a show--  

Olivia [00:42:48] And it would be so good.  

Annie [00:42:50] Yeah. It sounds like it's something that immediately could translate to TV, like a TV series.  

Olivia [00:42:54] I loved it.  

Keila [00:42:55] Me too.  

Annie [00:42:56] Keila, what's your last book?  

Keila [00:42:59] So my last book is Catherine House by Elisabeth Thomas. And this is one I read a few years ago. And I still think about this book all the time, mostly when I'm like almost asleep and it'll pop into my head and then I'm awake until three in the morning because I just can't stop thinking about it. It was so good. But it's about this exclusive school that has like an extremely selective admissions process. They have an experimental curriculum, and they have produced some of the world's best minds. And if someone is accepted to the school, then they're required to give the school three years of their life and leave everything behind. From not watching television or contacting their family. They can't even bring their own clothes. It's crazy. Like, they have to just leave their entire old self behind. So the main character I know she gets accepted to the school because she kind of wants to start over and use it as an escape to escape her old life because she'd gotten into some trouble. But everything is not what it seems when she gets there. Like, tragedy strikes her roommate and she believes that the school has something to do with it and she decides that she's going to uncover the truth and ends up uncovering a lot of dangerous secrets that the school has and it is just a wild ride. It's so good.  

Annie [00:44:33] I think I read this. Olivia, right? You read this. Yes, we read this together.  

Olivia [00:44:37] Yeah. I didn't realize that you read it, too.  

Annie [00:44:39] Yeah, I think this was during peak pandy. Like, I feel like I was just reading whatever could possibly get my mind off anything. And a wild ride is exactly right. Like, it is bonkers to me.  

Olivia [00:44:54] Yeah. I think Keila, you and I were talking about the ending of this book the other day and how you're still floored by it.  

Keila [00:45:03] Yeah.  

Annie [00:45:04] Okay. So those are our book flights. So my book flight, I have termed the well-rounded student because we've got a literary fiction, a memoir, and then a backlist coming-of-age story. So my Annie's book flight for campus novels includes The World Cannot Give, that's the book by Tara Isabella Burton. That's literary fiction set in Maine. Admissions by Kendra James, which is the memoir by the black woman who went to the Taft School. And then Edinburgh by Alexander Chee, which is the backlist coming-of-age novel. Olivia, How would you describe your book flight?  

Olivia [00:45:45] Okay. Well, I didn't name my book flight.  

Keila [00:45:47] I'm sorry. I really went up above and beyond.  

Olivia [00:45:48] You Cleverley did.  

Annie [00:45:50] I couldn't help myself.  

Olivia [00:45:54] But I guess if I had to, it would be like authors at their best. Because I truly think like I've met each of these authors at their best works in my mind. But this is-- I'm not going to say the entire title again-- but it's Babel by R.F. Kuang. Black Chalk by Christopher J. Yates. And Never Saw Me Coming By Vera Kurian. And I think we have a very clear, dark academia vibe tying all of these together in their own right.  

Annie [00:46:25] Yes, absolutely. Keila, what is the through line of your book flight?  

Keila [00:46:31] Well, I don't have a fun little title for it either, but a lot of it has to do with the mind, I guess. I don't know. The books are Transcendent Kingdom by Yaa Gyasi. Is that how you spell it?  

Annie [00:46:48] Yes, I think so.  

Keila [00:46:50] And the Hawthorne School by Sylivie Perry and Catherine House by Elisabeth Thomas.  

Annie [00:46:58] I also think yours are all strong willed female protagonists. Like, these are all women who are getting stuff done. They're women Reba would be proud of.  

Keila [00:47:09] Yeah. I like that. Women Reba would be proud of.  

Annie [00:47:14] Thank you guys so much. This got me very excited for fall reading for some reason. All of these books feel very autumnal to me and so makes me very excited to read some fall books. You can purchase book flights on The Bookshop websites. Just go to www.bookshelfthomasville.com. Our selections will be on the home page. Or you can also find all of our podcast selections under the heading Podcast Picks. And you can buy these as flights. Like, you could buy Olivia's flight Keila's flight. Or you can also create your own flight by buying these as individual books. It's totally up to you. But if you want to make your reading super easy this fall, you could buy one of our book flights. Thank you, friends.  

Olivia [00:48:00] Thank you.  

Annie [00:48:03] This week I'm reading Heretic by Jeanna Kadlec. Olivia, what are you reading?  

Olivia [00:48:09] I'm reading Babel by R. F. Kuang.  

Annie [00:48:13] Keila, what are you reading?  

Keila [00:48:14] I am reading Dead Flip by Sarah Farizan.  

Annie [00:48:20] 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 @Bookshelftville, and all the books from today's episode can be purchased online through our store website: www.bookshelfthomasville.com.  

[00:48:36] A full transcript of today's episode can be found at Fromthefrontporchpodcast.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.  

[00:48:50] Our executive producers of today's episode are Donna Hechler, Cami Tidwell.  

Executive Producers (Read their own names) [00:48:55] Nicole Marsee, Wendy Jenkins, Laurie Johnson, Kate Johnston Tucker.  

Annie [00:49:01] 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 the show even better and 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.  

[00:49:19] Or, if you're so inclined, you can support us over on Patreon, where we have three levels of support. Front Porch Friends, Book Club Companions and Bookshelf Benefactors. Each level has an amazing number of benefits, like bonus content, access to live events, discounts and giveaways. Just go to Patreon.com/fromthefrontporch. We're so grateful for you and we look forward to meeting back here next week.