Episode 518 || February Reading Recap
This week on From the Front Porch, Annie recaps the books she read and loved in February. You get 10% off your books when you order your February Reading Recap. Each month, we offer a Reading Recap bundle, which features Annie’s favorite books she read that month.
To purchase the books mentioned in this episode, stop by The Bookshelf in Thomasville, visit our website (search “Episode 518”), or download and shop on The Bookshelf’s official app:
How to Sleep at Night by Elizabeth Harris
Tilt by Emma Pattee (releases 3/25/25)
The Road to Tender Hearts by Annie Hartnett (releases 4/29/25)
Blessings and Disasters by Alexis Okeowo (releases 8/5/25)
Among Friends by Hal Ebbott (releases 6/24/25)
Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy (releases 3/4/25)
Annie's February Reading Recap Pairing - $52
How to Sleep at Night by Elizabeth Harris
Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy
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, Tiktok, and Facebook, 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 here.
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 Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson.
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Our Executive Producers are...Beth, Stephanie Dean, Linda Lee Drozt, Ashley Ferrell, Wendi Jenkins, Martha, Nicole Marsee, Gene Queens, Cammy Tidwell, Jammie Treadwell, and Amanda Whigham.
Transcript:
[squeaky porch swing] Welcome to From the Front Porch, a conversational podcast about books, small business, and life in the South. [music plays out]
“You love and hate the places dearest to you.” - Alexis Okeowo, Blessings and Disasters [as music fades out]
I’m Annie Jones, owner of The Bookshelf, an independent bookstore in beautiful downtown Thomasville, Georgia, and this week, I’m recapping the books I read in February. Before we get started, a thank you to everyone who’s been leaving reviews for From the Front Porch. iTunes reviews and ratings are how new listeners can best find out about From the Front Porch and — as a result — find out about our indie bookstore, too. Here’s a recent review:
Cozy, comfort and discovery I recently found From the Front Porch and have truly enjoyed so many episodes. It's warm, cozy and real and I cannot wait to keep exploring.
[00:01:38] Now, back to the show. Well, February is normally such a delightful month for me. It is my birthday month. It is a short month and I know people are sick of winter, but in the South or the deep South, anyway, winter is on its way out in February anyway and we typically get some really beautiful sunny days that are like just the right temperature. So I really love February. I'll be honest, Winter has kind of kicked my butt this year. We had a beautiful snow here in Thomasville in January, which was bizarre and unusual. T.
[00:02:14] Truly historic. And then February, I and everyone I know were so sick with one illness or another, and it just felt like I could never get my bearings. And so February this year did not have as many fond memories as perhaps February's past. And my reading life, I think, reflected that. Our reading lives reflect our real lives always. And so I read really good books, particularly end of January, early February. And then I kind of stopped reading. Not on purpose- just life. So I actually read really great books, but then I just stopped reading entirely. So the good news is you're just going to get reviews of really great books. The bad news is there weren't a ton of these there. There weren't a ton.
[00:03:06] So the first book I finished was How to Sleep at Night. This is by Elizabeth Harris. You may have seen this book a Few Places I Know Hunter, shelf by shelf, he interviewed author Elizabeth Harris on his Instagram, I want to say. So this to me is actually a friend and listener, Jennifer, who gave me this descriptor and I think it is accurate, where if you are a reader who likes fiction that you can fly through but maybe you're not a rom com reader, and maybe you're not a thriller or cozy mystery reader, and you just need a good work of fiction to just get you through a slump, I think this book is the kind of book you're going to be looking for. So the book is about really four people, two couples, Ethan and Gabe, and then Kate and Nicole. We're going to mostly talk about Ethan and Gabe, I thought their story was the strongest in the book. That may just be personal interest or personal bias, I don't know. We'll talk about Kate and Nicole in a second, but basically, Ethan and Gabe have been together forever.
[00:04:08] Ethan wants to run for Congress as a Republican, and he is gay. Gabe is a staunch Democrat. And what does it mean when our spouse, partner, significant other is so politically different from us? And then what happens when that political difference looms even larger? Because now they want to run for public office? So I love books that deal with American politics. I think about The Hopefuls. I think about young Jane Young. There is actually another book I don't have it in front of me, but there was another book that I read years ago that was in the same vein as Young Jane Young. It was such a great political kind of literary book. I want to see it was published by Norton. Well, nevertheless, I am drawn to those types of books. Even in 2025, I am drawn to those types of books. Big fan. Actually, dealt a little bit with politics in a steamy kind of way. So I was intrigued by this premise. I know there are some readers and listeners who, when we were talking about this on my private Instagram, they said, "I can't imagine being in a relationship with somebody who thinks so politically different from you.".
[00:05:25] And maybe it's because of where I live in the South, but I see this all the time where one spouse maybe leans one way politically and one leans another. Do I think it has become more fraught in the last few years? Maybe. But I know a lot of couples like this, and so I thought that was interesting. And maybe it just depends on where you live. Or if you live in a metropolitan area versus a rural area or something like that. That's something a sociologist can study for us. But in the book, Ethan wants to run for Congress as a Republican. Gabe is a staunch Democrat. They're also gay. And so what does this mean? And really is that a perk for Ethan that he can kind of be this outlier in the party? So I thought there was a lot of great, interesting things about American politics, particularly at the more state level. So I loved Ethan and Gabe storyline the most. At the same time, you also have Cate and Nicole. Cate is Ethan's sister. She's a journalist, so I did like that aspect. She's a journalist. She works for a newspaper. She's got the political beat. Nicole is her girlfriend from a decade or more ago, and they kind of wind up reconnecting. But Nicole is married.
[00:06:47] Cate and Nicole's relationship is somehow even messier than Ethan and Gabe's. What I did like, though it stresses me out a bit, was Kate as a journalist and her brother running for office and the ethics of that, and what she was allowed to cover or not cover as part of a newspaper journalist. So you've got a lot about American politics, American media, American journalism. You've got these two adult couples who are trying to figure out who they are themselves, and then who they are in relationship to each other. It's also just a really fast read. So this is not a book I spent a ton of time with. This is a book that I was able to finish in, I don't know, a couple of days. So if any of this sounds appealing to you, I think it's worth giving a try. I want to say I rated this 3.75 to 4 stars. If you're a star ratings kind of person. I really liked it. It scratched an itch and it was fun to read, like my friend said, without being a romcom or a thriller. So if you're in a reading slump, this might do the trick for you. That is How to Sleep at Night by Elizabeth Harris.
[00:07:59] And then I picked up the book Tilt by Emma Pattee. This one does not release until March 25th, so I genuinely am sorry about that. But you're going to see that I'm reading well in advance. I'm on a mission to find Shelf Subscriptions and to not get behind in 2025. It's one of my-- you could call it a reading resolution. It's a professional resolution. It's a professional resolution for me. But I picked up Tilt for a couple of reasons. First of all, it was short. Second of all, the publisher had sent us like three of four of these, which sometimes gets annoying because you've heard us talk before on the podcast. We don't get every book, obviously, and there are some we really want that we don't get. And then meanwhile there are some books where we get multiple copies, which is unnecessary. And sometimes it means I think a publisher is just really trying to do their job and trying to really market this book, but it can get a little overwhelming. And so I kept seeing this book, but finally I pulled it off the ARC shelf at The Bookshelf and thought I would give it a go.
[00:09:02] The main character's name is Annie. Not to confuse anyone, but the main character's name is Annie. Annie is about nine months pregnant and she is at Ikea shopping for her baby's crib. And she knows. She knows she should already have a crib okay? She's aware that she should already have the baby's crib, and she lives in the Pacific Northwest. And it's like a normal day at Ikea, which is to say, it's extremely stressful. And she's very pregnant and very uncomfortable. She feels like people are staring at her, and she gets in kind of this little kerfuffle with an Ikea employee because the crib she wants-- you know how Ikea works. She finds the crib number, she goes down to essentially the warehouse portion of Ikea, she tries to find the crib, she can't find it. She goes to an Ikea employee who's pretty dismissive and then, of course, the Ikea employee ultimately finds the crib. It's a whole thing. And then there's a giant earthquake. And this seemingly domestic work of fiction immediately becomes climate fiction. Cli-fi.
[00:10:07] And also just one woman's mission to try to find her husband because he's across town and now it feels like the world has ended. And I could not put this down. It's like Cormac McCarthy's The Road. It's like Megan Hunter's The End We Start From, where this kind of post-apocalyptic event happens. And the emphasis isn't so much on the event itself or the act of climate change. The book isn't so much about that. It's about the person it affects and the personal mission that winds up occurring because of this horrific event. I was hooked. I was desperate to see what happened to Annie. What happened to her baby? What happened to her husband? Would they all get together by the end of the novel? I adored this. No complaints about it. Five stars from me. One of my favorite books certainly I've read yet this year. And I really don't want to say more about it. I don't want to spoil it for you. I've told you all you really need to know, but I absolutely loved this book.
[00:11:20] I will say Annie B. Jones is pretty infamous at The Bookshelf-- I think it's literally on our whiteboard where we sometimes write quotes that each other says in the store. I do not like gratuitous birthing in books. That is I think about the show-- what was that show called? Call the Midwife. I cannot do that show. Tilt did not bother me at all. So for what that's worth, if you're like me-- there may not be very many readers out there like that. But if you're like me, a gratuitous birthing is not for you in literature, don't worry about that. This book is so well done, well handled, well written, well told. I just loved it. So that is Tilt by Emma Pattee. Pattee, I assume, is the pronunciation of this name. I'm going to spell it for you, but it's also in the show notes. P-a-t-t-e-e. Releases on March 25th. Tilt. So good.
[00:12:16] A total departure, but also a five star book for me, The Road to Tender Hearts. This is by Annie Hartnett. This does not release until April 29th, but like Tilt, I believe it is worth the wait and it gives you time to read Annie Hartnett's backlist. So she wrote the book Rabbit Cake, which was (and I don't know if you all are this way) but that was the first audiobook I ever listened to in full, and so it sticks out to me and I adored it. I love that book. It's got a scout like protagonist, a great narrator. It's a book about grief, but it's also deeply funny. So that's Rabbit Cake. Then she released two years ago-- it wasn't last year, I don't think. I think it was two years ago. Unlikely Animals, which so many of you told me that I would love and a lot of you loved it. And I haven't read it yet, so I'm going to read it this year, I hope, because when the Annie Hartnett art came in, I immediately called dibs. And I feel like now I need to go back and read Unlikely Animals.
[00:13:20] So our book opens with a man named PJ. He lives in, I believe, New England area, and he's kind of this slob, but also kind of beloved grouch kind of character. He seems to have a good heart, but he obviously has a drinking problem. He is divorced from his wife. He has an adult daughter. One of his daughters died when she was a teenager. And so you can immediately see that that is probably the reason PJ is the way that he is. And he lives a few doors down from his ex-wife and her new husband. They eat breakfast together every day. We're talking very Katherine Heiny dysfunctional people, dysfunctional family kind of story. I'm not going to name them all for you, but every character is so fully developed and interesting and complicated in the most hilarious ways. I laughed out loud in this book. I marked so many pages, so many sentences. And if you're worried it's not simply character driven. So PJ, we get this introduction to him. He lives this kind of quiet, messy life because he's kind of a messy person.
[00:14:37] Like I said, he has a drinking problem that he maybe can or cannot acknowledge. He obviously is still grieving the loss of his daughter, perhaps to the detriment of his living daughter. But all of the characters are so great. And then we realize that PJ, through a series of events, decides it's time for him to woo the woman that was-- like he comes across an obituary where his high school nemesis has died, leaving his ex-girlfriend like his high school girlfriend widowed. And she now lives in Texas. I'm pretty sure it's Texas. And so PJ takes it upon himself to go on a road trip to Texas to try to woo his high school sweetheart. That is one thing that is happening. Another thing that is happening at first, unbeknownst to PJ, is that his brother, who he is estranged from, has died. And his brother and his brother's family has these children, and turns out PJ is the next of kin. And so PJ might actually now be the parent and caretaker of these two children. Okay, that's all I want to say. There's so much. It sounds so complicated. It's not. It's almost like Amy Poeppel's Sweet Spot where you feel like, okay, there's a lot going on here. It never feels like that.
[00:16:14] Annie Hartnett has done a brilliant job because I think she first introduces you to PJ, and that's who you kind of focus on. And then she slowly starts introducing these other characters who become equally important. Equally important. PJ is not the only protagonist in this book. He's the only one I'm going to name for you today, but he's not the only important character. He's not the main character. Or not the only main character. And so Annie Hartnett somehow does this I think pretty brilliant thing where she slowly introduces these other characters who become as important as PJ all over the course of maybe this kind of road trip type of book. Great for Katherine Heiny fans, great for Amy Poeppel's fans. If you've never read Annie Hartnett, take the time now to read Rabbit Cake and Unlikely Animals and then preorder The Road to Tender Hearts. I think it will be just what you need this spring.
[00:17:07] There were elements of it that reminded me of this book that Olivia and I both read during the pandemic, which was so for sure outside of Olivia's reading comfort zone, but even a little bit outside mine. This book called The Big Finish, and I wound up really loving that book. I don't know if I would love it now, but I loved it in 2020 and there are elements of that book here. I just had such a great time with this book and it was like feel good fiction, but well written. I think my mom would really like this book and think it was funny, but a literary fiction lover, I think, could also really enjoy it. So it's got a lot of crossover appeal to me. That is The Road to Tender Hearts by Annie Hartnett. It releases on April 29th.
[00:17:49] At the top of the episode I quoted from Blessings and Disasters. This is a new work of nonfiction by Alexis Okeowo. It does not release-- okay, hold onto your hats. Don't get mad. It does not release until August 5th. But again, I'm trying to read. That's my reading goal. You all might hate me for it, but I'm trying to read well in advance. So partly for Shelf Subscriptions, but also for book buying purposes, just trying to read a wide range of lit that publishes throughout the year. So this releases on August 5th. Kindle has made some of this possible, by the way. Tilt and Road to Hearts I read in physical ARC format. Blessings and Disasters, I downloaded to my Kindle. So this doesn't release until August, and I'm sorry, but it drew my attention when I was going through the catalog. For reference, I'm the adult front list buyer for The Bookshelf. Olivia is the children's front list buyer. And that means Olivia and I are currently buying for summer, which is like some of May, June, July, August, and then we'll do fall in a couple months, I believe. Sooner than you'd think.
[00:19:01] So that's part of the reason this doesn't release until August is I was going through the summer catalog, and I saw this book, and it immediately got my attention. And now the beauty of the Kindle, which there are pros and cons, but the beauty of an e-reader is I can immediately download a digital reading copy. So I downloaded this as an e-book format. And the reason it struck me is because Alexis Okeowo is a journalist. She is from Montgomery, Alabama. She's the child of Nigerian immigrants who raised her in the heart of Alabama, and she moved to New York. And she noticed that when she told people where she was from, they would give really obvious reactions ranging if it was a Southerner, maybe they would immediately connect with her. If they were not from the South, they would kind of raise their eyebrows and say, oh my gosh, how did you survive? How did you get out? And so she just started to pick up on, oh, Alabama is divisive.
[00:19:59] And, listen, as somebody who now lives in Georgia, I went to college in Alabama, married somebody from Alabama, in Georgia, when I talk about my Alabama connections, Georgians feel some kind of way about Alabama. I think Georgia thinks it's better than Alabama. Alabama thinks it's better than Mississippi. All of you are wrong. All of you are wrong and so I would agree with Alexis Okeowo, although Alexis Cole is also black and so the looks she is getting and the Interactions she is getting have a lot to do with her race and her ethnicity. Anyway, she has now written this book. I hesitate to even categorize it because on the one hand, it's a memoir. It's her story of growing up black and a child of immigrants in Alabama. And on the other hand, each chapter is really about a different aspect of Alabama history and Alabama politics and culture. So, for example, of course, we get a chapter or two about the civil rights movement in Alabama, particularly in Montgomery. We learn more about Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King Jr, some of those civil rights heroes who we hear a lot about, but maybe we only hear about them in the elementary school textbook version.
[00:21:20] Anyway, I think a Okeowo does a really good job of giving us maybe a more complete picture. But then she's also weaving in her own stories of her parents immigrating to America, why they chose Alabama, the university system, how they experienced the university system, and then how she wanted to leave and go somewhere else for university. How that worked for her. It's all so fascinating. And I was drawn to this because I went to college in Montgomery. And so I immediately was like, I like reading about places where I've been. I also, perhaps because of the book I am also putting into the world, I am intrigued by stories about people who stay or people who leave and come back. Alexis Okeowo's parents, I believe, still live in or around Montgomery and she, during the pandemic and in order to write this book, came back home and lived in Alabama.
[00:22:18] There are also some great chapters. Of course, you get the civil rights movement, but you also get a lot about the period of enslavement in Alabama. A really I thought pretty in-depth look at the slave trade in Montgomery. And if you've been to the Equal Justice Initiative there, or if you've read, I'll tell you what, if you've read about Bryan Stevenson's work in Montgomery, this is a great follow up because you get to kind of read how the city has acknowledged its past and maybe still has a long way to go. There's also a very, to me, pretty memorable chapter about immigration. And she interviews-- because again she's a journalist. So it's not just personal. That's why I hesitate. I'm like this isn't a memoir, but it's also not straight historical nonfiction either. But she interviews a young man who is a dreamer, a DACA recipient, and he farms in Alabama. And I think it's just especially of the moment, sadly, to read about this guy who has lived his entire life in Alabama, but he wasn't born in Alabama. He wasn't born in America. And so Alabama is his home.
[00:23:31] I mean, that is what is so fascinating to read about. So I don't quite know how to sell this one. But I think if you liked the book South to America, you will like this. Again, I think if you are familiar with Bryan Stevenson's work, you will like this. If your favorite way to read about history is through a well-written work of personal nonfiction, I think this will work for you because it is, in so many ways, a history of Alabama. I was reading parts aloud to Jordan who I think would really like this book. So it really was about the history of Alabama. But then Alexis Okeowo brings in her own personal narrative and then also her own journalistic perspective where she's interviewing people. So this book really kind of covers a lot of territory, but it's also not long. Like it's not a giant tome, which is probably part of the reason I appreciated it so much. So that is Blessings and Disasters by Alexis Okeowo. Releases on August 5th. It really is so good and was such a great departure for me this month.
[00:24:40] Okay, speaking of books I immediately downloaded, I follow-- I want to say it's hard to know because the algorithm is so messed up. But I follow Riverhead Books on Instagram and they posted the cover of a book called Among Friends. This is by Hal Ebbott. It's a debut novel. It releases on June 24th, and honestly, I was sold based on the cover alone. But then I started reading about it and I was like, okay, let me see if I can get this. So I downloaded it to my Kindle. And basically we've got two couples and their kids are gathering for a birthday weekend at a country house to celebrate. This is a weird detail to remember, but he's turning 52, and so that gives you an idea of how old these people are, I guess. So it's set over the course pretty much over a weekend. So that immediately struck me. And then it's basically these two men who have been friends forever and they've been friends, I think, I want to say, since college, and they get together every year. They're very close, perhaps even closer to each other than they are to their wives. And then their wives are on this trip and then their two daughters. Each one of them has one daughter.
[00:25:48] And you just know immediately there is tension. I mean, immediately. The book opens with one of the characters has like a toothache, and he calls his friend instead of his wife because he knows his friend will give him more sympathy than his wife will. And then one couple is clearly perhaps not as wealthy, although this is a rich people behaving oddly book. Not necessarily poorly, but oddly. Although maybe poorly, you decide. Anyway, one couple is maybe not as well off, so they get in the car to drive to the country house belonging to the couple that is really well-off, even though they're both again certainly upper middle class. So immediately you can see that there is tension between the couples, but you really don't know why. And there is a deep-- I do not know how Hal Ebbott did this. There's a deep sense of foreboding throughout the entire book. It reminded me so much of The Dinner, and I think the publisher is calling it-- or at minimum, Miranda Cowley Heller is blurbing it The Paper Palace. If you all remember the Paper Palace. I loved that book. It was divisive. Not everybody did.
[00:27:00] But the whole time I was reading it, I thought the tension reminded me so much of The Dinner. This book is very much a simmering resentment, and you keep wondering what is going to be the boiling point. What is going to be the moment when it all comes to a head? And there's like lots of little moments that you think, is this it? Is this it? And then it happens. And I was reading it and I almost said an expletive because I was like, oh gosh. What just happened in this book? This book is, I think, darker than the cover suggests. That's what I will say. Which is why the Paper Palace is probably a good comp, because the cover makes it look like the big chill. It makes it look like, oh, friends reunite at a country house and maybe there's some tension. Haha. No, no. This book it's dark. The tension is real. It is not like just old college grudges. That's not what's going on here. It is so good. I loved this book. I can't wait for it to enter the world because I think people are really going to like it, though it will not be for everyone. So this is for fans of The Dinner and the Paper Palace.
[00:28:23] Like a lot of the books we've talked about today, I'm going to leave it there. I'm not going to dive too much deeper into it. Though, if you are a reader or listener who's wondering, well, I'm a thriller reader, is this for me? No, this is not a thriller. This is literary fiction with an underlying suspense. But this is a pretty quiet book also. It takes a while to get to some of these boiling points. It takes a minute to get to some of these inciting incidents. So I think this is for literary fiction fans who appreciate maybe a slow burn. That's what I'll say. This is not a thriller. Olivia readers, I don't think would enjoy this book. I think they'd be waiting too long. I think they'd be wondering, when is something going to happen? But if you're a literary fiction reader or just a fiction reader who likes a little bit of tension in your literature, then I think you'll really like this. So that is Among Friends by Hal Ebbott. It releases on June 24th.
[00:29:24] And then last but not least, speaking of Olivia, Olivia and Erin, both sold me on this book, Wild Dark Shore. This release sooner. It releases on March 4th, so you don't have nearly as long to wait. Both of them raved about this book, and Olivia gave me the physical ARC, which now I'm like maybe I'll pick it back up. But I've been listening to the audiobook this month, so I've been in a bit of an audiobook slump. I've not been listening to a ton of audiobooks, but I did download this one on the recommendation of Erin and Olivia. The author is Charlotte McConaghy, and then the audiobook is narrated by Cooper Mortlock, Catherine Littrell, Saskia Maarleveld and Steve West. I'm not sure on the pronunciation of Saskia's name. But that's part of the reason I downloaded the audiobook, was when I saw it was a full cast. I was like, okay, this could be really great.
[00:30:15] So Charlotte McConaghy wrote Migrations, and Once There Were Wolves. I feel confident I read Once There Were Wolves, but honestly I can't remember. But I feel like I did. This is another work of cli-fi, climate fiction. I immediately thought of Clear, which I read last year. I adored clear, in fact, I feel like I didn't maybe give Clear the attention it deserved on the podcast last year because I think I read it so far in advance, meaning I think it released in the winter of 2024 and I read it in the fall of 2023. But if you have not read Clear, this is my push for you to read clear. But basically, Dominic Salt and his three children have been living on Shearwater, which is a tiny island. The closest place to it is Antarctica, and they've been living there for years trying to protect seeds that I think the United Nations or some equivalent has placed there in case of the apocalypse. In case the world ends, there will be something from which to rebuild. And so it's Dominic's responsibility to care for the land, but also help. There's like a lighthouse there. There are researchers there. He's a caretaker, essentially.
[00:31:34] And Shearwater was full of researchers who were helping protect these seeds. But now, because of sea levels, Dominic and his kids are the only ones who really live there. Until, a woman washes up on shore during a horrible storm. It's so chilling and good. Honestly, I'm surprised this one doesn't release until March 4th because it's very wintry feeling to me. But this is a book about survival. It's a book about parenting. Like what brought Dominic and his children here. Like, why were children even allowed on this island? I think two of them are teenagers and one of them is around nine. And what's it like to be raised in isolation. Who is this woman? What brought her here? How does somebody just wash up on the shore accidentally? I have loved this. I've loved listening to it. And it gets Erin's and Olivia's stamp of approval. So if you are a mystery thriller reader, I think this will satisfy your curiosity. And then if you're more of an Erin or Annie kind of reader, this is one of those great-- I love when we have a Venn diagram book, and this is one of them. So Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy. You could read the physical book, obviously, but the audiobook is also great. I got it off of Libro fm.
[00:32:53] So those are the books I read in February. Truly not a dud among them. The bummer is that my reading rhythm was going so well and then I guess I got sick and recorded the audiobook for Ordinary Time, and life just happened. And so I feel like I dipped a bit starting in mid-February, which is kind of a bummer because I was on a roll. I was on a roll. These are all really great books. As usual with our Reading Recap episodes, we are offering a reading recap bundle just like in January. Because I am reading so far in advance, we're going to do a pairing. This month, the February reading recap includes How to Sleep at Night; that's the work of kind of political dysfunctional family fiction. And then Wild Dark Shore, which is the Annie, Olivia, Erin crossover book. So the bundle, the pairing, is $52. Includes How to Sleep at Night and Wild Dark Shore. You can find more details and the February bundle, as well as all of the books I talked about today through the link in our show notes. Or go to Bookshelfthomasville.com, and you can type today's episode number. That's 518 in the search bar. 518.
[00:34:05] This week I'm reading Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson.
[00:34:07] Annie Jones: 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 @bookshelftville, and all the books from today’s episode can be purchased online through our store website:
A full transcript of today’s episode can be found at:
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…
Cammy Tidwell, Linda Lee Drozt, Martha, Stephanie Dean, Ashley Ferrell, Gene Queens, Beth, Jammie Treadwell…
Executive Producers (Read Their Own Names): Nicole Marsee, Wendi Jenkins
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