Episode 564 || Literary Therapy, Vol. 26
This week on From the Front Porch, it’s a Literary Therapy session! Our literary Frasier Crane, Annie, is back to answer more of your reading questions and dilemmas. If you have a question you would like Annie to answer in a future episode, you can leave us a voicemail here.
To purchase the books mentioned in this episode, stop by The Bookshelf in Thomasville, visit our website (search episode 564) or download and shop on The Bookshelf’s official app.
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 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 Meet the Newmans by Jennifer Niven.
If you liked what you heard in today’s episode, tell us by leaving a review on Apple Podcasts. You can also support us on Patreon, where you can access bonus content, monthly live Porch Visits with Annie, our monthly live Patreon Book Club with Bookshelf staffers, Conquer a Classic episodes with Hunter, and more. 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...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]
In books, I have traveled not only to other worlds, but into my own. I learned who I was and who I wanted to be, what I might aspire to and what I might dare to dream about my world and myself. More powerfully and persuasively than from the shout-nots of the Ten Commandments, I learned the difference between good and evil, right and wrong. A wrinkle in time described that evil, that wrong, existing in a different dimension from our own. But I felt that I, too, existed much of the time in a different dimension from everyone else I knew. There was waking, and there was sleeping, and then there were books, a kind of parallel universe in which anything might happen and frequently did, a universe in which I might be a newcomer but was never really a stranger. My real, true world, my perfect island. Anna Quindlen, How Reading Changed My Life.
[as music fades out]
I'm Annie Jones, owner of The Bookshelf, an independent bookstore in beautiful downtown Thomasville, Georgia, and this week it's time for an episode of Literary Therapy. If you are a new or newish listener, you might not realize that From the Front Porch is a production of The Bookshelf, a small, independently-owned bookstore in rural South Georgia. By listening to our show and recommending it to your friends, you're helping keep our indie bookstore in business. And if you like what you hear, one way you can financially support us is through Patreon. Last year, we read the classic work Don Quixote together, and this year, we're switching gears a bit to read The Complete Stories by Flannery O'Connor.
[00:02:03] For $5 a month, you can access our monthly Conquer a Classic recaps, as well as our porch visits, monthly Zoom Q&As where we talk about everything from pop culture to nail polish to what books you should take on your next vacation. To learn more about our Patreon tiers and benefits, just visit patreon.com/fromthefrontporch. Now, back to the show. There's a link in the show notes too. You'll scroll on that page until you see the orange button that says 'Start Recording'. Click or tap there, then leave your name, your place where you're from, and your literary conundrum, and voila! I would love to hear from you. For this week's episode, I did ask for questions that had to do with a new year. What reading challenges do you foresee for yourself in this new year? Do you have things that you're trying to leave behind in 2025, bad reading habits you don't want to bring into this new year? Are there things you want to conquer this year but you haven't been able to do before? And so I got so many voicemails, I've narrowed it down to a handful that seem to encapsulate the overall feelings, the overall issues of a lot of us readers as we turn the calendar page. So first up, let's hear from Molly.
Molly [00:03:41] Hi Annie, this is Molly from Texas. I am thinking about how to celebrate the books I've read in 2025. I usually make some kind of Christmas ornament or I've done embroidery hoops where I sewed a book for each book I read in the past year and I'd wondered if you'd seen any other fun ways to celebrate the past year's reads or maybe begin recording the next year's reads, maybe alongside a reading journal or maybe on its own. So I'd love your thoughts. Thanks.
Annie Jones [00:04:25] I loved this question and I wanted to start with it because I do think if you are like me or honestly a lot of the members of The Bookshelf team, we talk about this on The Bookshelf a lot, that we are not always good about celebrating the wins. We're very good problem solvers. We were very good about trying to identify how we can be better, how we could improve, but it is very important, equally important I would argue, to celebrate the good things, to celebrate the wins, to honor the successes. And so I like this idea, Molly, of commemorating a reading year, to not necessarily just look back and think, oh, no, I didn't read what I wanted to, or I wish I had read that book but I didn’t or I didn't tackle all the books on my TBR. And instead to look at your list and think, wow, look at all that I read. I read some really great books this year. I love the idea of an ornament. I've never done this, but I did have a dear friend of mine, Courtney, who made ornaments for a couple of us in the book club, in a book club that we were in and she filled it. You've probably done this while you strike me as somebody who's very crafty. She did like a clear round ornament and then she filled with like miniature little books, which were the books that we had read that year. So, of course, I love the idea of an ornament and marking the year and kind of almost treating it like a time capsule. I also recently heard from a reader where they had their Christmas card, which of course this is too late for now, but I have thoughts about this. They did their Christmas card, a drawing, a graphic, with their top, I think it was five or 10, books of the year. And so it was this lovely little postcard that she of course sent out to friends and family, but also I'm sure she got to keep one and it showcased almost like the ideal bookshelf that if you've ever seen that artwork, she almost created one of those for herself to show what she had read this year or what her favorites had been. It's too late obviously to do a Christmas card but I like that idea. And I also thought, okay, maybe this is because I have a February birthday, but I was like what if you did a bookmark that listed your top 10 books of the year? Probably my favorite Christmas card Jordan and I ever did was at the end of 2020, we did a Christmas card that listed the top 10 works of art we had experienced that year. And now I wonder why we don't just do that every year.
[00:06:41] But really in 2020, I wanted to thank and memorialize all the things that had gotten us through that really rough year. And so I like the idea of a top 10 bookmark where you could list your 10 favorite books of the year. And yes, Christmas has passed. So instead, create a bookmark and pass it out to your family and friends. Put it in your gift bags when you give people birthday presents. Or if your birthday is coming up, pass it as a party souvenir, or bring them to your next book club meeting. Nobody's going to turn this down. Everybody wants a book mark. Everybody wants the book mark, and you've essentially created a book list for people. You could have, you could design it in Canva and you could have your 10 books on one side and then on the back, leave it blank and they could write in their own. I like this idea of kind of passing on your favorite, your favorite books of the year to your friends and family. And so I personally like the idea of a postcard that you can mail or that you just frame and then a top 10 bookmark to pass out to friends or family. I also wonder if you think about And I don't know if you are like this, but I, in years past, have done yearly photo albums and a way to commemorate like, oh, here are all the ticket stubs we used this year, or here are the pictures with all of the pamphlets and brochures from the travels we took. So I have done almost like miniature scrapbooks of sorts every year. But I wonder if you could have a slim notebook or journal, and it's not something you in all the time. Instead... At the end of each year, you say, okay, these were my top 10 books of 2025. These were my 10 top books of 2026. And that's all it is, is a record of the books you read and loved. And at the end every year, I think it would be really fun to sit down and look back. I mean, it's fun for me. The way I do this is because I have a podcast, is I memorialize it in a podcast episode. I sit down with Hunter. We talk over our favorite books. I mean, essentially it's like going and grabbing a coffee with your friend and going over your top 10 books of the year, that's what Hunter and I do.
[00:08:43] And so I like the idea of you mimicking that, but instead of going on a podcast, you record it in a journal, or grab a friend for coffee and go celebrate it in person and exchange book lists. I mean that's where I, by talking to Hunter, that's how I made sure I was like, oh, I need to read Lightbreakers before the end of the years, or I need read Audition before the year. Ornament is always a great idea. A Christmas card or postcard that you can mail or frame for your own home. A top 10 bookmark that you pass out to family or friends. Or a journal where every year you record your top 10 list. To me, I think commemorating what has passed is a lovely pastime and a great way to, again, honor the works of art that have changed your life and your heart and your mind over the last year. I think embroidery hoops, I think that's lovely. Obviously that's above my personal pay grade. I mean, I've seen people do like a coloring sheet and that's more my speed, where you could create a black and white line graphic and then fill it in and kind of color it in. I've see people do that before and I like that as well. But to me, the top 10 bookmark is what I would do. Easy peasy and then get them printed at Kinko's and you can pass them out to friends and family. That's what I'd do. Pass them out like old school business cards. I love that idea. Molly, you'll have to let us know how you decide to commemorate your 2025 Reads.
Caroline [00:10:07] Hi, Annie. This is Caroline from Walnut Creek, California. Congratulations on all of your 2025 milestones. I loved Ordinary Time and it's delightful to see the joy with which you are approaching parenthood. My bookish conundrum has to do with the many, many physical books I have on my shelves. Aside from a collection of favorites, most of these are books that are on my TBR list. I'm often pulled in by the shiny front-list books. But then they languish on my shelves for ages. I'm wondering how you decide which books to purchase and then which books pass along to another owner. I want to continue supporting independent bookstores, but I'm hoping to be more intentional about what books I bring into my home in 2026. Thanks for any insight.
Annie Jones [00:10:55] I loved this question from Caroline, but not only did I love this question, it was the question I got over and over and again. And Caroline kind of encapsulated it perfectly, so that's why I chose her voicemail. But a lot of you left voicemails with this same sentiment, which boils down to you own a lot physical books, but you're pulled in by shiny front list books. Which books do you purchase? Which books you pass on to someone else? What do you buy from an indie bookstore? How can you still support an indie bookstore without breaking your bank? How do you read off of your unread shelf? So there was, I think the next voicemail is from Stephanie, and she asks a similar type question. So I'm going to focus, first of all, in how do decide which books to purchase and which books do you pass on to someone else? That's the main question Carolina asked that I'm going to tackle. So obviously my book buying habits are going to look different from yours because I accumulate a lot of books in advanced reader copies. So for me, it's less about breaking the bank. And it's more about, oh my gosh, I'm drowning in books. And I think about this, I think about my closet. Now, Caroline, you live in California. So you're like me, maybe, depending on, I don't know. Where in California do you live? But you might be like me and maybe you don't need to change out your closet all the time because we don't get a ton of seasonality in our weather. That being said, I still do every spring and fall kind of trade out my closet, I pack away my sweaters, my long sleeves, I bring out my shorts and my t-shirts and vice versa. If I do that for my clothes or I seasonally decorate, I take down my fall decor, I put up some Christmas decor, I take my Christmas decor. I put some springy decor, seashells for summer, et cetera. If I did that for closet and the decor in my home, why would I not do that with my books? So I think it is pretty imperative once a quarter or twice a year to sit down in front of your bookshelves, gather the books from all over your house, because goodness knows I have them all over my house, and kind of go through them and start to think, now, wait a minute, what needs to go? Because I have very finite space in my home. I have a modest size house, some would say small, and I have lot of bookshelves. But even lately, I have found myself going, okay, wait a minute. But my books are starting to be cluttered and cozy is one thing, clutter and hoarder is another, and the line is fine.
[00:13:26] And so I've started to look at my bookcases and think, okay, wait a second, which books do I absolutely love and need to keep? So I personally keep my favorite books of the year. So we're talking the books with the most markings in them, because you know I kind of tab my pages, I tear my pages. So which books have the most marking in them? Which books are the most memorable to me at the end of the year? Which are the ones I have discussed in conversation with Hunter. For me in 2025, it was the Correspondent, a Guardian and a Thief. It was also Lightbreakers. I read toward the end of the year, Stone Yard Devotional. I kept that book because I had marked so much in it. So what books have the most markings? Which books am I going to look back and think, oh, that was the book of the Year. So in 2024, it James. I kept my paper ARC of James. And broke all my personal rules, and I bought a copy of James when I went to London. I bought the copy with the UK cover. And so both of those are on my shelves. That's okay, I guess, because James was that good. So it deserves two spots on my shelf. So which books are you going to remember at the end of a year? And now is the time to ask yourself that. Because for me I'm cleaning off the slate. I'm wiping off the chalkboard. I'm moving forward with my new reading life in 2026. So I'm mentally done with 2025. So now is a good time to ask myself, which books am I actually going to remember? And it's pretty easy for me to tell you that. They're the books I've talked about the most. They're books I have returned back to. And then there are some books I look at on my shelf and I think, well, I liked that in the moment, but I don't need it anymore. Somebody else might need it more than I do. Because I have a little free library literally right outside my door, it's a great way for me to donate books and allow them to move on to the next person. So even if I liked a book, maybe it was a four-star book, but it doesn't hold a lot of space in my memory. Maybe I didn't mark a lot. For me, a lot these are thrillers. I love a thriller, but I don't need to keep them on my shelf. And they're more inclined, those are great books for the little free libraries. People want to read those. Yeah, that's my first question. What books are going to stick out in your memory from the last year?
[00:15:42] And then the other books I keep are the sentimental books. So these are books that I have been gifted. Maybe Jordan wrote in the front or my dad wrote in front or Hunter wrote in the front and so I keep those. Even if I haven't read them or even if they're a decade old. Like the other day I was cleaning off my shelves and I noticed a book that I thought that looks a little maybe cheesy. Why am I keeping that? And then I flipped to the front and saw how it was inscribed. And I thought, well, I'm never getting rid of that. I'm ever getting rid of that. I'm extremely sentimental and nostalgic. And so, for me, if it has sentimental value of any kind, if my brother gave it to me, if my mom gave it me, my grandmother, like I keep those books. So that's my criteria. I firmly ascribe to the mantra a book will find you when it's supposed to. So maybe this is Marie Kondo of me, although if I recall, Marie Kondo like rips up her books, which I'm not precious with my stuff, but I do think that's a little weird. But maybe this is Maria Kondo of me, but I kind of am like, okay, look at your shelves. Okay, let's say there's a stack of a few unread books where you're like, well, I never got to these. I never read these. This happened to me. I picked up a book at almost, no, not almost. I picked one or two books at every bookstore I went on my book tour because I wanted to support the indie bookstores. I love supporting indie bookstores. And then at the end of this year, I looked and I thought, well, and I read some of them. I did, I read of them, but I looked at my stack recently. They were all kind of in a stack, honestly, from April, May, and then I had a baby in June. So they were all still sitting in a corner. And I thought, okay, let's be realistic. Which of these am I going to read? And I grabbed two and the rest went to my little free library. I supported an indie bookstore. I'm proud of that, I don't regret it. If I want to come back to, for example, I'm going to use the example of The Eights. That was a book that I was really excited to read. Feels very summery. I was really excited to read it, but I saw it on my shelf and I thought, I'm not reading that anytime soon. I'm just not. Now, if I see it in a used bookstore in a bit of serendipity, if I see it at the local library when I'm in the mood for it, I'll grab it back.
[00:17:44] Also, I work at a bookstore. I can order whatever I want. I can or whatever I wanted whenever I want it. So scarcity mindset, I think, is a bad way to be when there are so many books to read. So I put that one in my little free library and that is kind of how I would go through process of culling books. I would do this more than once a year. I would it at minimum twice, maybe in the winter, like right now, and then maybe in the fall, like toward the end of the year. See what you accumulated over the summer. So I would go through this process just like you do your clothes. When I go through my clothes, I say, what do I love and I'm going to keep? What's a maybe? And what do need to donate? And it's honestly pretty easy. So the donate pile is easy. That maybe pile, keep it for a week, keep it a month. My month's a long time, but you could keep it for a month. And then at the end of the month, look at it and be realistic and say, okay, wait a minute, I didn't wear those. I didn't read those. I'm not going to read those right now. And let those books go serve their next person. Let those books to the next person who needs them. So they're going where they need to go. That's kind of my mentality and how I process what books I want to keep on my shelf and which ones I want to get rid of. Yeah, I hope that answers your question. I'm going to play Stephanie's voicemail next because it relates Caroline to yours. And so then we're going to talk about this next concept of like, wait, when I go to an indie bookstore, I want to support an indie book store. I love these shiny frontlist books, but what if I can't buy all the frontlist book? So Stephanie kind of has a similar question. So let's play her voicemails next.
Stephanie [00:19:16] Hi, I am Stephanie and I am from Georgia. I kind of have two readerly dilemmas, so I hope it's okay to share both of them. My first one is that I'm a middle school English teacher and I'm also a grad school student. And I feel like 2025, my reading life was very, very off because I was reading so many books at the same time. I'm normally a two to three book at a time reader and I was writing closer to like seven to 12 because of how much reading there was for my grad school classes for middle school and young adult lit. And I feel like that really burnt me out and I have not picked up any middle grader YA since the spring. So for the first thing I would like is better tips on how to find that balance in 2026 because I do like having an up-to-date recommendation for my students. And then the second readerly dilemma, this will probably match more of what the audience needs is my unread shelf. I feel very good about focusing on my unread shelf in 2026. However, where I predict that I will run into some challenge is whenever there are new book releases, and I know that I can get them from the library. I understand that. However, I feel like I'm going to still miss that dopamine hit from actually going into the store and just perusing around and picking out the book. There's something about spending money that gives an extra dopamine hit for me, and I'm trying to figure out how to curve that as well so that I remain focused on my unread shelf.
Annie Jones [00:20:35] Okay, Stephanie, I'm going to answer your last question first and then we'll go back to balancing your reading life in 2026. So let's talk about your unread shelf. Sounds like we have a lot of people with this problem. I think this might come up at least one other time in today's voice messages, but you've got this big unread self. You want to tackle it in 2026, but the real issue that you seem to be asking about is, but how do I prevent this problem from happening again? Like you're going to address the problem in 2026 by reading the books that you own, great job. But what do you do about that dopamine hit? So I wanted to talk about this because I definitely get this from books. I get it from shopping in general. I get from online shopping and I get if from going to Dunkin' Donuts. So let me tell you some things that I have thought through for 2026 for myself. So, one of the things I have pondered, and I have not implemented this yet because I'm recording this episode at the tail end of 2025, but I'm thinking about for 2026. I have spent a lot of money at Dunkin' Donuts the last six months of this year because not only did the Dunkin' Refresher fill a void, but the act of going to Dunkin' is some days a lifesaver. Like, it gives me something to do with Isaac. We get in the car, it becomes an activity, a field trip. It's a nice way to start my day. It's nice way end my day. It's a ritual. That's what it's become. So one thing I have pondered because I have spent too much money. I mean, quite frankly, I've spent too money at Dunkin' this year. I would be probably horrified to look at the total. I don't want to look at total. I know it's lot. So I've wondered if in 2026, what if at the start of every month I buy-- and honestly, I think this is better to do in physical format than on an app. Ask me how I know. But I think, what if I buy a physical gift card, a $30 gift card at the start of the month, and that's what I've got. That's my Dunkin' money for the month. It's 30 bucks. That's My Dunkin' money. So I don't know your book budget, Stephanie, but let's say you love your local indie bookstore. I don't know what store that would be for you. You're in Georgia. I think you said.
[00:22:44] But let say you go to your local bookstore and you go in January and you buy $100 gift card. And that gift card is your Q1 gift card, so in quarter one, that's going to come to, I mean, books have gotten more expensive. Let's not talk about it. As a bookstore owner, let's not talk about it, but that's going to get you three to four hardback books, could get you two hardback books, three paperback books. I haven't done the exact math, but I think that's about right. That'll get you let's say four or five books in the quarter. Probably closer to three to four, if you're doing front lists. So three to four books in the quarter. Okay, well that's lovely. By the end of the year, if you have bought on one-- and the reason I say buy a gift card is there you've supported the bookstore. I mean, we love when people buy gift cards at The Bookshelf, first of all, so that's a great way to support a store. But you've also now given yourself a set budget that's a lot more fun than like a Dave Ramsey envelope system, you know? Instead, you've gifted yourself a gift card, and you can go into the store, you can still get your dopamine hit, but now you're being really purposeful. Because to me part of the dopamine hit comes from the anticipation, doesn't it? I mean, that's what they say about travel. They say, I say they, the experts say that you get a dopamine hit, a serotonin boost from the planning of the thing, even more than the thing. So if you now have purchased a $100 gift card to last you January, February, March, now you've got to plan out your reading. Now, this is fun. I think this is fun. I do not like budgeting, but budgeting for fun? Well, this I like. Because now you can think to yourself, okay, what book am I going to buy in January? What book am I going to buy in February? You can pre-order, you can make a list on your phone. You can go into the store and shop around, but type on your own and make a list. It's fine, nobody's judging you. Like you've already bought a gift card. So what do we care if you make a list on your phones? Maybe that sounds silly, but I think it's giving you the dopamine hit, but doing it within your budget. And it still allows you to buy, in the words of Caroline, a shiny frontlist book. But you're also focused mainly on your unread shelf. And now those shiny frontlist books can be a treat. They can be for every two unread books off your shelf you read, you go to the bookstore and you treat yourself with a little stroll around the shop whether to add to your list or to eventually buy. And so it's kind of a reward system too.
[00:25:19] It's almost like when we read in the personal pan pizza days you had to read four or five books and then you got your personal pan pizzas. So you read four or five unread books and then you treat yourself to a new book. I mean, I think that's lovely. I think that's a great way to kind of game it out and game the system. Here's what I'll also tell you. I learned this from my friend, Carrie, who used to own a bookstore in Birmingham. And she wrote this great book called The Localist, and it was all about ways to support your local store. Because what I'm hearing, what I heard in a lot of these voicemails was, I'm drowning in books, but I want to keep supporting my indie bookstore, but I want to read from my unread shelf. What do I do? So hopefully we've addressed some of that. But I do want to speak to you all because I think most of you are probably indie bookstore supporters, small business supporters. And here's what I want to tell you, every purchase counts. So my friend Carrie used to say she loved the customer who once a week came in and bought a magazine or once a we came in and bought greeting card. Books are expensive. They're getting more expensive by the day. It is a problem my industry, my store, we're going to have to face this. The increased cost is startling. But if you came in once a week and bought $5 greeting card, that is just as important of a purchase to me as a $35 book. And I mean that. That might sound silly to you, but believe me it is not. My friend Carrie was exactly right. If you come in or if you go to your local bookstore and every week you buy a magazine, that's a lot of magazines, but every month you buy one magazine or you make a conscious effort to buy birthday cards this year. That's one of New Year's resolutions. I'd like to get better at snail mail. I'm spouting this off. Please don't hold me to that. I am still thinking through. Remember, I'm recording this at the end of 2025, but I would like just to stay on top of people's birthdays because I'm afraid that the people who send birthday cards are dying off. Like your grandmother is who always sent you a birthday card. Well, what happens when your grandmother isn't here anymore? Well, maybe Annie B. Jones is going to mail birthday cards. So what if I bought all my birthday cards that I wanted to send from an indie bookstore? So there are other ways to support your indie bookstore. And then my friend Ruth Ann is always really good about saying there are tons of ways, cost-free ways, to support an indie store. Do you tell your friends about your favorite indie bookstore? Do you tell you friends about your favorite indie bookstore podcast? Do you Repost the things that we post on our Instagram or on your local book stores Instagram? I mean there are lots of ways that you can support your local indie without buying a book. Do I want you to keep buying books? Yes. I mean, obviously, I would like to stay in business, but I also believe personal finances matter.
[00:27:59] I want you to be careful with your finances and I want You to be smart with your finance's and what I'm hearing from a lot of folks is oh my gosh I have so many books. I'm drowning in books. So what do I do? Well, first of all, I think you got to go through them like you go through your clothes. And we talked about that with Caroline's question. And then I think you pass them along. You buy them as gifts. I've seen my friend Kylie on Instagram. She gifts a lot of the books that she has bought and read and loved. Then she wraps them up and she sends them to another friend. I think I saw her do this where she picked out her top 12 maybe and she wrapped them and she mailed them to her friend as like a blind date with a book bundle. I'm pretty sure I've got this right. So Kylie mailed 12 of her favorite books to her friend. And then I want to say her friend did the same for her and they treated it like a blind date with a book. So Caroline or Stephanie, if you're also getting rid of some books and you don't have a little free library or you don't quite know how to donate them, what a fun way to gift something to your friend. Would I care if a friend gave me a slightly used book? No, I would love it. I would it. And so that's another thing to consider, is wrap one of your used books or the book off your unread shelf that you never read. Pass it on to a friend, she might love it. It's time for those books to find new lives. And then when you do want to support an indie bookstore, maybe there's a way to be smart with your budget by using gift cards. This is the trick I'm going to try myself with Dunkin'. Let's see how it goes. And then maybe you buy your snacks or maybe you buy-- I just think at The Bookshelf. We have little chocolates at The Bookshelf. So maybe you by a chocolate once a month from The Bookshelf or maybe you buy you're greeting cards or your magazines. Those small purchases matter. Next time your pen runs out of ink, instead of ordering one from Amazon, go to your local bookstore and buy one. There are other ways to support your local Indies without always having to buy a first edition hardcover book.
[00:29:56] Stephanie and Caroline, and all of the rest of you who had this question about your physical books, your unread shelves, what do you do with them? What do you buy? What do you forward on to somebody else? I hope that answers that. Stephanie, you did also talk about being burnt out on reading. When you said you were reading seven to 12 books at a time, I gasped. I totally gasped. I have been in those moments. They are not my healthiest brain moments. Now, listen, you are probably super healthy. You are probably doing great. You're balancing a lot; you're juggling a lot. But when I'm reading seven to 12 books at once, which that would be a large number for me-- but even when I am reading let's say five to six books at a time, that is too many for me. My sweet spot is two to three. And I think Stephanie, that is what you said, was that your preference is two to three. So I think I would approach this with that quarterly seasonal mindset, where of course you want to stay on top of your YA middle grade reading. It sounds like that's a big part of your career. It probably is what makes you really good at your job. But do you have to read them all? And I would argue that you do not. And what if using Kirkus Publishers Weekly, bookish podcasts, what if you narrow it down and you trust the experts, you stock plenty of books for your kids' classroom, for their library, whatever, but you limit yourself to reading two or three a quarter. That feels like a plenty. Then by the end of the year, you will still have eight really great books to recommend to your students. You said your sweet spot was two to three, honor that. Let that be your actual sweet spot, live in your sweet spots. Read two to three books at a time, and let one or two of those books a quarter be for your job. For your middle grade reader, for your young adult reader. That's how I would do it if I were in your shoes. I hope that's helpful. Also, thanks for all you do for Kid lit and for the young readers in your life.
Annie [00:31:54] Hi, my name is Annie Taylor and I am originally from Waco, Texas, but I live in California because I'm going to a college out here. But I absolutely love reading. I think it's super important for people. But I'm a college student and so I've been trying to read five books a year even with my course load because it actually helps me de-stress when I am not studying. And so, but lots of my friends are like I never read because I don't have time for anymore. They're always reading their textbooks and other things you know working on projects. And so I wonder if there's a practice for college students because I do believe that people should still read for pleasure even though they're doing a master's program or an undergrad program. I'm wondering what kinds of practices can help young people still keep reading and helping really their workaholic mind just slow down during the semester because again so many of my friends just aren't good at that. But I think because of what I do, just reading when I can, I feel like it's really important for people. So, anyways, just thinking about how college students can also do that.
Annie Jones [00:33:22] Hi to a fellow Annie. Okay, I wanted to include this because we get a ton of college students at The Bookshelf because of our proximity to Florida State University. So we get lot of FSU students in the store and we hear this a lot. And I was a college student. I was going to say not that long ago, but that is no longer true. But I was also a college students and my reading life changed drastically when I was in college. I know that we have talked about how Jordan's reading life changed when he went to law school. Like that totally changed Jordan's reading life. So let's focus on some reading practices. I liked how you worded it. We're not talking about numeric goals. We're talking about rhythms and practices that might be doable for a college student as they try to read for fun while they are also juggling a heavy course load, reading a lot of books for school, doing a lot projects, etc. Time is precious. So I have a couple of recommendations. The first is when you work out, when you go for a walk, when you're exercising, listen to an audio book. And here is something I would like to try at The Bookshelf, but I'm going to pass it along to you, Annie, and you tell me if this is successful for you. I have seen a couple of bookstores do these audio book listening walks. So I love walking with my friends and shout out to my friend, Erin, we go for walk approximately once a week. Now, of course, we talk on our walks. But I like the idea of every so often, and this is what I've seen these bookstores do, you get with a group of your friends and you all put in your AirPods, your headphones, whatever, and you listen to audio books. Does not have to be the same audio book, by the way. So you all listen to an audio book and you walk, let's say, for 30 minutes to an hour. Walk around a park, walk around a downtown, whatever. And then at the end, you go grab a pastry, you go get a coffee and you sit and you share what you read together. The reason I like the communal aspect is because of loneliness, honestly. Like I think even college students who might be living on campus with one another, there still could be a tendency to like hole up into yourself. And maybe especially if you are really deep in your program and you're trying to finish projects and you are on deadlines, you're probably like in the library or in your dorm. Maybe I'm projecting, but like you're working hard and maybe you're not seeing a lot of other people. So I like idea of making this kind of a communal, friend activity where you're all listening to the same audiobook. Now, you don't have to do this communally. I'm sorry. You're listening to an audiobook does not have to be the same audiobook, but you're always listening to audiobook. You're having the same experience and then you're talking about it. Now it doesn't have to be a communal activity. Next time you're walking around or walking across campus, listen to an audio book instead of music.
[00:36:07] If you are driving from one end of campus to listen to an audio book instead of a podcast. So this is one way for books to kind of infiltrate, and you're not having to create any additional time. This is time you would have walked across campus. You already would've been driving somewhere. But instead of filling your ears with podcasts or music, you're going to listen to an audio book. So incorporating audio book listening into your reading life, I think would be an important and fun practice for a college student. And I love the idea of an audio-book listening walk. So that's my first tip. And then my second tip is read 10 minutes before bed. All of us are on our phones. I did just buy myself a brick. I succumbed ironically to the social media advertisements I was getting about the brick. So I did buy a brick to get off my phone more. But one time of day when I would really like to stop being on my phone is right before bed. It's not good for us. I mean, it's good for our eyesight. That sounds dumb, but it's true. It's not good for our attention span. It's good not for brains right before the bed. The blue light is not good for our brains right for bed. Everybody sleeps. I mean, I know college students don't sleep a lot, but you do sleep. And so why not say, I'm going to put my phone across the room, buy an alarm clock, buy an old school alarm clock and I'm going to read 10 minutes before bed. First of all, you'll find yourself falling asleep. So if you're an anxious person or a person who has trouble falling asleep, I actually think books really help. So I think you'll fall asleep faster reading a book than you would scrolling your phone. And a 10 minute timer. And you would be surprised, I think, how much reading you get done in 10 minutes. And it clears your brain from all the other reading you've done all day long. All day long, you've been reading other books, harder books. Read a fun Romantic novel, read a fun rom-com. This is not the time to challenge yourself. You're already challenging yourself. That's what college is. So read something fun for 10 minutes right before bed. Those are the two reading practices if I were back in college and I were trying to find time for my reading life, which was a constant struggle for me. I mean, I was not an English major. I think a lot of people make that assumption. I was not an English Major, but I did do my school's great books program. And so most of my curriculum, most of coursework was reading and I loved it. But I was also really disappointed because I did not have a ton of time to read for fun and reading for fun brings me back to myself. I mean, it is a great grounding activity. And so, if I could turn back time, I love the idea of an audiobook listening walk. I think the novelty of that would be really fun and add a source of play into your life. And then reading 10 minutes before bed. I think a lot of us put pressure on ourselves to read a whole book or read a chapter before bed. No, just set a timer. Read for 10 minutes and then be done. Turn out your light and go to bed. But I think that right before bedtime, you don't need to be reading schoolwork right before bed time. That's not good for you. And so, cleanse your metaphorical palette, your brain palette, by reading something for fun 10 minutes for bed. Those would be my two. Annie, report back, tell me if you practice any of these.
Haley [00:39:11] This is Haley in Kentucky, and I'm hoping that you can help me think of a new and creative way to track my reading for 2026. For the past seven or eight years, I have used Goodreads to track my reading and also have a notebook where I keep just a title, author, and the source that recommended the book. And I'm not super diligent about it but I do try to make sure that everything is on that list. This year Goodreads decided to go all wonky and it duplicated a bunch of books that I had on my shelf and so it looked like I had met my reading goal for the year when actually I had not and so I was happy to have that dual system of sort of an electronic like technological tracking and then my paper and pencil, but I really love tracking on Goodreads because I just like the visual aspect of it, but I would love to get away from Goodreads. I have tried StoryGraph in the past and maybe need a tutorial about it and it just hasn't quite worked for me. So I would just love some creative ways that people track their books and what some ideas that you might have for me going into 2026. Thank you.
Annie Jones [00:40:37] Okay, Haley, this depends on how nerdy you want to get because I'm a nerdy person, but I also am more type B than people think. So as for me and my house, I record my books on Instagram and then at the very end of the year-- and actually friend of the show Donna has sometimes done this for me. She's put all my books into StoryGraph so I can see the pretty graphs. I do like StoryGraph and I was going to recommend story graph if you had not heard of it or tried it. I do recommend StoryGraph. I personally think it's better than Goodreads. Obviously, I'm biased. Goodreads is an Amazon thing, so I prefer StoryGraph, but I am not great about tracking my books anywhere except Instagram, because I just feel like I cannot keep up with one more app. If I did not review my books on Instagram, what would I do? I would type them in my notes app. I would not buy a pretty journal because I guarantee you, I'm looking at one right now. It's not a book journal. It's one of those five-year journals, one line a day. I bought it when my book came out and I believe the last entry is from May 1st. So, yeah, I would keep track of my books on my Notes app, if it were me. But because you have used a notebook and Goodreads, I'm wondering if you could switch to StoryGraph. Let that be something new that you kind of nerd out over in the new year, watch some tutorials, whatever, but I think you could try Goodreads. And then I will tell you, I have a friend, Kimberly, and then you'll hear from Amanda in the next voicemail, I have lot of friends who use spreadsheets, use Google Docs. Again, it depends on how nerdy you want to get, but if you keep a spreadsheet with let's say the date you started, the date to finish, all the stats that you like from Goodreads. I've never used Goodreads for this purpose, but let's take Goodreads asks you when you start, when you finish, maybe how many pages the book is, whatever stats Goodreads uses, you put that in your spreadsheet and then you can create your own charts and graphs. And so I know that there are people who would love to do this.
[00:42:47] Now I would not, but sounds like Amanda keeps a spreadsheet. I think Olivia, if she didn't create spreadsheets for The Bookshelf, she would probably love to do this for herself. And again, you can kind of approach it as play. Like if that's what you want to do with your spare time, go whole hog, like go all in and create yourself a spreadsheet so that at the end of the year you can see the stats that you care about, what genres you like to read, Google Drive, Google Docs, they're so easy. Like they're so easy to use. So I personally would try StoryGraph, but I also think you could have a lot of fun in 2026 toying around with your very own spreadsheet. And if you're super nerdy by the end of the year, you might have a system that then your other friends adopt and like you all now share Haley's spreadsheet. I just feel like every friend group, every nerdy friend group has the one friend. My friend is Kimberly, who used to keep track of all of our book club books. That to me, trying a spreadsheet sounds really fun because it's way more personalized than even StoryGraph or Goodreads. You're recording the data that you want to know. That's how I would track my reading in 2026. I would use the Notes app. Have you heard of those people who when they have a baby who's born they start an email address for their child and then they email. Have you heard about this? Where they email their child all of the-- it's almost like an electronic baby book kind of thing. If you wanted to get real creative, you could do something like that. Like, start an email address and email yourself reviews, that'd be cute. But the truth is I don't know that you would keep that up. I don't know you, Haley, but I wouldn't keep it up. I would start and not finish. So I would switch to StoryGraph, watch the tutorials, or I would start your own spreadsheet because it sounds like you got frustrated with Goodreads so you use your notebook system anyway. Why not make it all electronic, do it all digital, and you create the spreadsheet you want to see in the world. That's what I would do.
[00:44:57] Let me tell you what my 84-year-old aunt does, which I love. I'm just going to throw this out there. Literally on those miniature legal pads, so not the full-size legal pad, the tiny legal pad. She just keeps in pencil, she's a former school teacher. She just keeps a tiny legal in the spot where she reads. And she doesn't even have book titles. Now she can tell you the book titles, she knows exactly what they are. But she just has listed by number. So like the first book she read last year and then she wrote the number of pages because what my aunt cares about is page count. So she's read like 20,000 pages in 2025. I mean, something ridiculous, but it was so fun. There was no fancy notebook, there were no charts, there were not graphs. She just recorded in pencil in her beautiful handwriting how many pages she had read because she totaled each book's pages. And that was her way of documenting what she read in 2025. I have a picture. I'll try to remember to post it on Instagram. Anyway, Haley, StoryGraph or your own spreadsheet, that's what it sounds like I would do if I were you. I think you could have a lot of fun actually with the spreadsheet option, kind of creating your own template, playing around with color. Like I do think that could be really fun. So that would be my recommendation for you in 2026. Have fun with it.
Amanda [00:46:14] Hi Annie, it's Amanda from Thomasville, Georgia. First time I've said that in a while, and it sounds so great. You asked for literary therapy questions regarding potentially new year and how to read for the new year. I'm one that sometimes sets reading goals and then sometimes epically fails them. Moving and starting a new job and various things get in the way and the fact that I'm a mood reader. I do plan on completing the Flannery O'Connor challenge. What other challenges do you think would be good for maybe a mood reader who also already has a lot of backlist books? We're talking maybe over 400 on her spreadsheet? I do sometimes make a list and then get mad at myself when I let my mood take over and not read them, but any help would be appreciated. Thanks!
Annie Jones [00:47:13] That's a lot of backlist titles, Amanda. But I respect it and I respect the spreadsheet. I respect so much that I just recommended to Haley that she keep a spreadsheet. I'm very impressed that you have a spreadsheet of backlist titles. I think this sounds like backlist title that you want to read, not that you own. Am I right about that or do you own them? I'm not sure now what you said. But anyway, you've got this spreadsheet where you keep a list of backless titles. What are some reading challenges? You're going to do the Conquer a Classic. We're so glad you're joining us. What reading goals could you set for yourself? Well, I think you could do one of the things that I recommended to Stephanie, because I know you also, Amanda, are a teacher and you work in education. So maybe you're reading books for work, I don't know. But I think for every two or three new books you read, you read a backlist title, because I knew you read lot of front lists. So you could incorporate backlist titles as kind of your treat. I totally know what you mean about being a mood reader though. So here's a suggestion. If these are books that you own, now if they're in a spreadsheet, this will be even easier. But if these are the books that own, what if you arranged them by genre like you were shopping at a bookstore? If these only books that exist on a spreadsheet so they're just titles, you don't own them, can you organize the spreadsheet by genre? And so you know when you're in the mood for a thriller you go to your backlist spreadsheet, you scroll to the thriller section, and you look and then you see, okay, I've got five thrillers to choose from, I'm going to read this one. Because then you're not removing the serendipity of it. You're not ignoring your mood. You're still totally in tune with what you want to read, but you've systemized it, you've gamed it like we talked about. So I like the idea of having a TBR shelf that's organized by genre. Or a spreadsheet, as the case may be, organized by genre so that when you're in the mood for something, it's almost like you're giving yourself a prescription. You know your mood is blank, so you're going to read blank. You're going to write yourself a description for this book. I like that idea a lot. I have not often arranged my books by genre, but I think that that could be really fun because you're essentially shopping your own shelves. And maybe that could also provide the dopamine hit that we were talking about with Stephanie and Caroline. So that is one way, I think, to listen to your mood, but also to still incorporate these backlist titles into your reading life.
[00:49:41] The other thing I would suggest for you as a reading challenge is a bookish bingo. Because to me, instead of making your challenge be about number of books read, maybe you make yourself a list of, okay, and I'm bad about a yearly thing, quarters really do work well for me. I think it's because of Bookshelf. And maybe for you it would be semesters. But I think however your work life goes, there goes your actual life. So for me, my life is divided up into quarters. So I think that's why I have found yearly challenges harder of late. So maybe you set up a bookish bingo for yourself for every quarter, or you do a yearly one or a semester one, but lots of bookstores. And by the time this episode's out in the world, maybe we will have created a reading challenge. I don't know. But lots of indie bookstores do this where they literally have a bingo sheet And it's a work of translation, a novella. A debut novel, a work of nonfiction. And so that way you're not reading in any specific order. You're looking at that bingo sheet and you're thinking, well, what am I in the mood for today? Well, I'm in the mood for a scary book. Okay, well, is there a scary book that somehow is on this bingo card? Like, and then you could treat yourself. Again, I am big into the reward system, but you could say to yourself I'm going to treat myself to an Empire bagel coffee after I complete this bingo card, or whatever the case may be now that you're a Thomasville local. I'm going to treat myself to a bagel as soon as I finish this bingo card. And maybe it's a seasonal bingo card. I made for me and my family this fall. So I made one for me, one for my mom-- no, for summer. I did it for summer. One for me one for mom, Ashley, and my Aunt Lisa. So I've made four different cards on Canva and it was like summer reading lists. And I looked at the books I thought that I might want to read over the summer. I forget how many it was, six to 10. And I did that for each of us. Each card was different. Each reading list was different and I wound up reading three or four off the list. And that was enough because I also am a mood reader. So some of those books I was not in the mood for. I think I already mentioned the eights. I think that was on my summer reading list and I didn't get to it because I was never in the mode for it. That's all right. That's fine. There's nothing wrong with being a mood reader. So I like a bingo card or a reading list, something that you can kind of go back to when you're in a reading rut or when you are not sure what to read next. Sometimes I know exactly what I want to read next. I don't need a card or bingo or reading challenge when I'm in that zone. But when I am outside of that zone and I'm scrambling a little bit wondering what do I read next? That's when the card would come in handy, that's when challenge would come in handy, that's when shopping the spreadsheet or shopping the shelves would come into handy. Those would be my tips for you, Amanda.
Holly [00:52:34] Hi Annie, my name is Holly. I'm originally from Queens, New York and now live in Los Angeles. Longtime listener of the podcast. Love it, love everything that you do. With 2026 coming up, I find myself already both so excited about and also overwhelmed about the many amazing looking new releases headed our way. And I am just always curious, especially as we go into the new year. If you have any advice or what your method is for how to kind of narrow in on which ones you actually decide to pick up and read. I would be curious about just for like your own self, what your own methodology is for figuring out which ones you're going to actually prioritize since we can only read so many books, and any advice you have for the rest of us to do the same. Thanks.
Annie Jones [00:53:25] Holly, this is a great question and a great way to end today's episode. So I also get very excited about and overwhelmed by new releases, particularly when we start a new reading season, whether that's a new year or a new literal season, like my spring reading or summer reading. Here's what I would tell you. I love our Literary First Look events at The Bookshelf. Yes, of course, this is a bit of a plug, but I do love these seasonal reading guides that we put out. Anne Bogle does this, I know for the summer. Maybe she does one at other points as well. But I like being given a starting place for books to read in the new season because to me that immediately kicks off my priorities. Seeing what somebody else has prioritized, seeing what a professional bookseller, a professional reader, a professional-book-podcaster, what they deem worthy is so helpful to me. So I prioritize my own reading by looking at the experts. For me, that is Kirkus, Publishers Weekly, fellow indie bookstore reviews on a website called Edelweiss. That is kind of how I prioritize my reading. And sometimes does that mean a book slips by me? Yes, it does. And again, you cannot live by the scarcity mindset when it comes to reading. There's no need to. There are so many books. It'll find you when it's supposed to find you. Here's the other thing I do. And I'm best about this with my eBooks. So I'm not a huge eReader, but as you all know, I did buy a Kindle in 2024. This was to help a problem, which I saw arising, which was fewer physical ARCs. And as a reader of frontlist books to sell in my store, I really do need to be reading frontlist titles, and I need to reading advanced reader copies. And I started to get nervous because I primarily, and I prefer to read physical books. But I was worried we were going to see fewer ARCs printed, and I think that trend has begun. So I bought a Kindle, and I download e-books from Edelweiss to my e-reader every season. And I prefer reading physical books, but if I can't get a physical copy, I download the book to my e-reader. And here's what I do. I don't know how you guys do it because I never had owned a Kindle before, but I downloaded, for example, the other day, 46 books. Is that true? It was probably more like 36 because I had gone through a Simon& Schuster catalog, a Harper Collins catalog, a Penguin Random House catalog for spring. So now I have these 36 books, which is a big old TBR list, and I'm not going to read all of them. I'm 100% not going to read all those.
[00:56:09] But what I immediately did was I divided those books into collections and I labeled them. January, February, March. I think I was doing it for spring. So January, Feb, March, April. So now each month has about what, five books? Give or take some months, like January doesn't have as many as April. But I immediately divided them up so that I knew, okay, if I want to read for January, these books are my priority. If I want read for February, these books are my priorities. That was particularly helpful for me because I'm reading for Shelf Subscriptions. So you could arrange them however you want. And we just talked about Amanda arranging her spreadsheet or her physical shelves based on genre. I think for you, somebody who gets excited or overwhelmed by, or both, new releases, I think that's a great way to do it is to just have-- and even if you don't have an e-reader, maybe you have a list on your phone and you're like, okay, this book keeps popping up on my Bookstagram, Riverhead keeps pushing this book at me, I'm going to log it, I'm going to log it somewhere. And then for me, if a book is coming up more than once, so if I see a book on Instagram, but then also Hunter reads it, and then also maybe Olivia asks me about it in passing, and then I see the ARC pop up at The Bookshelf, I'm grabbing that ARC. I'm immediately moving that one to the top of my list. And so, by keeping a physical list, whether it's digital-- I guess that's not a physical list-- in a notebook or on your Notes app or in a collection in your e-reader. That way, when a book comes up more than once, to me, it automatically gets moved to the top. Because that means it feels a little bit like I'm being told, oh, that book, I might need to read that. That book is popping up a lot, I need to read that. It is easy to get overwhelmed. I think the key is to tell yourself. You have time. You have time. That might not be true, Holly. You might not think that as true, but I think it is okay to tell ourselves you have time because we get into a big old frenzy when we think, oh my gosh, I have to read all these books before the end of the year. No, you don't. You can read them next year. You can read when they come out in paperback. You're not behind. You're going to fall out of line. You're not going to miss the finish line. You're going to miss the pizza party. Like there's plenty of time. I would channel excitement. And the way I would do that is by nerding out over it. So creating little lists, creating a spreadsheet if you want. We talked a lot about spreadsheets today. Creating a physical TBR. But I think having a list on your phone, I don't know.
[00:58:55] Do you ever do this with? I keep going back to clothes, but I think about the people I follow who love fashion and how they have let's say they have these items of clothes saved but not purchased. So they know that in April they're going to need a new white shirt. So they've got, I don't know, there's a way on your phone if you use Safari to organize your internet tabs. There's also a way obviously on Google Chrome to organize your tab. So maybe you get one part of your internet browser that's all books and you have them all up. And then as you buy them, you check them off or as you read them, you check the off. I think some kind of checklist, some kind of shopping list. I have friends who are very strategic shoppers and so literally they have a list of this year I need a white shirt, I need new pair of boots, I needed a pea coat. And that way when they're shopping if they see a pea coat even if it's in May, they know in October I really need a pea coat now it's on sale I'm going to grab it now. So if you have this list of book, next time you are in an indie bookstore or next time you're browsing online on Libro.fm or whatever, and the book pops up, you can look at your list and say, oh yeah, this one was on my list. I don't know how you prioritize new releases now, Holly, but that would be my recommendation to you. Keep a list some way, and I would organize it by date released. That's what I would do. I would organized it by day released, and I think what you'll discover is by the time June rolls around, you'll look back at your January books and be like, oh, I don't really need to read that. That's okay, I really don't need to need to that. I think that's what will wind up happening. Is the list will be helpful because it'll give your brain somewhere to put it, but you don't necessarily have to read it right that moment. You don't have to grab it right that moment. You can keep a list and be more strategic about it, if that makes sense. This was really fun. I loved brainstorming this with all of you. I wish we could all go on an audio book listen walk and talk about these things. But that would be my recommendation. And my lawn guys just showed up. I don't know if you can hear them, but we finished just in time. Don't forget that you can leave me a voicemail for a future literary therapy episode by going to fromthefrontporchpodcast.com/contact, scroll to the middle of the page until you see the orange button that says "Start Recording" then leave your name, where you're from and your literary conundrum and you could be a featured on a future episode of From the Front Porch. This week, I'm reading Meet the Newmans by Jennifer Niven.
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:
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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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