Episode 566 || January 2026 Reading Recap

This week on From the Front Porch, Annie recaps the books she read and loved in January. You get 10% off your books when you order your January Reading Recap bundle. 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 566), or download and shop on The Bookshelf’s official app:

January Reading Recap Bundle

  • The Land in Winter by Andrew Miller 

  • Homeschooled by Stefan Merrill Block 

  • Vigil by George Saunders 

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 Whidbey by T. Kira Madden

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...Ashley Ferrell, Beth, Cammy Tidwell, Gene Queens, Jammie Treadwell, Joseph Shorter IV, Kimberly, Linda Lee Drozt, Nicole Marsee, Stephanie Dean, and Wendi Jenkins.

Transcript:

Welcome to From the Front Porch, a conversational podcast about books, small business, and life in the South.  

Is the idea of healing to get you back to the way you used to be or to turn you into something new?   -Ben Markowitz, The Rest of Our Lives.  

[00:00:37] 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 January. If you like my book reviews here on the podcast, you might be interested in joining my private Instagram account, Annie's Five Star Books. For $50 a year, you can become a part of my bookish community online. Through the private Instagram Account, you'll get access to my book reviews, backlist and frontlist titles. I host monthly Instagram story Q&A's and share about the books I start, but never finish. If you follow me personally online, you've seen my reviews for years. And of course, From the Front Porch listeners will always have access to these free monthly reading recap episodes. The private Instagram is simply a place separate from the Bookshelf where I get to be more detailed with my reviews and Five-Star Book Club members can also choose if they want to order my five-star reads each month from the store. There's a quarterly newsletter option for the social media averse, too. For more information or to sign up for the 2026 group, it's never too late, visit anniebjonesrights.com/five-star-book-club. There's a link in the show notes. Now, back to the show.  

[00:01:50] Every month, I like to give short reviews of the books I read that month. And since we haven't done these in a while, I'm going to share some of my December reviews too. I'm going to try to keep this episode tight, but I did quite a bit of reading in December and did not cover it here on the podcast. So I want to recap a couple of those books that I still think would be worthy of your TBR lists, and then I'll move into the books that I read in January. So first off, in December, I wound up going on like a little Booker spree. I don't typically align a ton with Booker. I'm referring to the Booker Awards. I don't always read in line with Bookers tastes. I more align, I think, with the Pulitzer, occasionally the National Book Award, but for whatever reason, I found myself reading several novels back to back that were Booker long-listed or short-listed last year or in previous years. One of the books that I read, but I'm not going to review here is, oh gosh, Small Great Things. The Claire Keegan book. That's the name of it? Now I'm blanking. But anyway, it's that short almost novella that's very much set around the holiday time. I think it has since become maybe a Netflix or TV adaptation. But anyway, I really liked it. I'm just not going review it here because to me it's quite a seasonal book. But I read quite a few Booker nominated or long-listed, short-listed titles. And one of them was Stone Yard Devotional. This is by Charlotte Wood. I have referenced or talked about this book in a previous episode of From the Front Porch. I did find a way to kind of sneak it in.  

[00:03:22] This book is quiet and sparse. Our unnamed narrator finds herself, despite her lack of belief, retreating to a convent in the wilderness of Australia kind of right during the height of the pandemic. And unbeknownst to maybe me or you, perhaps if you lived in Australia or New Zealand, maybe you were familiar with this, but at the same time, we were all experiencing the COVID-19 pandemic. Australia was experiencing it too, and they were also experiencing a mouse plague. And when I say a mouse plague, I was talking about this with Olivia, and she thought I meant mice were dying. That's not what I mean. I mean mice were infiltrating spaces in Australia. And so in this book, mice play a crucial role. And I did have somebody comment to me on my Instagram account. They said, how much mice are we talking? Guys, it's so much mice. It's so much mice, which that did not bother me in any way. But I do need you to know, there are a lot of mice in this book. And so if that is a turn off for you in any ways, I guess be warned. Anyway, the unnamed narrator, she retreats to this convent and despite her need for uncomplicated silence, she finds a lot complications. Of course, the nuns themselves run hot or cold, depending on the day. The mice are scampering wildly throughout the walls and across the floorboards. And then a dead nun's bones wind up returning to the convent and they find their home in the great room.  

[00:04:49] And so this book winds up being about, yes, faith and doubt, but it's also about grief, uncertainty, forgiveness, coming to terms with the lives we've been given. I loved this book. I loved it. I'm kind of annoyed that I read it after our Top 10 Books of the Year episode because this would for sure have been in my Top 10. If you're a fan of Matrix by Lauren Groff, Wild Dark Shore, Memorial Days, if any of those are appealing to you, the Memorial Days comp comes from the setting of Memorial Days. A lot of That book is set in Australia and so the setting felt familiar to me. This was long-listed for the Booker. It was a New York Times notable book at the end of 2025. I loved it and I just wanted to talk about it one more time because I do think it's a great wintry book to read. It's not particularly set in the winter, as I recall. In fact, maybe quite hot and dusty in Australia, but it felt wintery to read. It felt like a book that you hunker down in your cozy chair with. I loved it. I absolutely loved it. So that is Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood. I finished that in December.  

[00:05:54] Also, in December, I picked up The Land in Winter. This is by Andrew Miller. This was also, I believe, longlisted for the Booker. My friend kind of hand sold me this one after it had been hand sold to her. So it was hand sold her in her local bookstore out in the Midwest, and then she hand sold it to me. And I'm always curious what other bookstores are recommending, what they're selling. This book is quiet. It is told from the perspectives of two different couples across December, 1962. The women in each marriage are both pregnant and they develop kind of an unlikely friendship. And then the men barely know each other exists. One's a doctor. One's a farmer. And this is a book (I cannot stress this enough) where nothing huge happens. I kind of kept waiting for some big moment that would kind of turn the novel on its head. And that moment never really came unless we're talking at the very, very end. And that's a very different kind of book. This is not a plot-driven book. This is a character-driven novel about these two couples. I had a lot of folks on Instagram ask me if this was like Dearly Beloved or Crossing to Safety. I kind of think the best comp is Buckeye or a darker version of Nile Williams if you have read Nile William's books. I really appreciated the author's insight into each member of these couples. It's told from at least three, maybe four of their perspectives. You definitely get the two wives perspectives, but you also get the doctor's perspective.  

[00:07:28] This was a five-star book for me until the end. And that big, bombastic kind of moment I was waiting for did eventually come, but not until the final pages. And I can't decide still even what I thought about it and how he chose to end it, but I'm so glad to have read it. This is great, obviously winter reading, perhaps you get that from the title. It is set in a dark and cold December. This one is all about marriage and class. And in that way, maybe it is a little bit reminiscent of Dearly Beloved or Crossing to Safety. But in my mind, I don't know the subject matter or the things that these couples are grappling with reminded me a little more of the things happening in Buckeye. So I really liked this one. It's got a beautiful cover. That is The Land in Winter by Andrew Miller. I read quite a few books actually in December. I had a great December reading month, which is almost beyond my comprehension. But I'm going to move on now to the books I finished in January. So I wanted to kind of wrap up my December reading here and then move on to January.  

[00:08:33] So in January, I began listening to the audio book of Meet the Newmans. This is by Jennifer Niven. It is narrated fantastically, I might add, by Maren Ireland and Tim Campbell. The main character is-- well, there are a couple of main characters, but really the focal point of the novel is Dinah Newman. The front cover is almost like a Doris Day type actress or type looking woman on the front cover, which kind of sets the tone. I can't decide if it's an accurate tone, but it does set the tone. So Dinah Newman is this woman who is at the heart of the Newman family. The Newman family is beloved by America. That they are famous on TV. They have this long-lasting, long-running television show and now the real world of the 1960s, kind of the upheaval of the 1960s is trickling into the show. And the show is starting to feel a little bit out of touch, out of reality. And the Newman's are struggling to find a way to continue their beloved television show in the middle of cultural upheavals. So while that is happening and kind of while that's happening in the background, Del Newman, Dinah's husband, who's kind of the force behind the TV show, he is in a car accident. And the car accident prevents him from being able to make decisions about the show and that eventually falls to Dinah. That's kind the underlying plot that's kind of happening. In the meantime, each of the members of the Newman family is trying to find their way in the 1960s. This has a great 1960s LA setting, very memorable to me, kind of Los Angeles setting. Maybe it's because I was reading this while the Netflix Warner Brothers of it all was happening, but I really liked being in this world of studio lots and TV making. I don't know, I really, really loved the setting of this one.  

[00:10:31] I also really loved The Newman's. And I think if Jennifer Niven had focused entirely on the Newman's, I would have been totally sold on this book. And instead she chooses to incorporate all of these side characters who force Dinah and her family to act. So Dinah sometimes doesn't quite feel like the deciding force. Instead she's heavily influenced by the forces at work around her, whether it's people or the culture. So the book shines when it is about Dinah, Del and their two sons. One of them is like the stereotypical eldest son, he's doing all the right things, he is the future of the show, he's trying to direct episodes of the show, but that kind of grates on Del's nerves. And then behind the scenes, maybe he has a love affair with his roommate and best friend, and they're trying to keep it under wraps because obviously the 1960s is not kind to same sex couples. And so, that is kind of one plot point. And then the other younger son is almost this Beatles-esque, very popular, young singer, songwriter, and he's trying to find his way through fame. I loved all of the Newmans. I was very invested in each of their storylines. I was less invested in the side characters that Jennifer Niven adds. And as a result, the book becomes a little bit complicated. I think if the book had focused on the Newman family and the issues facing the Newman family, that would have been fine. But I think instead, Jennifer Niven was trying to address all of the things that were happening in the sixties that maybe were the backdrop against which the Newmans are trying to make their old fashioned black and white television show.  

[00:12:17] It was between three and a half to four stars for me. The audio book is fantastic. Certainly, I think the most obvious comp title and the one the publishers have been pushing this month is Lessons in Chemistry. This is definitely poppier feeling than Lessons in Chemistry, though not as poppy as the cover suggests. There are some heavy things happening in this book. I would argue too many to the detriment of the book. So I liked this one. I think it'd probably make a great book club selection. And I know Erin picked it for our January audio book Shelf Subscription, and that made total sense to me because it is excellent in audio book format. So if you're going to read this one, I would do it in audiobook format. The narrators, Maren Ireland and Tim Campbell do a really great job. This is one that would be great to discuss because I think there could be a lot of complicated-- not complicated, that's not the word I'm looking for. There could be lot of contrasting opinions about this one. I think some readers will love it. I think people could hate it. So that is Meet the Newmans by Jennifer Niven. Excellent in audiobook form. I listened, of course, through Libro.fm.  

[00:13:21] Then, because Meet the Newmans did not quite hit for me, I wound up not choosing it for my January Shelf Subscription. Instead, I felt like Erin was absolutely right to pick it as her audio book subscription. So I had to keep hunting for a January Shelf Sub. So I picked up Lost Lambs by Madeline Cash. This is a debut novel about the Flynn family. I loved it. Five stars. It was my January Shelf Subscription. It is not for everyone. I think I compared this in my shelf sub card to Fleishman is in Trouble, Kevin Wilson, Marcy Dermansky, Sons and Daughters of Ease and Plenty. That is the direction this book goes. I loved it, not everyone will. So we are introduced to the Flynn family. Bud and Catherine are the mom and dad, the husband and wife. Their marriage is falling apart, but before they fully call it quits, they decide. Not so much in a family meeting, but just by sleeping with other people to sleep with other peoples. Like they don't really have a conversation about it. They just all of a sudden decide to try an open marriage, an open relationship. While they are doing that, their daughters have their own issues to contend with. There's a boyfriend nicknamed War Crime Wes. There is a possible conspiracy tied up in their dad's place of business. And then there's a gnat infestation at the local church. And this does matter. Mice are to Stone Yard devotional as gnats are to lost lambs. Madeline Cash's characters to me are very Amy Sherman-Paladino-esque. Smart, quick, witty, very funny. Cash's writing feels clever. I laughed-out-loud multiple parts, although it is a very certain type of humor, which is why I use the Amy Sherman Paladino comp, because it's weird, dark humor. Definitely weird, dark humor, especially when it comes to the conspiracy that one of the younger daughters thinks it's happening at her dad's work.  

[00:15:19] There is so much going on in this work. The three daughters each have their own different issues that they're battling and facing. I loved this one. I could not put it down. I took a copy with me when I went to go get-- I think I got a manicure or a pedicure at the beginning of this month. In fact, I could probably count on one hand how many manicures I've had in my life. But I was desperate post-Christmas. But the thing about a manicure is you can't use your hands. So I brought my Kindle and I will never forget the nail technician. He was so kind because I was like trying to be subtle. I didn't want to be a pain. So I was subtly balancing the Kindle in my lap and tapping every chance I could to keep the pages turning. And finally the nail technicians got me this stand to hold my Kindles up while he did my nails. It was so lovely and wonderful. But that's how desperate I was to keep reading this book. I was totally hooked. I loved it. I think once you pick it up, you won't be able to put it down. That is Lost Lambs by Madeline Cash. It's a debut novel. It is fantastic. If you like the comps that I mentioned, if you like Kevin Wilson, if you like Marcy Dermansky, Sons and Daughters of Ease and Plenty, if you liked that kind of literature, Fleishman is in Trouble, then you will like this.  

[00:16:32] Okay, then throughout December and into January, I was listening to, I'm trying to think, maybe I finished Meet the Newmans in December, actually. Anyway, I was kind of on the hunt for a January shelf sub, but after I finished meet the Newman's, I started listening to the book, The Rest of Our Lives. This is by Ben Markovitz, and I picked this one up because at this point in time I had wound up reading quite a few of the Booker longlists. And so I guess I was just like, well, let's keep it going. And I did not realize that this book was already out in the UK. But it did not release in America until January. So it is out now. You are able to read it, listen to it. I listened to it in audiobook format through Libro. The audiobook is narrated by Eric Myers. I liked the audiobook. I don't think you have to listen to this one in audiobook format. And this actually wound up being shortlisted for the Booker. I will just be very transparent with you. I don't fully understand why. I wound up liking this one, but I hated the character so much. The narrator, I want to be clear, I don't hate Eric Myers, the narrator. I hate the character, Tom, who is narrating this book. Yeah, the first 50 to 100 pages, it's hard to say when you're listening, but I think about the first 50 to a 100 pages, I did not like this book and I almost gave up. I took the question to my private Instagram and I was like, should I stop reading this? And a couple of people encouraged me. Most people said to give up. A couple women encouraged me to keep reading. I'm glad I kept reading.  

[00:18:01] I think it is four stars in terms of literary quality. I could totally see it being longlisted for an award. Shortlisted? I don't know. But I think I understood by the end what Ben Markovitz, the author, was trying to do. And Ben Markovitz actually has a great... Is it technically an op-ed? He has a great op-ed in the New York Times, kind of about what inspired this book. And that I read it after I finished the book and that maybe helped me further understand some of the decisions he made. So our main character, our protagonist and narrator is Tom. Tom is sardonic, he's down in the dumps. He's a law professor, kind of on sabbatical that maybe sort of has been forced. I really did not like Tom. I cannot stress this enough. Tom and his wife have a complicated marriage. His wife had an affair years previous and Tom "forgave her" but you can tell obviously not. Very obviously not. And their youngest daughter is about to go to college and Tom has always told himself if he would just keep the marriage together until after the girls were out of the house, then he could kind of live his life, divorce his wife if he wants, et cetera.  

[00:19:15] So the book opens with Tom and his wife and you get maybe a sense of their marriage, it is not good. And he winds up taking their daughter to college. And the wife doesn't go. And I have a lot of questions. I have a lot of questions, but anyway, Tom takes his daughter to college and then decides to continue the road trip. So this is a road trip book in which Tom winds up crossing the country to California. So he starts on the East Coast and then heads to California, along the way playing some pickup basketball, he has always been kind of in love with the sport of basketball. He kind of thinks maybe he could write a book about pickup basketball and the power of pickup basketball to bring people together. But the book is really all about the inner workings of Tom's mind and all the things going around in his head. Not only his marriage, but his relationship to his friends, to his relationship, to past loves, some of whom he meets along the way of this road trip. And also underlying most of this is Tom's health and his failing health, his aging. And then Tom is also struggling with maybe the new world that he's trying to navigate as a lawyer and law professor and some of the things that are coming up in his career. Stuff dealing with the Me Too movement or in Tom's view political correctness or things like that.  

[00:20:37] Here's the magic of the book because there is some magic to it, which is I hated Tom. I hated him for most of this book. And somehow I did not wind up loving Tom, that would be inaccurate, but I did wind up seeing Tom more fully as the story unfolded. And I wound up understanding him better by story's end. He's evaluating his life on this road trip, his health is slowly deteriorating. I never felt a kinship with him, but by the end I felt like I got him better. And I think that is the magic of the book, is that it helped me understand this character who I previously had a real intense hatred or dislike of. This book is not for everybody, and surely by listening to this review, you know that. If you already have a bias against male protagonists, and I know some of you do, you can leave this one on the shelf. You don't have to read this. But I, for one, am glad that I persevered and gave it a chance. It's not the best road trip novel I read last year, that award I think would go to Road to Tender Hearts, but I liked it and I'm glad to have read it. I ultimately am really glad to have read it. I also think it's good in audiobook format. I liked the narrator. I think the narrator did a good job of being Tom, both for better and for worse. So I'm glad I read it. It wasn't my favorite book I ever read, but I am glad to have gotten to k now Tom a little bit better.  

[00:21:58] Okay, then I picked up This Is Not About Us by Allegra Goodman. Allegra goodman just keeps on putting out hits. This one-- and now I'm so sorry. Now that I'm looking at my list, I finished all of those books in December. Oh my gosh, I really did have a great December read. So I read Stone Yard Devotional, Land in Winter, Meet the Newmans, Lost Lambs, and The Rest of Our Lives, all in December. Because This Is Not About Us was my first book of the year. Wow, December and January do kind of run together to me. Anyway, This Is not About Us was my First Book of January, interesting. I picked this one up because again, kind of on the hunt for Shelf Subscriptions, for books to talk about in Literary First Look, which is coming up. This book releases February 10th. You will recognize Allegra Goodman from Isola, which is her historical fiction that came last year. And then I love and have long sung the praises of Sam, which came out a couple of years ago. It was a Shelf Subscription pick for me. I loved that book. I am fascinated by Allegra goodman because each of her books is so vastly different from the other and they've all been great. I did not read a solo, but it got starred reviews from basically everybody. And I heard about it from multiple readers. I just wound up not picking it up, though now I am tempted to go back. So, This Is Not About Us is totally different. It is a collection of connected short stories, though it did read like a novel to me. I think if I had not told you it was a collection of short stories you the reader might not have known that. They are connected short-stories, but yeah, to me it just felt like a novel told from different varying perspectives of the Rubenstein family.  

[00:23:39] So the Rubenstein family have these three sisters who are the matriarchs. They're each in their 70s, early 80s, and the book opens with the death of one of the sisters. And I'm not going to go into a ton of detail, but what I will tell you is there is an apple cake that is on the cover of this book and that is the inciting incident, after which all the rest of the plot follows. So the Rubenstein family is relatively close. They have these three very Jewish matriarchs who keep the family together. And then a feud begins after the death of one of the sisters and the presence of this apple cake. And the rest of the novel, the rest of the stories kind of unfold with this rift in the family underlying everything. Each story is about a different member of the Rubenstein family. I read this one on my Kindle. I'm trying to remember if there's like a family tree at the beginning. I think that there is. I didn't need it and I don't think you will need it either, but that kind of gives you an idea of what to expect. Each member of the Rubenstein family kind of gets their own story. And I loved this one. Actually, the New Yorker published one of the short stories. And my understanding is maybe she published one of those short stories a few years ago and readers begged for more of this family. And so the result is This Is Not About Us. And I loved it. I think it's fantastic, really good New Year's reading. The first book I finished in January, 2026. It releases in February. It is excellent. It is This Is Not About Us by Allegra Goodman. The less I say about it, I think the better.  

[00:25:16] Next up, I read Vigil by George Saunders. I had started this one in December and then decided to hold it until January. It released January 27th. So it released this week. So it's out now. Jill "doll" Blaine. We kind of know her as doll. I don't know that George Saunders calls her an angel, but we're kind of led to believe she's an angel type figure. She's hurtling through the air to her next mission. She has always been responsible for helping lost souls find their way to the next life. And so there is a powerful oil tycoon on his death bed and Doll Blaine finds herself on a mission to help him to the afterlife. Unfortunately for her, this powerful oil tycoon, K.J. Boone, (which is a great name for a character) doesn't really seem to need her comfort. He doesn't have regret. He doesn't have a desire to make amends, even though all the evidence points to the fact that he should have regret, he should want to make amends. And so Doll kind of finds it her responsibility to somehow help him see the light. Weirdly, I think the comp to this is a Christmas Carol. It's a Wonderful Life. I mean, those are definitely the vibes. It's not campy. Like it's not camping to me. It's quite a serious work very much in line with the same themes Saunders was addressing in Lincoln and the Bardo, which is like for me, a top 10 of the last-- was that published in the last decade? I'm losing track of time, but I do think it was published within the last decades and I loved it.  

[00:26:52] And so if you liked Lincoln and The Bardo. To me, Vigil is a less complicated version of that story because he's dealing with the exact same themes. He's dealing grief and death. In this book, he's also dealing with human nature, the complexity of it, what we might face at the end, meaning facing our own demons, facing our own decisions. This is a book about capitalism. This is a books about are we good or bad? Are we complicated? Are somewhere in the middle? Is this powerful oil tycoon a villain or is he just a person? I thought this was excellent. I loved it. I think if you liked Lincoln in the Bardo, pick this one up. If you didn't like Lincoln in the Bardo but you appreciated the themes of it, like maybe you thought Lincoln and the Bardo was a little bit convoluted or too many characters, this simplifies it. Because really most of the characters in this book-- I mean, there are a few people at play, But the two primary characters in the work are Doll and K.J. Boon, whose name I did have to look up a couple of times because really it's Doll trying to grapple with why this person, why she can't quite shuttle him to the afterlife the way she has done so many times before. I really liked this one. It's short, complex. If I were you, the best way to read this book, in my opinion, is in one or two sittings. Don't let it go beyond that. I think it's meant to be consumed in one of two sittings. It's not short enough, but it's almost novella-like. Loved it. Vigil by George Saunders came out this week.  

[00:28:32] I then listened to another audio book. I downloaded This Story Might Save Your Life by Tiffany Crum. This releases March 10th. I fully picked this one up because I finished the Ben Markovits, I finished Meet the Newmans, and I needed an audio book to fill the void. And I saw that Julia Whelan narrated this. And I have a complicated relationship with Julia Whelen, but one thing I will say about her is she's comforting, because I've heard her voice so many times. I've her voice so many time that when I see a book is narrated by her, I'm like, well, might as well give it a go. And that is the only reason I picked this up. This book is not just narrated by Julia Whelin though. It is also narrated by Sean Patrick Hopkins, who does a great job. This book is another one like Meet the Newmans, that I think the only way to read it is in audiobook format. I mean, I fully believe that that is the only to read this book. So it is about Joy and Benny. Joy and Benny are podcasters. They have a podcast, a kind of survivalist podcast about how to survive these very weird scenarios. The audiobook is great because you get actual snippets of the podcast episodes, kind of like that Amy Tintera book. Oh gosh, what was the name of it? Listen for the lie. I had to look it up because I kept wanting to say two truths and a lie and that wasn't it. Listen for The Lie. So kind of like that where you get this great kind of production. You get really an audio book production in this book.  

[00:30:00] So Joy and Benny are lifelong best friends. They have this podcast together and they are on the cusp, they're on the eve of signing this really big podcast deal, like million-dollar deal. Millions of dollar deal. Joy and her husband Xander go missing. And so Benny is as the best friend, as the podcast cohost, kind of one of the top suspects and you get his perspective and then you also get Joy's perspective. We don't know what's happened to Joy, but she has left behind a half written memoir. And so you get Joy's perspective in the past tense, and then you get Benny's perspective in the present. The setup is great. I think the setup is good. I think audio book is fantastic. I loved 60% of this book. By the end, she lost me a little bit. The author lost me little bit, I don't think she'll lose everybody. I think a lot of people will really like this book. I think it's already gotten a little bit of buzz. It would not shock me if this was some kind of celebrity book club selection. Feels like it could be a Reese pick. Yeah, I think this one'll make a splash. I liked it, loved the first 60%. Fantastic in audio book format. I think is well worth your time. I think it'll just depend on what kind of reader you are, how Tiffany Crum as an author kind of wraps everything up. I think mileage will vary, but overall I liked it. This Story Might Save Your Life by Tiffany Crum releases on March 10th, fantastic in audiobook format.  

[00:31:43] Then I picked up The Reservation by Rebecca Kauffman. I started this one months ago on Kindle because I really like Rebecca Kauffman. Actually, this is a huge overlap for me and Erin. Erin I think has read I'll Come to You and Chorus, which are the two maybe more recent Rebecca Kauffman books. I read The Gunners and The House on Fripp Island, which are her earlier works. So I think between the two of us, Erin and I are Rebecca Kauffman completionists. This is her new book, which I immediately saw in the publisher catalog, downloaded it to my Kindle, and then I started reading it and the Kindle version, the e-reader version was messed up. Like there were weird capital letters everywhere. And so I stopped reading. I was like, I cannot. I'm barely an e-reader anyway. And you mess up the format and I cannot do it. So I put it down and I was like I'll just wait till I get a physical ARC and reader, wouldn't you know it? I never got a physical ARC. And then I saw our friend Meg of Meg's Reading Room. I saw her rave about this one and I'm like, dang it. I knew that was going to be a good book and I with stubborn and wouldn't read the e-reader copy. So I went back, redownloaded the book and it still had some capital letter type issues but overall was not nearly as bad as the first version. I don't really know what happened. Anyway, redownloaded this to my e-reader and read it in one sitting. Well, one sitting? Maybe multiple sittings, but one day. I loved it. Five stars. Oh my gosh. It's so good. The Reservation by Rebecca Kaufman.  

[00:33:16] It does feel a little similar to the Allegra Goodman book I just mentioned This is Not About Us because this feels like another novel told in stories feels kind of like these connected short stories tell the story of this restaurant one day in a restaurant's life. So the book is told from the restaurant staffers perspectives, the line cook, the chef, the hostess, the owner, you get all their perspective over the course, all their perspectives over the of a day because at the very beginning of the book, 21 ribeyes go missing-- or is it 22? Quite a few ribeye steaks go missing from this restaurant. And so that, again, like the apple cake in the other book I mentioned. That is kind of the inciting incident, the underlying mystery, though this book is in no way, shape or form a traditional whodunit or mystery. You do, as the reader, want to know who stole those steaks? Who took those steaks? But ultimately, this book was beautiful. It is so beautiful about food, about restaurant work, about the service industry. There is one character in particular who will stick with me for a very long time. And I suspect the case would be true for a lot of readers. I loved this one. I know Erin ultimately read this one and loved it too. Just one of my favorite books of the year so far, which it's early days, obviously, in the words of Love Island. It's early day, but I loved it. The Reservation by Rebecca Kauffman.  

[00:34:45] After I finished the audiobook narrated by Julia Whelan, I again was kind of like I got to keep the momentum going. And my friend Jennifer told me I needed to read Homeschooled. This is by Stefan Merrill Block. It is the read with Jenna Pick for January. I had downloaded this to my Kindle, started it and did not like it. Was not interested, put it down, thought good for someone but not for me. And I downloaded the audiobook on recommendation of my friend and also did not think I was going to like the audio book. Stefan Merrill Block narrates his own book. So he is the narrator and that makes total sense. It is his memoir, his story, but I wasn't sold on his narration. By the end I was because I do think a memoir is best told by the person who wrote it. But I think we all know this, not every author is a great audio book narrator. So I struggled a little bit with the narration, but ultimately I was glad I listened to this one. Though if I was recommending it, I think I would recommend it to you in print format first. So if you are not familiar with this one, it is a memoir about Stephen Merrill Block's experience as a teenager adolescent growing up in Plano, Texas when his mom decides to homeschool him. And I do want to use the word homeschool very, very loosely here. And there is an author's note at the end of the book. I do wonder if it should be at the beginning of the book because the title of this book to me is not a hundred percent indicative or does not totally convey what's inside.  

[00:36:20] This book is not in my mind a book about homeschooling. This is a book about a mother-son. This is mother-son story. A complicated mother-son story. This isn't even like Educated. That's not what this is. I'm going to struggle with a comp. I literally finished this one this morning and I was like I have to talk about it. So I don't know that I have a comp for you yet, but I think the publisher is saying educated and I would push back on that. I don't think that's what this is. This is a mother-son story about a woman who doesn't want her son to grow up and she keeps him at home and homeschools him throughout his adolescence until he ultimately enters like the largest high school in the country in Plano, Texas. I wound up really liking this book. I liked the back half way more than I liked to the front half. I was really mad at the mom throughout a lot of this book. And I think Stefan Merrill Block does a really good job of handling his own story with grace, and the story of his mother with grace, even though there's some abuse happening here. I mean, there really is. It's complicated. It's complicated, but I do think it is worth a read. I really liked it. And so if you can handle it, and I think you can, I believe in you dear reader. I think can handle, I liked it. That is Homeschooled by Stephen Merrill Block. I feel like I didn't give it its justice here in the podcast, but that is because I literally finished the audio book as I was pulling into the driveway this morning. Great for book clubs. Would be an excellent book club book. If I hadn't already picked my book club for Reader Retreat, I would pick this one because I think there's a lot to unpack together. So that is Homeschooled by Stefan Merrill Block. I now see why it was a Jenna Bush hater pick. At first, I wasn't sure and now I totally get it. I think he sticks to the landing, nails the landing. Nails the ending. And I think this one's worth your time.  

[00:38:18] So those are the books I read in December and January. Kind of wrapped up my December reading and then new year reading and honestly, great, like really good start. Really good end to 2025 and really good start to 2026. I feel good. There was a moment in probably two weeks ago where I thought, oh no, I'm not going to finish anything. I was kind of stuck on a book. Anyway, I'm so glad I moved past that little slump because I wound up having a really great reading month. And I think I was able to keep the momentum going from December, which I'm shocked by. So those are the books I read in December and January. If you're new here, we do a Reading Recap bundle for these Reading Recap episodes. So we are offering a January bundle. The bundle is $77 and includes three books, The Land in Winter by Andrew Miller, Homeschooled by Stefan Merrill Block, and Vigil by George Saunders. Wow, great stack, all male authors. What do you know? I can surprise even myself. You can find more details and the January bundle online through the link in our show notes, or go to Bookshelfthomasville.com. You can type today's episode number 566 into the search bar and all of today's books will come up as well as the bundle. I would love to know what you read this month, so feel free to find our posts on Instagram about today's episodes and tell us how your January reading was. This week I'm finishing up Whidbey by T. Kira Madden.  

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: 

bookshelfthomasville.com 

A full transcript of today’s episode can be found at:  

fromthefrontporchpodcast.com  

Special thanks to Studio D Podcast Production for production of From the Front Porch and for our theme music, which sets the perfect warm and friendly tone for our Thursday conversations. 

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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Caroline Weeks

a weekly conversational podcast on books, small business, and life in the South