Welcome to episode 14 of From the Front Porch, conversationsations on Books, Small Business, and Life in the South.

I'm Annie Jones, co-owner of the Bookshelf in downtown Thomasville, Georgia, and I'm

joined today by my business partner and friend Katie Chastin. Today we're talking about Harper Lee's new book, Ghosts at a Watchman, and what makes a southern town become a literary mecca. Let's get started.

Hey Annie, welcome back. You've been in Asheville at the Book Sellers Winter Institute.

I want to hear a little bit about that before we get started.

Yeah, it was my first booksellers conference and it was way more fun

than those legal conferences I used to have to go to with my previous job. It was

amazing to be just in a hotel full of booksellers and they're a rowdy crowd

huh man they're a boosy bunch like a bunch of boosy book nerds nothing like it is there. It is so it was so unique I just I don't think I was quite mentally prepared for that

But it was really fun when you work in a small business your business feel small and

your world feels small and then to go to a booksellers conference and to see 500

bookstores represented and all

talking about, you know, small business and minimum wage and all the things that affect

small business and Amazon and it was just really neat to realize oh yeah I'm a part of this

much bigger culture yeah and so that was really that was a really great experience and I learned a lot about independent bookstore day which is coming up on May 2nd

So be looking for more information about that. I think we're going to do some fun things at the shop

So it was a really great experience.

And I'm sad that that's the first one I've ever been to.

But because it was in Asheville, not too terribly far

from where we are in Thomasville.

It was driveable and so we were able to go.

Jordan tagged along.

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