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

When despair for the world grows in me, and I wake in the night at the least sound, in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be, I go and lie down where the wood drake rests in his beauty on the water.

I come into the peace of wild things, who do not tax their lives with forethought of grief, I come into the presence of still water, and I feel above me the day-blind stars waiting with their light, for a time I rest in the grace of the world, and I'm free.

I'm Annie V. Jones, owner of the Bookshelf, an independent bookstore in beautiful downtown Thomasville, Georgia, and this week it's time for our annual Reading Resolutions episode with guest host Hunter McClendon.

Before we get started, I wanted to deliver the good news that the Bookshelf website is back up and running.

I would love to tell you all the behind the scenes, ups and downs, it took to get to this point, but I will refrain, and instead gently remind you that From the Front porch is a production of a small, independently owned bookstore, and every purchase you make from our business matters a great deal.

Head to BookshelfThomasville.com to check out the new site, to purchase a shelf subscription, or a newly released book or two, there's even time to snag tickets to today's Winter Literary Lunch.

And if you're listening to this later, that's okay, because the Winter Literary Lunch is recorded, and you can watch it any old time.

Thank you for your patience while we've been undergoing technical renovations this month. It is so nice to be back.

Happy New Year Hunter!

Happy New Year!

I feel like Seinfeld or somebody said, like, after January 5th, you weren't supposed to say Happy New Year anymore, but I reject that.

Well, I feel like, for like the... I don't know, in my head, I'm like, oh, it's like the first two or three months, it's like still new.

Yeah, until my birthday on February 2nd, I want to tell everyone I know, Happy New Year.

Listen, if we have to refer to babies as like 22-month-tholds...

Right, we can say Happy New Year however long we want.

Yeah.

So Hunter is the mastermind behind the popular bookstagram account at Shelf by Shelf.

He's my friend and frequent collaborator, and this week, much like we have done for the past few years, we are sharing our readerly resolutions and intentions.

You know, I went back. I went back and listened, not to full episodes, because I can't do that. I cannot listen to my voice.

But I did go back, I looked at notes from last year, and then I listened to 2021, our reading resolutions.

And, hey, the audio quality on these episodes has really improved. Shout out to Studio D.

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