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

Wasn't it strange that a poem written in my vocabulary and as a result of my own thoughts or observations could, when it was finished, managed to show me something I hadn't already known?

Sometimes, when I tried very hard to listen to what the poem I was writing was trying to tell me, I felt the way I imagined godly people felt when they were trying to discern God's will.

Right this, the poem would sometimes consent to say, and I'd revel in a joy to rival the saints that poetry. This mysterious presence I talked about and professed belief in might truly be real. Tracy K. Smith, ordinary light.

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 June.

Are you following the bookshelf on Instagram? It is a great way to learn about upcoming events, including our next reader retreat, to find out about all the new books that release each week, and it's where you can share your thoughts on this week's podcast episode.

Hop on over to Instagram and make sure you're following us there at Bookshelf TV. And if you've been missing my book reviews on my personal Instagram account, that's because I moved them to a paid for private account called Annie's Five Star Books.

You can follow me there if you're so inclined. Also, you are going to notice a theme in today's recap.

Audio books saved my reading life this month. Many listeners may know this already, but Libro FM is my favorite and preferred resource for audio books.

When you purchase a book through Libro FM or by a membership, you're supporting local independently owned bookstores like ours.

You can of course support the store nearest you, but if you're a fan of from the front porch and looking for an easy way to support our show and our indie bookstore, you can purchase audio books at

Libro dot FM forward slash bookshelf Thomasville every purchase you make matters. I promise now back to the show.

I am recapping the books I read in June. It has been a wild summer over here. We've traveled a lot. We've done bookshelf things like reader retreat. I got a puppy.

You can maybe hear the exhaustion in my voice. I don't know, but it has been a really kind of wild summer, which has resulted in a really up and down reading life.

I finished quite a few I think books in June, but most of them were audio books, which is pretty unusual for me. I think that's because we spent a lot of time on the road.

We traveled a lot took a couple of road trips headed to some family functions. And so Jordan and I were able to listen to some audio books in the car.

My other books that I finished I really did enjoy, but I could just tell that my attention span was a little bit lax this month. I just had difficulty I think focusing.

Instead we've been watching a lot of ex files as I think I alluded to or mentioned last episode. I don't know. It's just been kind of weird. We'll see if we can get our rhythm back in July. I doubt it.

I've got quite a few travels in July as well, but we're doing our best and you probably are to so here are the books that I read in June.

First I took on vacation. We went to New York at the end of May beginning of June. We went to New York and I took several books as book lovers or want to do. I took I think I took six books, which was silly.

And I read to I read to just wasn't that kind of vacation. And so I wound up finishing a ladies guide to scandal. This is by Sophie Irwin. You've heard me maybe talking about this one.

It releases July 11th. So you only have a couple of weeks to wait, but in the meantime, you might want to try Sophie Irwin's previous novel, a ladies guide to fortune hunting, which I loved.

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