April 26, 2025 marks the first time I’ve missed being a bookstore owner since we sold the shop back in September. It was Independent Bookstore Day and I kept remembering the dramatics of how that day felt. You’re so excited so you make big plans! Like stuffing give-away bags or bringing in musicians or pop-up shops or planning an extra special story time–and then the day before you find a way to convince yourself that there’s no way anyone’s showing up and you’ve just wasted a ton of money on things no one will use and you won’t be able to pay rent and then you’ll have to close your store and the world will end and then and then and then…

And then inevitably–the whole community shows up and buys you clean out of everything. Which is both a blessing and a curse. Such is life as a small business owner!

Anyway, I promoted the hell out of different indie bookstores across the country to my dozens of followers on instagram and it felt really good. I feel like I have a unique perspective as someone who has a lot of insight into the world of bookselling and small business ownership but no longer has to keep a customer-service personality at all times. I feel like I have a lot to say in that regard but I have no idea what people want to know. I’m really good at answering questions or chatting about a topic presented to me–not so good at coming up with the topic myself. Which is why this blog has had one singular theme for the past… 4? years?

April also marks another first since I sold the store–I read an audiobook!! 😀 I’m back, baby!! Anyway–let’s get into what we’ve been reading.

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Out of the Woods by Hannah Bonam-Young

One of my dear internet friends, Jackie, had an HBY author event at her store in Florida. When it was over, she sent me a signed copy of this ARC because she knew how much I loved the last book in this series. Jackie and I didn’t even meet through being booksellers! I love the internet even more than I hate it.

Anyway I ADORED this book! Oh, I related to this main character so much. She and her husband have been married for 10 years and she is in kind of an “I don’t know what I’m doing with my life” sort of space right now. Sound like someone else you know (points at self)? She even had a parent die just after she graduated from high school (just like me). Uncanny.

Anyway–she and her husband are feeling a little… stagnant in their marriage and decide that they need to go on a week-long couples’ camping trip in the wilderness. Even though neither of them have ever gone camping before. So fun.

I liked this book because of the way that Hannah Bonam-Young can take romance (a genre that can, let’s be honest, get kind of repetitive at times) and turn it into something that we’ve never seen before. I mean I, at least, have never read a contemporary romance about a married couple! Usually once they get married, they become supporting characters in other stories within the series but they’re done. They lived happily ever after, after all right? Well… maybe not.

Anyway–because of her ability to spin this genre on its head while keeping what we love about it, I’m a loyalty reader of HBY from now on.

Now, onto something completely different…

A House with Good Bones by T. Kingfisher

I found myself at Red Fern Booksellers in Salina KS and while I was there I saw the cover of this book and I was drawn in. First of all–something about reading books that take place in the south is almost a guaranteed yes for me. I don’t know why. And I had no idea what I was looking at with this cover but I loved it. But finally, I saw this was written by T. Kingfisher–an author that most of my friends are obsessed with. The only other thing I’ve ever read by her was a middle grade book about a baking wizard who has a sourdough starter as a familiar and a gingerbread man that sits on her shoulder everywhere she goes. Highly recommend, btw.

But generally speaking I’m not that into middle-grade OR fantasy. So that was kind of a one-off for me. But this was a horror book–and I’ve been trying to get myself out of my contemporary romance rut. So I snagged this. And DAMN IT WAS SO GOOD!

Look, I can’t tell you what this book is about but I can tell you that it’s hilarious. So even when it’s scary–the tension relaxes a lot with the narrator’s side-track rants or little jokes. Which is what I need in my horror, tbh. The rest that I can give you is just a list of words and phrases and hope it’s enough to convince you to read it: grandma’s house, rose. garden. filled with. thorns, suburbia, buried family secrets (literally), and… VULTURES.

Oh! And then I read an audiobook in two days. Finally. I’ve missed plowing through books and that’s basically the only way that I can do that.

The Wedding People by Alison Espach

This is one of those that I keep hearing about everywhere–everyone saying it’s so good. And I gotta agree. I loved this one!

At first I worried that it was just going to be a typical sad-girl-book (which used to be my bread and butter but I just can not abide these days, personally). And, sure, there’s a sad girl. But… nah. You know, plot-wise it’s a LITTLE like A Man Called Ove. LOL!

Our main character goes to a really fancy hotel to… how do people on the internet say this? Unalive herself. But then she runs into a bride who is hosting her wedding in this hotel this week and she begs her not to ruin her wedding by making everyone look at a corpse being wheeled through the lobby in the morning. A fair ask, I think. Despite the bummer-sounding opening, this book was really funny and really endearing. I can see it being turned into an excellent dark rom-com starring Allison Brie as Phoebe and Julia Garner as Lila. (I do want to say that in addition to suicide there’s an infertility and divorce theme running through as well.)

Anyway–I love the way that books have these somewhat kooky premisses so that they can really dig into something a lot bigger. Like, this book is ultimately about the way that it’s so hard to ask for what you need. Or even recognize it, sometimes. And A House With Good Bones has to do with generational trauma and also about how sometimes the people who hurt us the most have a lot of hurt inside of them, too.

All of these were five star reads for me! And I’m excited about the books I’ve snagged to read in May, too!