Episode 601 || New Release Rundown: October

From the Front Porch

Annie Jones, Erin, and Olivia from The Bookshelf in Thomasville, Georgia host a weekly book recommendation podcast called 'From the Front Porch.' In this

Key takeaways

• Annie Jones recommends Nafissa Thompson-Spires' novella The Four Wives and Five Deaths of Richard Milford, praising its multi-perspective narrative set in 1920s Oklahoma and the audiobook narration by Kevin Free, Kamali Minter, and Adrenrele Oho.
• Olivia highlights Allie Millington's middle-grade novel Trunk No. 3, a story about a boy named Cleo who runs away with a sentient suitcase that leaves him magical items like a bunny and notes.

Main topics

• October 2026 book releases
• Audiobook narration experiences

Notable quotes

I am grateful for a comforting podcast that never fails to wrap its arms around me like a warm hug.

Conclusion

The episode provides listeners with curated reading recommendations tail

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:01) Welcome to From the Front Porch, a conversational podcast about books, small business, and life in the South. Speaker 1 (0:24) My faith wanes and waxes. I am no wiser than I ever was. It is only that I've seen more than I'd ever seen. Sarah Perry, Death of an Ordinary Man. Speaker 1 (0:39) I'm Annie Jones, owner of The Bookshelf, an independent bookstore in beautiful downtown Thomasville, Georgia. Today, I'm joined by The Bookshelf's operations manager, Olivia, and our store floor manager, Aaron, to give you a rundown of our favorite new books releasing in October. Do you love listening to From the Front Porch every week? You can spread the word by leaving a review on Apple Podcasts. All you have to do is open up the podcast app on your phone, look for From the Front Porch, Scroll down until you see write a review and then tell us what you think. Here's a recent review from Booked with Brady. Speaker 3 (1:16) Our lives are Speaker 1 (1:17) complicated and hard enough, and there is always so much chaotic energy around us. I am grateful for a comforting podcast that never fails to wrap its arms around me like a warm hug. Annie and her crew are delightful, giving the best book recommendations and hosting the most wonderful conversations. I've been a listener for years and plan to be for many years to come. The podcast is perfect for those that enjoy a calm, comforting listening experience while also gaining a mile-long TBR list. Five stars. Thank you, Brady. And thank you to all of the reviewers who've left kind words and thoughtful reviews for our show. We're so grateful anytime you share from the front porch with your friends. Thank you for spreading the word about our podcast and about our bookstore too. Now, back to the show. Hi, guys. Hello. Hello. It's October-ish. We're so close. It's so chilly. I need a jacket. No, Speaker 3 (2:21) I Speaker 1 (2:21) don't, but I want one. Speaker 1 (2:26) Listen, we've all we are recording this at the tail end of September. This episode will come out the very beginning of October. I believe as you are listening to this, it is October 1st. So happy October, everyone. Happy spooky reading season. Happy. It might finally start to. Speaker 1 (2:43) I don't know you guys dip in humid Olivia's looking Speaker 3 (2:45) at me like Speaker 1 (2:46) absolutely not don't say things you can't promise Speaker 3 (2:49) every year we're like the people who keep rooting for that losing sports team we're like this is the year this is too soon some of Speaker 1 (2:57) us are rooting for losing sports Speaker 1 (3:01) My college team sucks. My fantasy team sucks. Speaker 3 (3:06) But Joe Burrow's hanging in there for you. Speaker 1 (3:08) Listen, Joe Burrow's hanging in there, but my backup quarterback out second game, second play of the second game, just like Joe Burrow last year. I told my friends, I think I'm a witch. I think I have powers that I can only use against myself. Speaker 3 (3:25) Very specific powers you have there. Such Speaker 1 (3:27) specific powers. Speaker 1 (3:30) Yeah, so it's October. I do love October. I do think perhaps maybe the humidity will drop, or at least in our minds, things will start to change. And it does. It feels like we are solidly in fall. It's also a very big release month. So as usual, we are not going to talk about all the books coming out in October. A great way to keep up with a lot of the books coming out this month, though, is by tuning in on Tuesdays at 1 p.m. on Instagram, where Olivia and I break down. you know, I don't know, anywhere from three to nine, 10. It's the Speaker 2 (4:04) whim of the morning. Yeah. And Speaker 1 (4:06) it's whatever we want to talk about. But we are doing those Newsday Tuesday videos. They are live on Instagram and then they live for now on Patreon and they're for free. So you do not have to join us on Patreon at any tier. You can just pop on over there and watch those videos. So if throughout the month, you're like, what's coming out this week? Generally, we're trying to keep up with that over at Newsday Tuesday. So. Speaker 1 (4:34) Guys, who's doing this? Is Keela? Do I need to give Keela credit for posting these books to the website? Michelle, who's doing this? Speaker 2 (4:42) It's a podcast, so it's Michelle. Speaker 1 (4:44) Michelle. Michelle. Thank you. God, this has changed the number of times this lingo has changed this year. Speaker 1 (4:52) Thank God for Michelle. Michelle is posting all of these books on the store website so you can browse our podcast book selection super easily. Just go to bookshelfthomasville.com. You can type episode 601, 601 into the search bar and you'll see all of today's books listed, ready for you to pre-order or purchase. As usual, you can use the code newreleaseplease at checkout and get 10 % off your order of today's books. All right. Are we ready? Oh, yeah. All right. My first book is one I have talked about a little bit on the podcast already. It is The Four Wives and Five Deaths of Richard Milford. This is by Nafisa Thompson Spires. It releases next week on October 6th. I love this book. It is, I would argue, perhaps more novella than novel. Lengthwise, it's not too long. audio book. It's four or five hours. I'm going to talk about the audio book in particular in a minute. But the book is set in 1920s Oklahoma in an all-Black community where a bootlegger named Richard Milford, who has no shortage of enemies, has been found dead. And the town cannot figure out what has happened, or everybody has a theory about what has happened. They're speculating. There's a lot of gossip about it. And we, the reader, get the perspective of his four wives. And I'm using air quotes. Some of them are his actual wives. Some of them are his romantic partners. Some of them are his housekeepers. But we get the perspective from basically four women in the life of Richard Milford. And we get their perspectives on who he was slash is or is slash was and what might have happened to him. And then sprinkled or alternating. So you get a wife's point of view and then you get this lovely chapter. I think this is great. But you get this chapter from the perspective of the community itself. So kind of the royal we perspective. I loved this. I did not read Nafisa Thompson Spire's previous work that was Heads of the Colored People. I am pretty sure that was like a National Book Award finalist. It wouldn't shock me. Actually, they just did the long list for the National Book Award, and this wasn't on there. I don't know. Hunter's up on all those book awards. I am less so. This one should, in my opinion, receive some accolades. It reminds me a lot of one of my favorite backlist titles of all time, The Mothers by Brit Bennett. I did listen to the audiobook, and I think Erin did as well, so she can weigh in. But the audiobook is narrated by Kevin Free, Kamali Minter, and Adrenrele Oho. And I thought they did a fantastic job. It is a fantastic listen. I loved the audiobook experience. I felt very immersed in it. But I also loved the writing enough where I wish I'd gotten a physical copy too. So Erin, what did you think? Speaker 3 (7:35) Oh, I loved it. I probably will get a physical copy as well to keep. It's just I think it deserves all the awards. I'm really impressed when people can pack truly what feels like a saga into 200 something pages. It's incredible. Speaker 1 (7:50) That's the thing. It's a very well-rounded, complete story. You get all these different perspectives. I think it is primarily character driven, but because you want to know what happened to Richard Milford, like that, that kind of pulls you through. So even if you're a plot driven reader, I think you might like this, but the way that she weaves a total and complete story. and multiple perspectives of that story into such a short page count is really impressive. So that is The Four Wives and Five Deaths of Richard Milford by Nafisa Thompson Spires. Speaker 3 (8:20) Kila also read it and loved it. If you like to read like Kila, Kila also liked it. It's not a huge time investment. So if you are just like, I just want to read a little something over the weekend, you could do it. It's very short. Speaker 2 (8:32) I do love a minimal time commitment. So My first book is I think everyone, almost everyone, a lot of people should be excited about this. It's Trunk Number Three by Allie Millington. Yes. Speaker 3 (8:44) I know. October Speaker 2 (8:46) 20th. I love Allie Millington. I'll read whatever she writes, I believe. Her children's picture Speaker 3 (8:52) books. I don't think I Speaker 2 (8:53) might have. She doesn't have like a ton out so far, but I do think she's becoming a consistent and prolific writer. Trunk number three is right in her wheelhouse of you're going to have an object that is personified. In this case, it's a suitcase called trunk number three. Of course. And she's kind of a grumpy trunk. She's happy staying closed in this like dusty old shop. So sweet. I know. But then one day a little boy named Cleo steals her because he wants to run away because of problems at home where he just doesn't feel like he's in the right place. He feels like he keeps messing up and doing the wrong things. And so he's ready to just run away as a child thinks that they could, which they won't. Speaker 3 (9:52) How many times did you try to run away as a child? Speaker 2 (9:55) I think one time I made it to the end of the block and then I was like, Speaker 3 (9:57) what Speaker 2 (9:58) am Speaker 3 (9:58) I doing? I Speaker 2 (9:59) don't have money or a car or any, or an identification Speaker 3 (10:02) or anything. Speaker 2 (10:04) But you know, kids, they get upset and they do things. So Cleo steals this suitcase, takes it home, starts realizing everything you might need to run away that he has none of. And so. He just kind of slips, angrily writes a note and slips it in this suitcase. And the next time he checks, or he puts popcorn in it the first time. He was hiding it. So he puts popcorn. And he thought that that would be his road trip snack. Right. It's Speaker 3 (10:35) a Speaker 2 (10:35) good snack. It's Speaker 3 (10:36) a Speaker 2 (10:36) good snack. Won't fill you up. No. So Cleo puts some popcorn in there. And then the next time he opens it, the popcorn's gone. And in its place is a bunny. Speaker 2 (10:48) And then the next time he opens it, there's a note and it's just like, hey, I see you've taken my bunny. I would like it back. And now Cleo's just kind of like, what's going on with this suitcase? So he writes a note back in the suitcase and that's how the correspondence starts. Okay. So then you have back where the suitcase was from. It's called the Repertorium. And this little girl, Earl Grey, lives there. Speaker 3 (11:17) What a great name. Speaker 2 (11:19) Yeah. With her adopted father. And the Repertorium is this place where it's a library of forgotten items where anytime you touch one of the forgotten items, it brings you to a memory from that item. So they have it categorized like happy memories, thoughtful moments, peaceful moments, scary. And so you can just go in there and experience different moments. But the Repertorium is on its last leg because no one really goes there. And now they're running out of funding. So Earl Grey has her own issues. And through the correspondence with Cleo, they both kind of. like come to terms with like what they're dealing with and working with. And they find this friendship and some answers