Wayne Caldwell will present his latest work, “River Road,” at 1 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 7, at Blue Ridge Books in Waynesville. 

“What are you reading after the election?” a friend asked me last week. She asked me because she had picked a book specifically for the occasion. She was reading “Democracy in America.”

“De Tocqueville?”

“Yes,” she said. “When I had to read it for school it was boring. It’s not boring now.” 

Author John Kotab will present his latest book, “Bee the Change: If We Protect, Nature Will Provide,” at 1 p.m. Saturday, June 15, at Blue Ridge Books in Waynesville. 

Author Tiffany Hall will present her new book, “Bigger,” at 1 p.m. Saturday, April 20, at Blue Ridge Books in Waynesville. 

Author Sarah Dean will host a special reading and signing from 1-3 p.m. Saturday, April 13, at Blue Ridge Books in Waynesville. 

As I think ahead to 2024, I can’t help but feel so lucky to live here, in these mountains. 

One way to enjoy winter is to read about someone who lives north of the Arctic Circle. It’s never going to be that cold here, is the idea.

In this day and age of Amazon, Kindles, big box bookstores, streaming services and social media that fight for more of our attention everyday, local, independent bookstores are in constant competition with these heavy hitters. And yet, those like Blue Ridge Books seem to weather it all. So what’s the secret?

In this day and age of Amazon, Kindles, big box bookstores, streaming services and social media that fight for more of our attention everyday; local, independent bookstores are in constant competition with these heavy hitters. And yet, those like Blue Ridge Books seem resilient to it all. What’s the secret?

Sitting at a booth in the back of her store on recent morning, Allison Lee remembers the days long ago when her father ran a small-town business.

“My father was an independent store owner, a dime store, then later a hardware store,” she recalled. “I grew up on a Main Street in a small town, and when I was young I worked for my parents. I learned to count back change, ring things up on the old register. And it always meant a lot to my family about who the customers were, and how you serve the community. When he passed away some 17 years ago, some of the first people to land on my mother’s door were longtime customers.”