I hope you’re ready for all of the You’ve Got Mail references because I constantly feel like I’m living in a movie with my jewel-box of a bookstore in St. Helena, smack dab in the heart of Napa Valley!

I’ve always been a reader — I’d spend hours in my room devouring The Boxcar Children and Nancy Drew. When I was 13 my mom got really into baseball, a passion I did not share. She would drive us from our home in San Diego to Anaheim to see a game and I would climb up into the empty nosebleeds to read, spending the afternoon with a box of cracker jack and a novel. When I moved to Prague after college, I squirreled away in a dark, wood-paneled bookshop reading Camus and Durrell, sipping bitter coffee and wondering if I should take up smoking or wear a beret. Obviously, I was very cool!

Twenty years ago I made Napa my home and quickly discovered Main Street Books. The woman who ran the store, Liza, was the person I turned to for resources, recommendations for kids books when I became a new mom and didn’t know what to look for, publishing insights and general delight. If I was having a bad day I’d stop in just to reset in her calm, smart presence. She was one of the first people I told when I got an article published and she cheered (in her quiet way) when I got an agent and assured me it would all be fine when the inevitable rejections came in.

When the magical Naomi Chamblin of Napa Bookmine purchased the store a few years ago, Liza continued to run it. She was the person people expected to see behind the register! After Liza retired, Naomi felt it was time to pass the torch. I cried with happiness when she asked if I’d consider taking over. It is an incredible honor to step into this role, to play that part for other people, to watch a new set of kids discover their interests and create community wide memories, becoming a piece of the town fabric. And what a gift to have the bookstore become a foundational part of my own kids’ lives. I can already picture them stocking shelves and working the register when they’re older!

I have big plans for Wild Plum Books. Together we’ll be creating something pretty special. There will be book clubs and events and maybe a story hour where I’ll get to where a funny story lady hat á la Meg Ryan (another You’ve Got Mail reference). I hope you’ll follow along @wildplumbooks and sign up for the newsletter here to hear about all of the fun happenings. 

From one book lover to another, I hope you’re in the middle of a truly excellent read.