600 miles and counting . . .

FOUR SEASONS BOOKSYesterday I drove a little over 400 miles in steady rain with only 1 brief stop to carry out a cup of coffee.  Today I drove about 200 miles in more rain with no stopping.  And yes, I'll admit I  arrived in quaint and lovely Shepherdstown a little road-weary.  But, all that fatigue faded in an instant when I set foot in FOUR SEASONS BOOKS.  Once inside, I reveled in the wooden floors which set off a satisfying creak as you walk over them.  I took my time browsing through the wonderful selection of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, travel, children's books, memoir. . . really, everything you can think of! There was the new Lee Smith novel set in Asheville at the time Zelda Fitzgerald was a patient in a mental hospital there.  There were the books which made the long lists for the National Book Award.  Shepherdstown is a community of readers, so it did not come as any surprise to me that local patrons had already cleaned the store out of Alice Munro books earlier today after the announcement about her Nobel Prize.  "We have more on order," Sarah, the bookseller at the register told me.
They also had copies of my novel, All That's Missing at the front counter.  Be still, my heart.  THANK YOU!  This is why writers love booksellers.
Tomorrow I'll be attending the Author's Breakfast at the West Virginia Library Association Conference at the Clarion Conference Center and, tonight I am curled up in bed enjoying the two books I purchased at Four Seasons Books, a collection of poems by Mary Oliver and Irene McKinney's poetry collection Unthinkable.  Outside, it is still raining, but it doesn't matter.  I am completely happy and satisfied, all because of an oasis called FOUR SEASONS BOOKS that awaited me at the end of my long journey.