Perks Ep. 78 | Susan Thomas | Spinning a Good Yarn with Books and Brew | 2-17-21

This week we travel to Eastern Kentucky to the town of Morehead in our quest to explore cool independent bookstores in our region. Morehead is home to a little over 7,000 residents and Morehead State University. The university as well as the regional medical center in town give the community a diverse makeup. And it’s location inside Daniel Boone National Forest and the head of the Sheltowee Trace Trail make it a tempting destination for folks who like to hike, hunt, fish, and soak up nature.

Our guest, Susan Thomas, is a managing partner and owner of CoffeeTree Books and the Fuzzy Duck Coffee Shop which have been a family business for over 20 years. It has morphed several times and is now housed in the town’s old single screen movie theater on Main Street. They have transformed the space to include a coffee shop in the old concession area, event space at the stage, and a business office in the old projector room, not to mention everything you would expect to see in a bookstore. But they have been creative with their space and have included a store within a store. CoffeeTree is also a destination for locals looking for supplies for fiber arts like knitting. They carry high quality yarns and classes for knitters. Susan is a knitter herself and wanted to offer products she used to have to travel over an hour to purchase. And while there weren’t initially many knitters in Morehead, Susan and others have nurtured a whole crop of townspeople anxious to learn and create.

Susan tells us why books and yarn aren’t the strangest store within a store concept in town, why she has an affinity for books about bees, and why moving back to her hometown after 16 years in Nashville is a decision she hasn’t once regretted.

Books mentioned in this episode:
1- The Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett
2- The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett
3- Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer
4- Vesper Flights by Helen Macdonald
5- The Storied Life of A J Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin
6- The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend by Katarina Bivald
7- Born Standing Up: A Comic's Life by Steve Martin
8- Outliers by Malcom Gladwell
9- The New One: Painfully True Stories From a Reluctant Dad by Mike Birbiglia and J. Hope Stein
10- The Prophets by Robert Jones Jr
11- We Begin at the End by Chris Whitaker
12- Amari and the Night Brothers by B. B. Alston
13- Good Talk by Mira Jacob
14- Murmur of Bees by Sofia Segovia
15- The Honey Bus: A Memoir of Loss, Courage, and a Girl Saved by Bees by Meredith May
16- Goat Song: A Seasonal Life, A Short History of Herding, and the Art of Making Cheese by Brad Kessler
17- The E Myth: Why Most Businesses Don't Work and What To do About It by Michael E. Gerber