Alissa Redmond, Owner
South Main Book Company, 110 S. Main St. Salisbury, NC 28144
@southmainbookcompany

What kind of reader were you as a child? What was the first book that made a strong impression on you?
Unsurprisingly, I was a diehard library kid awash with BookIt prizes. I cried in kindergarten over Charlotte's Web and was hooked over books from then on. My parents would drop me in a Christian bookstore and I'd somehow emerge with R.L. Stine and Christopher Pike thrillers - books were an escape and a path forward for me from an extremely young age.

What do you love about being able to work around books every day?I love hearing kids walk in, screaming with excitement. I love how impressive our store appears the first time you walk in. Kids will ask if we are a library, follow my dog around the store, and hopefully leave a little more passionate about chasing the feelings they got visiting the books we have. Raising a community of readers is a total thrill for me.

A great thing about living in Salisbury is how supportive so many are for us. People in Salisbury get the importance of shopping locally and intrinsically understand a town is not a town without a good bookstore. I have always been especially grateful for everyone welcoming my family into community with theirs as we moved here just before COVID hit, and I can't imagine a better place for us to have landed at that very particular time.

What makes you happy? What are you grateful for?
I am grateful to have wonderful staff who are equally passionate about promoting literacy in our community. Their love of our store gives me the freedom to pursue all the creative dreams I've carried forever and never had the time to follow through on (I'm writing my first novel now, and it is so hard!). Seeing my daughters shop the shelves and find little pieces of themselves - that is true happiness for me.

Tell us about some of your favorite books and writers of all time.
THE AMAZING ADVENTURES OF KAVALIER AND CLAY by Michael Chabon is one of my favorite books of all time, and THE POSTCARD by Anne Berest is gorgeous as well. Roxane Gay and Shirley Jackson are my desert island favorite authors, without a doubt. Louise Erdrich and Anne Patchett are my ultimate heroes - fabulous booksellers and inspired authors. Gabrielle Zevin, Ocean Vuong, Marr Karr, Jon Krakauer, Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, S.A. Cosby, David Joy, Wiley Cash, Valerie Perrin, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Adrienne Maree Brown - these authors can do no wrong. I'm excited to see what Chris Whitaker, Kirsten Miller, Marie Tierney, Alison Espach, Holly Brickley, Wright Thompson, Adrienne Young, Aimee Nezhukumatathil, Tia Williams, Liz Moore, Maggie Thrash, Lisa Taddeo, V.E. Schwab, Chanel Miller, Hisham Matar, Amanda Peters, Sarah Sentilles, and Kaliane Bradley's do next. There are so many talented voices in this world, and we are living in some crazy times; hopefully we at least get some amazing books out of all of this.

As you reflect on your year of reading, what books have you recently enjoyed? And what books are you looking forward to in 2025?

ZEAL by Morgan Jerkins, EMPEROR OF GLADNESS by Ocean Vuong, FUNDAMENTALLY by Nussaibah Younis, and WILD DARK SHORE by Charlotte McConaghy were all amazing novels for me to start off my reading year. I am certain I will continue re-reading Omar El Akkad's ONE DAY, EVERYONE WILL HAVE ALWAYS BEEN AGAINST THIS for weeks, maybe years, to come. I am continually reading about resistance (creative and otherwise) right now, searching for the perfect book to pass to everyone I know that will somehow transport us to better days.

Interviewed by Mia Funk