We're celebrating Reading this October in honor of Book Month, One Dog-Eared Page at a Time (no wait –we have bookmarks!)
At Allport Editions, we’re big believers in the power of the written word, whether it’s stamped on a greeting card, scribbled in a notebook, or pressed between the pages of a well-loved book. To celebrate National Reading Month, we asked the readers on our team to share their favorite books (they were all sad to find out they could only pick 3).
Based on their bookshelves, here’s a lovingly unscientific analysis of some of my brilliant co-workers.
Get to know them the best way I know how: through the stories they return to, recommend, and pretend they don’t quietly build their personalities around.
At Allport: Erin wears a lot of hats (and wears them well). She supports most departments, helps build and maintain the website, steps in wherever she’s needed and always tries to make everything work better. She also happens to be the proud mom of Tuna, a resident office dog that likes to sit in boxes.
Bookshelf Analysis: A dreamy realist with a literary sixth sense for where magic meets melancholy. These are books that say hard things gently and leave a soft echo behind, stories where love is radical, grief is sacred, and beauty comes at a cost. There’s a deep belief here that tenderness matters, and that healing is never simple, but always worth the mess.
The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune – An anxious government worker, stuck in the gears of bureaucracy, is sent to assess a mysterious orphanage and ends up discovering a chosen family that rewrites his understanding of love, purpose, and home. It’s a slow, glowing story about how kindness is rebellious, care is powerful, and radical joy is never small.
In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado – A memoir like no other: haunted, fragmented, and sharp edged. Machado reconstructs her experience of queer domestic abuse through the lens of horror, fairy tale, and scholarship, each chapter another room in a structure built to contain both truth and trauma. It’s beautiful, unflinching, and formally brilliant; a story that holds space for the ghosts we live with and the stories we’re told not to tell.
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald – A glittering autopsy on the American Dream, told in sentences so good they feel illegal. Gatsby builds his life like a shrine to longing, but the book knows what he doesn’t: that desire can’t rewrite the past. It’s champagne-soaked, starry eyed, and absolutely devastating by design. Nothing gold can stay, but it’s impossible not to reach for it anyway.
What I’ve realized while putting this together is that our reading lives are just as different and beautiful as the cards we sell. We love books that ask hard questions, make us laugh unexpectedly, or just remind us that connection is what we’re all here for, whether through words, worlds, or wildly specific lore.
This month, grab something from your shelf… or better yet, someone else’s (support your local library & independent bookstores), and sink into a story. Revisit a favorite, get haunted by footnotes, cry about marshes, spiral over moral philosophy, or finally figure out what’s actually happening in Flatland (if you do, please report back).
So, Happy Book Month from some of the bookish weirdos at Allport Editions, including myself, who is currently finishing Under The Whispering Door by TJ Klune, and using this post as an excuse to sneak in one last book recommendation. You’re welcome.
Check out the other shelves of our fabulous Team that makes up Allport Editions! I might be biased, but I think they’re pretty awesome
Until next time,
Sam