Whitney Gallegos’s day-to-day life is a page-turner. She opened Poppy Books in Spanish Fork with her mother, Karin Smith, in December 2022. Poppy Books & Gifts is located in a 1930s house that they renovated into a cozy book nook filled with treasures. Poppy Books has hosted authors such as Shannon Hale, Mac Barnett, Shawn Harris, Christopher Paolini and more. Whitney has a 3-year-old daughter who gets to come to work with her every day and help Utah Valley citizens alike find their next read. Whitney has alopecia and never has to worry about styling her hair, since she wears a wig everyday. She literally woke up like this.
Fully Booked My day is filled with emailing authors, publisher reps, etc., posting pictures and stories to our Instagram page, restocking and re-shelving books, giving book recommendations to customers, reading (if I have down time), rearranging shelves so the store is looking nice and reordering books sold during the day.
Hero’s Journey I was diagnosed with ADHD in college and had to learn how to focus on projects and be productive while dealing with that!
Plot Twist During Covid, I started to love to read again and because of that love of reading, Poppy’s was born.
Daily Underscore I always listen to the Red Hot Chili Peppers.
Vital Title “The Red Rising” series. It’s a series that feels like Game of Thrones but in space! Political intrigue, epic stories and great characters.
Tired Trope When people buy their books from Amazon and tell us about it.
Dream Storybook World Middle Earth, but after it was saved by Sam and Frodo.
Just My Type From Casa Salza, the pork quesadilla. From Bombay House, butter chicken and garlic naan.
Life Genre Cozy fantasy! I get to live my fantasy of being surrounded by books all day!
Audiobook or Physical Physical by far, but I’ve learned to love audiobooks this last year as well!
The Sequel Hopefully I will have met Brandon Sanderson (wink wink) and I plan on continuing to grow our business and maybe open up a new location!