Photo courtesy of the NY Times

The “Pioneer Valley” that runs through central Massachusetts could portend the future of Decatur. Aside from sharing certain demographic attributes with our city, this string of towns along the Connecticut River Valley, boasts one of the largest concentrations of authors in the nation.

An article from today’s New York Times profiles this “author-saturated, book-cherishing, literature-celebrating” mecca, where you can’t go a couple miles without tripping over a book reading or festival at a local book shop or venue.

Looking like a matured Decatur, the area is rife with intriguingly-themed book festivals throughout the year and is saturated with independent book shops. (See the NY Times slideshow of local Pioneer Valley shops here)

So the question remains: can/will Decatur become a southern version of this bookish haven? Will authors continue to migrate to our city limits? Will our book festival continue to see its attendance grow and will local authors continue to replenish the line of speakers at our local shops? Only time will tell. Decatur certainly doesn’t have the rustic 18th and 19th century homes that provide part of the charm of these Northern independents, but the relatively recent emergence of book nooks like Little Shop of Stories and Wordsmiths coupled with the increasingly popular Decatur Book Festival, seems to indicate that Decatur could be well on its way to becoming the central hub for local southern writers.