Aiken has become a regular stop for Dorothea Benton Frank when the best-selling author goes on tour to promote a new book.
"I love it here because there is a real heart connection," she said Tuesday night during an appearance at Books-A-Million in the Aiken Mall. "Everybody is just so happy. Maybe it's the vitamin D from all the sun, and maybe it's because it's a horse town and people get more exercise. I don't know what it is, but everybody is always in a pretty good mood. I've never had an unpleasant moment in Aiken, not one."
Frank talked about and signed her 16th and latest book, "All the Single Ladies." She also signed some of her earlier novels.
"'All the Single Ladies' is about friendship," Frank said. "It's about women of a certain age who are in their early 50s. They lose a mutual friend who always kind of played her cards close to her chest, and they want to figure out who she really was. They make discoveries about her life, and in the process, they ask themselves a lot of questions, too."
A native of Sullivan's Island, Frank writes about the coastal South Carolina area where she was raised.
Approximately 160 people showed up to see the author during her Aiken visit, and nearly all of them were women.
"She makes me feel like I'm at home when I read her books because they are set in the places that I know," said Pat Shealy. "She always tells a good story."
Joan Majore moved from New York's Long Island to Aiken nine years ago, and she enjoys Franks' novels because they've helped her learn more about the Palmetto State.
"I like the way she writes about the Lowcountry," Majore said. "Since I live here now, I want to read all about the area."
One of Franks' most enthusiastic local fans, however, is a man named Hemrick Salley Jr. He brought Frank a brooch that belonged to his late mother.
"She writes about the South, and I like Southern things and stories," Salley said. "She has all kinds of nice twists in her books, so you don't know exactly what is coming about."
Dede Biles is a general assignment reporter for the Aiken Standard and has been with the newspaper since January 2013. A native of Concord, N.C., she graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.