Events Calendar
Explore family friendly events, theatres, galleries, concerts, nightlife, things to do, and more in the Greenville, SC and Upstate areas.
Interested in adding an event to our calendar? Please click the green “Post Your Event” button below.
John Lane will be reading and signing from his latest collection, Coming Into Animal Presence! This book has something for everyone with its wide range of writings and will be sure to entertain. For environmentalists, the outdoorsy, animal-lovers, and everyone in-between! Meet us at the bookshop!
About the Book
John Lane continues his exploration of the intersection of the human imagination with the world of other animals in a companion volume to COYOTE SETTLES THE SOUTH (2016) and NEIGHBORHOOD HAWKS (2019). Each of these fifteen pieces–some more formal essays, some journalism, and some stories of Lane’s encounters with wild animals in wild places–explores the diversity and the mystery of what’s often been called “the more than human world.” In each piece there is always animal presence, sometimes central and sometimes peripheral. In one piece the Columbian mammoth comes back to trouble the contemporary political landscape of South Carolina. In another, he ponders the fate of a wing-shot goose finding a last refuge in the Lane family’s tiny frog pond. In another, Lane ventures into an abandoned Zimbabwean gold mine alone to check on the status of a common genet, a shy carnivore.
About the Author
John Lane is Emeritus Professor of environmental studies at Wofford College and was founding director of the college’s Goodall Environmental Studies Center. He is the author of a dozen books of poetry and prose, COYOTE SETTLES THE SOUTH was one of four finalists for the John Burroughs Medal and was named by the Burroughs Society one of the year’s “Nature Books of Uncommon Merit.”
As an environmentalist in 2013 Lane was named Upstate Forever’s “Clean Water Champion,” and “Water Conservationist of the Year” by The South Carolina Wildlife Federation. In 2014 he was inducted into the SC Academy of Authors. He, with his wife Betsy Teter, is one of the co-founders of Spartanburg’s Hub City Writers Project.
Join us for an evening of cocktails and conversation with New York Times bestselling author Megan Miranda, in honor of her brand new novel, The Only Survivors. We’ve let Megan keep us up reading past our bedtime since All The Missing Girls came out in 2016, and this new book promises to be the same kind of page turner: a bunch of friends who survived a horrifying accident in high school meet at the Outer Banks every year to commemorate their survival. Only this year, there’s one less of them, and everyone looks like a suspect.
Your ticket includes admission, a cocktail in the spirit of the story, and a copy of the book, as well as an after-hours bookstore evening with Megan.
BOOK SUMMARY
Seven hours in the past. Seven days in the present. Seven survivors remaining. Who would you save?
A decade ago, two vans filled with high school seniors on a school service trip crashed into a Tennessee ravine—a tragedy that claimed the lives of multiple classmates and teachers. The nine students who managed to escape the river that night were irrevocably changed. A year later, after one of the survivors dies by suicide on the anniversary of the crash, the rest of them make a pact: to come together each year to commemorate that terrible night.
To keep one another safe.
To hold one another accountable.
Or both.
Their annual meeting place, a house on the Outer Banks, has long been a refuge. But by the tenth anniversary, Cassidy Bent has worked to distance herself from the tragedy, and from the other survivors. She’s changed her mobile number. She’s blocked the others’ email addresses. This year, she is determined to finally break ties once and for all. But on the day of the reunion, she receives a text with an obituary attached: another survivor is gone. Now they are seven—and Cassidy finds herself hurling back toward the group, wild with grief—and suspicion.
Almost immediately, something feels off this year. Cassidy is the first to notice when Amaya, annual organizer, slips away, overwhelmed. This wouldn’t raise alarm except for the impending storm. Suddenly, they’re facing the threat of closed roads and surging waters…again. Then Amaya stops responding to her phone. After all they’ve been through, she wouldn’t willfully make them worry. Would she?
And—as they promised long ago—each survivor will do whatever he or she can do to save one another. Won’t they?
A propulsive and chilling locked-box mystery filled with the dazzling hairpin twists that are the author’s signature, The Only Survivors is New York Times-bestselling author Megan Miranda’s best novel yet.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Megan Miranda is the New York Times bestselling author of seven novels of psychological suspense and mystery, include the Reese Witherspoon Book Club pick, The Last House Guest. She’s also the author of seven novels for young adults. She grew up in New Jersey, graduated from MIT, and lives in North Carolina with her husband and two children.
REVIEWS
“In All the Missing Girls Megan Miranda leads readers back through the past of a small southern town, enfolding them in a slow, tense nightmare of suspicion, menace, and tangled motives. A twisty, compulsive read–I loved it.” — Ruth Ware, author of In A Dark Dark Wood.
“Sleepwalking is creepy. You’re asleep, but you’re walking through the night—like the living dead. I knew when I started The Girl from Widow Hills I was in for some shivers. But I had no idea the terrors that were in store.”—R. L. Stine, bestselling author of Goosebumps and Fear Street
Join fan favorite Susan Boyer for a drop-in launch party and signing at Wine & Design (next door to Fiction Addiction!) on Tuesday, April 11th from 5:30-8pm to celebrate the launch of her new book, Big Trouble on Sullivan’s Island.
This event is FREE and open to the public. You can also purchase an $18.01 ticket that includes a paperback copy of the book, a $33.87 ticket that includes a hardcover copy of the book, or a $22.25 ticket that includes a large print copy of the book. Additional books can be ordered on our website or purchased at the event while supplies last. Susan will be available to mingle and sign books at the event.
If you do not feel comfortable attending in-person, signed copies can be purchased on our website.
Tickets can be purchased online through Tuesday, April 11th at 2:30pm. Refunds can be requested up until the ticket cutoff. At-the-door tickets will be available as space allows.
From the author of the best-selling Liz Talbot Mystery Series comes a novel about family and secrets, and the lengths we’ll go to in order to protect both.
Can this charming do-gooder carry the day?
Charleston, SC. Hadley Cooper has a big heart. So when the easygoing private investigator gets a request from a new friend to stake out her husband’s extramarital activities, she immediately begins surveillance. And when her client is discovered dead on her kitchen floor, the Southern spitfire is certain the cheater is the culprit … even though he has the perfect alibi: Hadley herself.
Flustered since she observed the cad four hours away in Greenville at the time of the murder, the determined PI desperately searches for clues to tie him to the crime. But when her ex-boyfriend, who happens to be the lead detective on the case, arrests a handy suspect, Hadley fears a guilty man is about to walk free.
Can this Palmetto State sleuth make an impossible connection to prevent a miscarriage of justice?
With dry wit and delightful dialogue, Susan M. Boyer delivers an eccentric, vegan gumshoe sure to appeal to any fan of Southern women’s fiction. With her merry band of sassy friends, Hadley Cooper is a Lowcountry detective you won’t soon forget.
Big Trouble on Sullivan’s Island is the engaging first book in the Carolina Tales series. If you like strong heroines, quirky sisterhoods, and plenty of Southern charm, then you’ll love Susan M. Boyer’s wonderful whodunit.
Read Big Trouble on Sullivan’s Island and take a trip to the lush Lowcountry today!
About the Author:
Susan M. Boyer is the author of the USA TODAY bestselling Liz Talbot mystery series. She was blessed with a quintessential small-town childhood and has had a life-long love affair with books. Susan is grateful to have been gifted with an over-active imagination. She was one of those children whose teachers were always telling her mamma that her talents needed to be “channeled.” She’s been making things up and writing them down her whole life.
Susan’s debut novel, Lowcountry Boil, won the 2012 Agatha Award for Best First Novel, the Daphne du Maurier Award for Excellence in Mystery/Suspense, and garnered several other award nominations. The third book in the series, Lowcountry Boneyard, was a Spring 2015 Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance Okra Pick, and was short-listed for the 2016 Pat Conroy Beach Music Mystery Prize.
Lowcountry Book Club was was a Summer 2016 SIBA Okra Pick and was short-listed for the 2017 Southern Book Prize in Mystery & Detective Fiction.
There are currently eleven books in the Liz Talbot Series. The novella, Postcards from Stella Maris, was released September 26, 2022.
Susan loves beaches, Southern food, and small Southern towns where everyone knows everyone, and everyone has crazy relatives. You’ll find all of the above in her novels. She and her husband call Greenville, SC home and visit the Carolina coast as often as possible.
You may request a full refund prior to the ticket cutoff.
Join us for a Pop-Up with author Jennifer Ferguson and her book Lenny the Lemming!
BOOK SUMMARY
When Lenny’s peaceful life of foraging for basic needs takes an unexpected turn, he ends up on a journey that ends with a friendship he didn’t know he needed.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Jennifer lives in Greenville, South Carolina with her mother, three tabby cats, and a cockatiel. She is on the autism spectrum and is employed part time at a local supermarket. Also, she is an active member of Greenville CAN (Collaborative Action Network). greenvillecan.org
Come meet Jennifer, hear more about her books, and get a signed copy!
There was nothing like the elementary school book fair – the smell of new books in the air, the rush of racing your friends to find the next installment of your favorite series, and, if you were lucky, the crinkle of money from Mom in your pocket.
Life felt so much easier back then, didn’t it? Don’t you find yourself wishing from time to time that you could just go back?
This April, you can – but we’re doing it grown-up style.
Don’t miss our Boozy Book Fair at Carolina Bauernhaus Greenville (556 Perry Ave Suite B118, Greenville, SC 29611) on Sunday, April 16th from 2-4pm!
We’ll have suggested book and drink pairings by Carolina Bauernhaus owner Casey Certain.
Book categories will include:
-Geeks & Gamers
-Read the Rainbow
-Gothic & Ghastly
-Drawing Under the Influence
-Guide to Adulting
-Get Lost in the Woods
-Not Your Mama’s Cookbook
-Altered States
-Meet Cute Moments
-Criminally Good Reads
…and much much more!
This event is FREE and open to the public, so bring your friends! Be sure to RSVP so we have the booze + books ready – we can’t wait to see you there.
Please join us to celebrate the launch of The House is on Fire with Rachel Beanland. A riveting reimagining of one of early America’s deadliest tragedies, the Richmond Theater Fire of 1811, The House is on Fire is told from the perspectives of four characters whose lives are irrevocably altered in the aftermath of the inferno.
Rachel will be on hand to talk, answer questions, and sign books, as we enjoy an incredible lunch at Soby’s! Get your ticket today!
BOOK SUMMARY
Richmond, Virginia 1811. It’s the height of the winter social season, the General Assembly is in session, and many of Virginia’s gentleman planters, along with their wives and children, have made the long and arduous journey to the capital in hopes of whiling away the darkest days of the year. At the city’s only theater, the Charleston-based Placide & Green Company puts on two plays a night to meet the demand of a populace that’s done looking for enlightenment at the front of a church.
On the night after Christmas, the theater is packed with more than six hundred holiday revelers. In the third-floor boxes, sits newly-widowed Sally Henry Campbell, who is glad for any opportunity to relive the happy times she shared with her husband. One floor away, in the colored gallery, Cecily Patterson doesn’t give a whit about the play but is grateful for a four-hour reprieve from a life that has recently gone from bad to worse. Backstage, young stagehand Jack Gibson hopes that, if he can impress the theater’s managers, he’ll be offered a permanent job with the company. And on the other side of town, blacksmith Gilbert Hunt dreams of one day being able to bring his wife to the theater, but he’ll have to buy her freedom first.
When the theater goes up in flames in the middle of the performance, Sally, Cecily, Jack, and Gilbert make a series of split-second decisions that will not only affect their own lives but those of countless others. And in the days following the fire, as news of the disaster spreads across the United States, the paths of these four people will become forever intertwined.
Based on the true story of Richmond’s theater fire, The House Is On Fire offers proof that sometimes, in the midst of great tragedy, we are offered our most precious—and fleeting—chances at redemption.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Rachel Beanland is the author of the forthcoming novel, The House Is On Fire, which will be published by Simon & Schuster in April 2023. Her debut novel, Florence Adler Swims Forever, was selected as a book club pick by Barnes & Noble, a featured debut by Amazon, an Indie Next pick by the American Booksellers Association, and one of the best books of 2020 by USA Today. It was also named a New York Times Editors’ Choice and was recognized with the 2020 National Jewish Book Award for Debut Fiction (Greenberg Prize). To date, it has been published or is forthcoming in nine countries.
Rachel’s writing has also appeared in Lit Hub, Business Insider, Creative Nonfiction, and Broad Street, among other places. She is a graduate of the University of South Carolina and earned her MFA in creative writing from Virginia Commonwealth University. Rachel lives in Richmond, Virginia with her family.
REVIEWS
“Fully realized characters and gripping prose makes for an excellent, riveting novel that is highly recommended.” —Booklist, STARRED review
“Powerful… Beanland enlivens the smart and suspenseful narrative with fully developed protagonists that illuminate the community’s response to mass catastrophe. Readers will relish this.” —Publishers Weekly, STARRED review
“Propulsive… full of historical detail and full-blooded characters” —Shelf Awareness
“Propulsive. Rachel Beanland’s The House Is On Fire pulls you into a major moment in American history via the lives of four vividly drawn characters.”—Farah Ali, author of People Want to Live
“I could not turn the pages fast enough! An absolutely propulsive feat of storytelling! The House is On Fire reveals the little-known events of an American tragedy of Titanic proportion. In heart-stopping, intimate detail Beanland transports us directly into the souls of a truly diverse cast of Virginians whose varied means of survival during the theater fire and in its deftly-told aftermath, not only paint a rich portrait of 1800s America, but also hold up a timeless mirror to the racial disparity revealed by unexpected loss – and the means through which we must all come together to rebuild. Brava!”—Afia Atakora, author of Conjure Women
A new book club at Hub City Bookshop, Rainbow Reads meets on the third Wednesday of the month and focuses on reading stories centered around LGBTQ+ characters and experiences. Our goal is to create inclusive and intersectional conversations within an open and welcoming environment. This book club is free and open for anyone to join—we only ask that you purchase your book through Hub City Bookshop. Join us on February 15th at 6:00 PM as we discuss The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid!
Join us for an evening with author Katy Simpson Smith as we celebrate her book The Weeds! Lush, intoxicating, and teeming with mischief, The Weeds is a tense, mesmerizing page-turner about science and survival, the roles women are given and have taken from them, and the lives they make for themselves. Hear more about the book and Katy’s writing process as we enjoy a book-inspired cocktail with her. This is a ticketed event.
Your ticket includes admission, a cocktail, and a copy of the book.
BOOK SUMMARY
Two women, connected across time, edge toward transgression in pursuit of their desires.
A Mississippi woman pushes through the ruin of the Roman Colosseum, searching for plants. She has escaped her life, apprenticed herself to catalog all the species growing in this place. Crawling along the stones, she wonders how she has landed here, a reluctant botanist amid a snarl of tourists in comfortable sandals. She hunts for a scientific agenda and a direction of her own.
In 1854, a woman pushes through the jungle of the Roman Colosseum, searching for plants. As punishment for her misbehavior, she has been indentured to the English botanist Richard Deakin, for whom she will compile a flora. She is a thief, and she must find new ways to use her hands. If only the woman she loves weren’t on a boat, with a husband. But love isn’t always possible. She logs 420 species.
Through a list of seemingly minor plants and their uses—medical, agricultural, culinary—these women calculate intangible threats: a changing climate, the cost of knowledge, and the ways repeated violence can upend women’s lives. They must forge their own small acts of defiance and slip through whatever cracks they find. How can anyone survive?
Lush, intoxicating, and teeming with mischief, Katy Simpson Smith’s The Weeds is a tense, mesmerizing page-turner about science and survival, the roles women are given and have taken from them, and the lives they make for themselves.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Katy Simpson Smith was born and raised in Jackson, Mississippi. She is the author of the novels The Story of Land and Sea, a New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice and one of Vogue’s Best Books of 2014; Free Men; and The Everlasting, a New York Times Best Historical Fiction Book of 2020. Her writing has appeared in The Paris Review, The Los Angeles Review of Books, Oxford American, Granta, Literary Hub, and elsewhere. She received a PhD in history from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and an MFA from the Bennington Writing Seminars, and is also the author of We Have Raised All of You: Motherhood in the South, 1750-1835. She lives in New Orleans.
REVIEWS
A Most Anticipated Book of 2023 at Literary Hub
A Most Anticipated LGBTQ Book of the Season at Electric Literature
“Luminous . . . A lyrical meditation on power, need, and love.”
—Kirkus Reviews, starred review
“Erudite, playful, and filled with fury about gender inequality, [The Weeds] can be recommended to readers of cli-fi and feminist literary fiction.”
—Booklist
“[A] centuries-spanning story . . . Katy Simpson Smith muses on the constraints and choices of women trying simply to survive.”
—Eliza Smith, Literary Hub
“Ingenious . . . Potent details bring [The Weeds] to vibrant life . . . Readers will enjoy stopping to smell the clematis.”
—Publishers Weekly
“A novel that repurposes the old-school botanical survey as a way of sorting through curiosity and desire in their rawest forms, set against the high-romantic backdrop of the Roman Colosseum in plant-strewn, crumbling ruin.”
—Sam Bett, Literary Hub
“[A] subtle, intelligent work.”
—Library Journal
Join us for an evening of cocktails and conversation with National Book Award-winning author Charles Frazier and his beautiful new novel, The Trackers. A sweeping Depression-era story of art, aspiration, intrigue and the American dream, this is a literary event we’re over-the-moon excited about. Your ticket includes admission, a cocktail in the spirit of the story, and a copy of the book, as well as an after-hours bookstore evening with Charles.
For this event, all books will be presigned and personalized (if you wish) through the link below. Charles’s other titles are also available for sale and signature, but books will not be signed in person.
BOOK SUMMARY
Deep in Depression-era America, painter Val Welch travels westward to the rural town of Dawes, Wyoming, where he’s landed a New Deal assignment to create a mural representing the region for their new Post Office. A wealthy art lover named John
Long and his wife Eve have agreed to host Val at their sprawling ranch. Rumors and intrigue surround the couple: Eve left behind an itinerant life riding the rails and singing in a western swing band. Long holds shady political aspirations, but was once a WWI sniper—and his right hand is a mysterious elder cowboy, a vestige of the violent old west.
One day, Eve flees home with a valuable painting in tow, and Long recruits Val to hit the road with a mission of tracking her down. Journeying from ramshackle Hoovervilles to San Francisco nightclubs to the swamps of Florida, Val’s search for Eve narrows, and he soon turns up secrets that could spark formidable changes for all of them.
In The Trackers, singular American writer Charles Frazier conjures up the lives of everyday people during an extraordinary period of history that bears uncanny resemblance to our own. With the keen perceptions of humanity and transcendent storytelling that have made him beloved for decades, Frazier has created a powerful and timeless new classic.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Charles Frazier grew up in the mountains of Western North Carolina. Cold Mountain, his highly acclaimed first novel, was an international bestseller, won the National Book Award, the ABBY Award, the Heartland Award, the Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction, and was adapted into an Academy Award-winning film by Anthony Minghella in 2003. He is also the author of Thirteen Moons, Nightwoods, and Varina.
REVIEWS
“Charles Frazier’s Cold Mountain is the most impressive and enthralling first novel I have read in a long time. It is a magnetic story, ambitious in scope, with richly developed characters and beautiful evocations of landscape. Though set in an earlier time, it is contemporary in the profoundest sense, with resonance of A Farewell to Arms.”
—Willie Morris
“Strikingly beautiful . . . In its vivid evocation of a time and place, its steady storytelling momentum, and its unabashed affirmation of a fiction that takes moral choice seriously, Cold Mountain calls to mind Snow Falling on Cedars.”
—Newsday
“Thirteen Moons brings this vanished world thrillingly to life… One of the great Native American, and American stories, and a great gift to all of us, from one of our very best writers.”
—Kirkus Reviews, starred review
“Nightwoods is unsettling stuff, tense and eerie and brutal. . . .Nightwoods is no typical thriller. It hits hard because you come to care so much about the characters, all of them drawn with that precise enchanted prose. By the book’s climactic scenes in the shadowy mountain forest that gives Nightwoods its title, the unhurried, poetic suspense is both difficult to bear and impossible to shake.”
—Entertainment Weekly
Join us for an evening of cocktails and conversation with National Book Award-winning author Charles Frazier and his beautiful new novel, The Trackers. A sweeping Depression-era story of art, aspiration, intrigue and the American dream, this is a literary event we’re over-the-moon excited about. Your ticket includes admission, a cocktail in the spirit of the story, and a copy of the book, as well as an after-hours bookstore evening with Charles.
For this event, all books will be presigned and personalized (if you wish) through the link below. Charles’s other titles are also available for sale and signature, but books will not be signed in person.
BOOK SUMMARY
Deep in Depression-era America, painter Val Welch travels westward to the rural town of Dawes, Wyoming, where he’s landed a New Deal assignment to create a mural representing the region for their new Post Office. A wealthy art lover named John
Long and his wife Eve have agreed to host Val at their sprawling ranch. Rumors and intrigue surround the couple: Eve left behind an itinerant life riding the rails and singing in a western swing band. Long holds shady political aspirations, but was once a WWI sniper—and his right hand is a mysterious elder cowboy, a vestige of the violent old west.
One day, Eve flees home with a valuable painting in tow, and Long recruits Val to hit the road with a mission of tracking her down. Journeying from ramshackle Hoovervilles to San Francisco nightclubs to the swamps of Florida, Val’s search for Eve narrows, and he soon turns up secrets that could spark formidable changes for all of them.
In The Trackers, singular American writer Charles Frazier conjures up the lives of everyday people during an extraordinary period of history that bears uncanny resemblance to our own. With the keen perceptions of humanity and transcendent storytelling that have made him beloved for decades, Frazier has created a powerful and timeless new classic.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Charles Frazier grew up in the mountains of Western North Carolina. Cold Mountain, his highly acclaimed first novel, was an international bestseller, won the National Book Award, the ABBY Award, the Heartland Award, the Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction, and was adapted into an Academy Award-winning film by Anthony Minghella in 2003. He is also the author of Thirteen Moons, Nightwoods, and Varina.
REVIEWS
“Charles Frazier’s Cold Mountain is the most impressive and enthralling first novel I have read in a long time. It is a magnetic story, ambitious in scope, with richly developed characters and beautiful evocations of landscape. Though set in an earlier time, it is contemporary in the profoundest sense, with resonance of A Farewell to Arms.”
—Willie Morris
“Strikingly beautiful . . . In its vivid evocation of a time and place, its steady storytelling momentum, and its unabashed affirmation of a fiction that takes moral choice seriously, Cold Mountain calls to mind Snow Falling on Cedars.”
—Newsday
“Thirteen Moons brings this vanished world thrillingly to life… One of the great Native American, and American stories, and a great gift to all of us, from one of our very best writers.”
—Kirkus Reviews, starred review
“Nightwoods is unsettling stuff, tense and eerie and brutal. . . .Nightwoods is no typical thriller. It hits hard because you come to care so much about the characters, all of them drawn with that precise enchanted prose. By the book’s climactic scenes in the shadowy mountain forest that gives Nightwoods its title, the unhurried, poetic suspense is both difficult to bear and impossible to shake.”
—Entertainment Weekly
Join us on Tuesday, April 25th at 5:30 pm for an In Conversation event with author Matthew Vollmer. He’ll be chatting with about his book All of Us Together in the End.
All Of Us Together In The End is a lyrical examination of transformation after loss, by a writer the New York Times calls “irresistible” and “utterly convincing.” We’re excited to have Matthew in store with us and can’t wait to hear all about his writing processes, what inspires him, and ask questions about his book.
So don’t miss out on this free event!
BOOK SUMMARY
Vollmer’s family memoir shimmers with wonder and enchantment and begins with the death of his mother from early-onset Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. Soon after, flashing lights and floating orbs appear in the woods surrounding his family’s home in rural North Carolina, where his widowed father lives. Formative memories of having been raised in the Seventh-day Adventist church resurge in Vollmer’s mind, hastening self-reexamination and reckoning.
He corresponds with a retired geology professor about “ghost lights,” which supposedly occur more in North Carolina than any other American state. He scrolls TikTok. He contacts an eccentric shaman who lives in Spain to have transcendental psychotherapy administered over Zoom. And then Jolene emerges, a woman endeared for decades to Vollmer’s father, holding secrets to their family’s past.
Amidst the turmoil and loneliness of the pandemic, All of Us Together in the End is a poignant and often humorous investigation into belief set in a time where it seems people will believe anything. It is an elegiac affirmation of the awesome, strange, otherworldly ways our loved ones remain alive to us, even when they are out of reach.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Matthew Vollmer is the author of two short-story collections as well as three collections of essays. He was the editor of A Book of Uncommon Prayer, which collects invocations from over 60 acclaimed and emerging authors, and served as co-editor of Fakes: An Anthology of Pseudo-Interviews, Faux-Lectures, Quasi-Letters, “Found” Texts, and Other Fraudulent Artifacts. His work has appeared in venues such as Paris Review, Glimmer Train, Ploughshares, Tin House, Oxford American, The Sun, The Pushcart Prize anthology, and Best American Essays. He teaches in the English Department at Virginia Tech and lives in Blacksburg, VA.
REVIEWS
“Matthew Vollmer thinks too much. I’m glad, for I’m probably not thinking enough most days. All of Us Together in the End is an honest missive addressed to hope, regret, childhood, faith, truth, parenting, and the paranormal. And Love, with all its mysteries. It’s an insightful, beautiful memoir that I’ll remember forever.”
—George Singleton, author of You Want More: Selected Stories
“This engaging what’s-in-the-woods puzzle elegantly probes the questions that characterize deep relationships and deeper mysteries.” —Publishers Weekly, Starred Review
“All of Us Together in the End is an unforgettable record of ‘a purposeful journey’ that became ‘a collision with the ineffable.’” —Rebecca Foster, Foreword Reviews, Starred Review
We are so excited to spend an evening talking about the highly anticipated new thriller from the USA Today and #1 bestselling author of The Perfect Marriage and One of Us Is Dead author Jeneva Rose! Colleen Hoover herself says You Shouldn’t Have Come Here is “Everything I want in a thriller. Sexy, shocking, and tense with an ending I never saw coming.” We’ll enjoy a cocktail as we listen to Jeneva talk about her book and her writing process. Join us!
Your ticket includes admission, a cocktail, and a copy of the book.
BOOK SUMMARY
Grace Evans, an overworked New Yorker looking for a total escape from her busy life, books an Airbnb on a ranch in the middle of Wyoming. When she arrives at the idyllic getaway, she’s pleased to find that the owner is a handsome man by the name of Calvin Wells—and he’s eager to introduce her to his easygoing way of life. But there are things Grace discovers that she’s not too pleased about: A lack of cell phone service. A missing woman. And a feeling that something isn’t right with the ranch.
Despite her uneasiness, the two bond and start to fall for one another. However, as her departure date nears, things change for the worse. What began as a playful romance soon turns into a complicated web of lies. Grace grows wary of Calvin as his infatuation for her seems to have morphed to obsession. Calvin fears that Grace is hiding something from him—including her reason for staying at his ranch to begin with. Vacation flings typically end in heartbreak, but for Grace and Calvin, it’ll be far more destructive.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jeneva Rose is the internationally bestselling author of The Perfect Marriage and One of Us Is Dead. Her work has been translated into more than a dozen languages and optioned for film and television. Originally from Wisconsin, she currently lives in Chicago with her husband, Drew, and her English bulldog, Winston.
REVIEWS
“Everything I want in a thriller. Sexy, shocking, and tense with an ending I never saw coming. Jeneva Rose is the queen of twists.”Colleen Hoover, #1 New York Times bestselling author
“A page-turner from start to finish with a whiplash of a twist ending, Rose has cemented her place as a must-read author for fans of domestic thrillers. Sexy, sizzling, and suspenseful.”Jennifer Hillier, USA Today bestselling author of Things We Do in the Dark and Little Secrets
“Jeneva Rose’s latest is a cat-and-mouse thriller, rustic Airbnb style. Throw in sexy romantic tension between narrators Grace and Calvin, and you have an unputdownable story where the suspense accelerates with every page turned. The twist at the end is brilliantly unexpected. This story will make you think twice about your next vacation rental, and about being a host. Sexy, shocking suspense.” Kaira Rouda, USA Today bestselling author
“A dark, suspenseful psychological thriller with a great premise and masterful use of twists. Rarely have I read a book where I have switched allegiance with characters so frequently and still got my prediction wrong. It’s a pitch-perfect sinister read and begging for a sequel.”John Marrs, USA Today bestselling author of The One
“[An] intriguing thriller…A sinister undercurrent runs throughout, and while the reader is privy to each narrator’s thoughts, there are a few land mines buried along the way to the surprise ending. Rose should win new fans with this one.”Publishers Weekly
Celebrate indies, and celebrate Fiction Addiction!
Independent Bookstore Day is a one-day national party that takes place at indie bookstores across the country on the last Saturday in April. This year marks 10 years of celebrating IBD, and we couldn’t be more excited!
Stop by Fiction Addiction on April 29th for a free gift with every purchase, a free Independent Bookstore Day bag with any purchase of $75 or more, as well as exclusive IBD merchandise, available for one day only as supplies last!
We’re also thrilled to be celebrating Fiction Addiction’s 22nd birthday! We’re so grateful to have been a part of the Greenville community for the past 22 years, and can’t wait to ring in a new year with you all.
There’s so much to celebrate, so come spend the day with us! We can’t wait to see you there.
Join us on Monday, May 1st at 5:30 pm for an In Conversation event with Benjamin Schipper about his graphic novel Joe Death and the Graven Image.
Somewhere between Mike Mignola, A Fistful of Dollars, and Johnny Cash’s Ghost Riders in the Sky, this tale is an adventurous take on the existential hitman, set against a dreamy western backdrop populated by witches, spirits, ghouls, and other monsters. Joe Death explores what it means for Death to undo what he does best. More importantly, what is the true cost of salvation? We’re very excited to have Benjamin in store with us and can’t wait to hear all about his life and writing processes, what inspires him, and ask questions about his book.
So don’t miss out on this free event!
SUMMARY
After surviving a brutal massacre, the last surviving heir of the town of Hard Hollow is kidnapped by the bloodthirsty bandit, Scary Harry. The spirit of Hard Hollow enlists Joe Death-a six-shooter-totin’ grim reaper-to rescue the child. Joe ventures out into the Valley, a desert world with mountains on all sides whose heights reach into the heavens and fissures dive into the underworld itself. He meets all manner of strange characters, creatures, and monsters; each of them all too familiar with Joe’s typical line of work.
Emerging writer Benjamin Schipper dives deep into this tale of the reaper with a name, employing a beautiful and quirky style that gives this macabre odyssey all the heart, humor, and tension essential to a modern masterpiece.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Benjamin Schipper is a writer and artist living in the United States with his wife Karen and their little black dog Willow. He writes primarily from his own experiences and filters them through genres such as fantasy and science fiction. He likes to think he sees people before money, ideas before artwork, and relationships before networks.
The majority of his work is traditionally drawn in pencil on marker paper, scanned into Photoshop, and colored there. He does, however, work upon design principles, making his artwork fit the message of each project.
Join us on Tuesday, May 2nd at 5:30 pm for an In Conversation event with Dr. Benjamin Gilmer! He’ll be chatting about his book The Other Dr. Gilmer: Two Men, a Murder, and an Unlikely Fight for Justice.
The Other Dr. Gilmer takes readers on a riveting and heart-wrenching journey through our shared human fallibility, made worse by a prison system that is failing our most vulnerable citizens. With deep compassion and an even deeper sense of justice, Dr. Benjamin Gilmer delves into the mystery of what could make a caring doctor commit a brutal murder. And in the process, his powerful story asks us to answer a profound question: In a country with the highest incarceration rates in the world, what would it look like if we prioritized healing rather than punishment?
Come by and hear more about Gilmer’s writing journey at this incredible free event!
SUMMARY
A “mesmerizing” (The New York Times Book Review) true story about a shocking crime and a mysterious illness that will forever change your notions of how we punish and how we heal—an expansion on one of the most popular This American Life episodes of all time, now with a new postscript
“A remarkable medical detective story–cum–memoir, grippingly told . . . I was drawn in by every part of it.”—Atul Gawande, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Being Mortal
Fresh out of medical residency, Dr. Benjamin Gilmer joined a rural North Carolina clinic only to find that its previous doctor shared his last name. Dr. Vince Gilmer was loved and respected by the community—right up until he strangled his ailing father and then returned to the clinic for a regular week of work. Vince’s eventual arrest for murder shocked his patients. How could their beloved doctor be capable of such violence? The deeper Benjamin looked into Vince’s case, the more he became obsessed with discovering what pushed a good man toward darkness.
When Benjamin visited Vince in prison, he met a man who appeared to be fighting his own mind, constantly twitching and veering into nonsensical tangents. Sentenced to life in prison, Vince had been branded a cold-blooded killer and a “malingerer”—a person who fakes an illness. But it was obvious to Benjamin that Vince needed help. Alongside This American Life journalist Sarah Koenig, Benjamin resolved to understand what had happened to his predecessor. Time and again, the pair came up against a prison system that cared little about the mental health of its inmates—despite more than a third of them suffering from mental illness.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Dr. Benjamin Gilmer is a family medicine physician in Fletcher, North Carolina. He is an Albert Schweitzer Fellow for Life and associate professor in the department of family medicine at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine at Chapel Hill and at the Mountain Area Health Education Center. A former neurobiologist turned rural family practitioner, Dr. Gilmer has lectured across the country about medical ethics, rural health, and the intersection of medicine and criminal justice reform. He lives with his wife, Deirdre; their two children, Kai and Luya; and their dog, Prince Peanut Butter, in Asheville, North Carolina.
Join authors Lee Smith and Daniel Wallace for a book talk and signing at Wine & Design on Wednesday, May 3rd at 2pm to celebrate their latest books, Silver Alert and This Isn’t Going to End Well.
There are three ticket options for this event. A $32 ticket admits one to the event and includes a copy of either Silver Alert or This Isn’t Going to End Well. You can also purchase a $61 ticket that admits one to the event and includes both books. Additional books can be ordered on our website or purchased at the event while supplies last.
If you’re unable to attend, signed copies of the authors’ books can be purchased on our website.
Tickets can be purchased online through Wednesday, May 3rd, at noon. Refunds can be requested up until the ticket cutoff. At-the-door tickets and books will be available as space allows.
This funny and endearing novel of family, secrets, and aging follows an elderly man who heads off on a joyride with a new young friend—who may have some secrets of her own.
A driving force in literature, the one and only Lee Smith returns with a road trip novel, a story full of hope and humor about not going away quietly—at any age.
Aging Herb’s charmed life with his dear wife, Susan, in their Key West house is coming undone. Susan now needs constant care, and Herb is in denial about his own ailing health. The one bright spot is the arrival of an endlessly optimistic manicurist calling herself Renee. She sings to Susan during manicures, gets her to paint, and brings her a sense of contentment.
But then Herb and Susan’s adult children arrive to stage an intervention on their stubborn, independent father, and as a consequence, Renee’s gig with Susan—and her grand plans for her own life—start to unravel as well. So much had seemed as if it could change for Renee, who is not the happy, uncomplicated young girl she pretends to be. She is actually named Dee Dee, and she’s fleeing a dark past.
And Herb can’t just let go of all that he has ever had. So, he suggests one last joy ride in his Porsche. And the two take off north out of Key West, soon setting off a Silver Alert. As the unlikely friendship between Herb and Dee Dee deepens, we see how as one life is closing down, another opens up.
In this buoyant novel, the masterful Smith asks: What do we deserve? And how do we make it our own? Sometimes, you just have to seize the wheel.
Fans of Smith’s many books in her storied, bestselling career won’t want to miss her newest novel. And readers of novels like Evvie Drake Starts Over by Linda Holmes will adore Silver Alert.
About the Author:
Lee Smith is the author of fourteen novels, including Fair and Tender Ladies, Oral History, Saving Grace, and Guests on Earth, as well as four collections of short stories, including Me and My Baby View the Eclipse and News of the Spirit. Her novel The Last Girls was a New York Times bestseller as well as a co-winner of the Southern Book Critics Circle Award. A retired professor of English at North Carolina State University, she has received an Academy Award in Fiction from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the North Carolina Award for Literature, and the Weatherford Award for Appalachian Literature.
In this powerful memoir, the bestselling author of Big Fish tries to come to terms with the life and death of his multi-talented longtime friend and brother-in-law, who had been his biggest hero and inspiration, in a poignant, lyrical, and moving memoir.
If we’re lucky, we all encounter at least one person whose life elevates and inspires our own. For acclaimed novelist Daniel Wallace, he had one hero and inspiration for so much of what followed: his longtime friend and brother-in-law William Nealy. Seemingly perfect, impossibly cool, William was James Dean, Clint Eastwood, and MacGyver all rolled into one, an acclaimed outdoorsman, a famous cartoonist, an accomplished author, a master of all he undertook, William was the ideal that Daniel sought to emulate.
But when William took his own life at age 48, Daniel was left first grieving, and then furious with the man who broke his and his sister’s hearts. That anger led him to commit a grievous act of his own, a betrayal that took him down a dark path into the tortured recesses of William’s past. Eventually, a new picture of William emerged, of a man with too many secrets and too much shame to bear.
This Isn’t Going to End Well is Daniel Wallace’s first foray into nonfiction. Part love story, part true crime, part a desperate search for the self and how little we really can know another, This Isn’t Going to End Well tells an intimate and moving story of what happens when we realize our heroes are human.
About the Author:
Daniel Wallace is the author of six novels, including Big Fish, which was adapted and released as a movie and a Broadway musical. His novels have been translated into over three-dozen languages. His essays and interviews have been published in The Bitter Southerner, Garden & Gun, Poets & Writers and Our State magazine, where he was, for a short time, the barbecue critic. His short stories have appeared in over fifty magazines and periodicals. He was awarded the Harper Lee Award, given to a nationally recognized Alabama writer who has made a significant lifelong contribution to Alabama letters. He was inducted into the Alabama Literary Hall of Fame in 2022. He is the J. Ross MacDonald Distinguished Professor of English at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
This Isn’t Going to End Well is his first book of nonfiction.
We are so excited to spend an evening with Patti Callahan Henry and her new novel, The Secret Book of Flora Lea! This story follows the lives of two sisters, Hazel and Flora, after they are evacuated from London as part of Operation Pied Piper during World War II. When Flora suddenly goes missing in the English countryside, she’s presumed drowned— until 20 years later, when a children’s book arrives to the London bookshop where Hazel works, based on the secret fairy tale only the sisters shared.
Hear more about the story and Patti’s writing process over book-inspired book-inspired cocktails with her. This is a ticketed event.
Your ticket includes admission, a cocktail, and a copy of the book.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Patti Callahan Henry is the New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author of several novels, including Surviving Savannah and Becoming Mrs. Lewis. She is the recipient of the Christy Award, the Harper Lee Award for Alabama’s Distinguished Writer of the Year Award, and the Alabama Library Association Book of the Year. She is the cohost and cocreator of the popular weekly online live web show and podcast Friends and Fiction. A full-time author and mother of three, she lives in Alabama and South Carolina with her family. Find out more at PattiCallahanHenry.com.
BOOK SUMMARY
When a woman discovers a rare book that has connections to her past, long-held secrets about her missing sister and their childhood spent in the English countryside during World War II are revealed.
In the war-torn London of 1939, fourteen-year-old Hazel and five-year-old Flora are evacuated to a rural village to escape the horrors of the Second World War. Living with the kind Bridie Aberdeen and her teenage son, Harry, in a charming stone cottage along the River Thames, Hazel fills their days with walks and games to distract her young sister, including one that she creates for her sister and her sister alone—a fairy tale about a magical land, a secret place they can escape to that is all their own.
But the unthinkable happens when young Flora suddenly vanishes while playing near the banks of the river. Shattered, Hazel blames herself for her sister’s disappearance, and she carries that guilt into adulthood as a private burden she feels she deserves.
Twenty years later, Hazel is in London, ready to move on from her job at a cozy rare bookstore to a career at Sotheby’s. With a charming boyfriend and her elegantly timeworn Bloomsbury flat, Hazel’s future seems determined. But her tidy life is turned upside down when she unwraps a package containing an illustrated book called Whisperwood and the River of Stars. Hazel never told a soul about the imaginary world she created just for Flora. Could this book hold the secrets to Flora’s disappearance? Could it be a sign that her beloved sister is still alive after all these years?
As Hazel embarks on a feverish quest, revisiting long-dormant relationships and bravely opening wounds from her past, her career and future hang in the balance. An astonishing twist ultimately reveals the truth in this transporting and refreshingly original novel about the bond between sisters, the complications of conflicted love, and the enduring magic of storytelling.
BOOK REVIEWS
“A world war and a fairy tale collide in the British countryside in 1940–and Patti Callahan Henry is the perfect novelist to explore how the living are forever changed. The Secret Book of Flora Lea is a treasure: moving, surprising, and deeply evocative of an England that everyday walked the tightrope between heartbreak and hope. –Chris Bohjalian, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Lioness and The Flight Attendant
“Deft, lyrical and supremely satisfying, The Secret Book of Flora Lea isn’t so much a departure for Patti Callahan Henry as it is a culmination of her gifts as a novelist. This is a book about difficult history and unsinkable hope, ordinary magic in the form of love, and about how our stories can save and sustain us in the most trying moments of our lives. Callahan’s plot will keep you guessing even as her characters steal your heart. I loved it.” –Paula McLain, author of The Paris Wife and When the Stars Go Dark
“A spellbinding tale of hope and perseverance, The Secret Book of Flora Lea is as enchanting and whimsical as the Whisperwood fairytale hidden within its pages. It reminds us that a happily-ever-after isn’t out of reach—so long as we heed the tiny voice within, whispering that the real magic of the story may be closer than we think.” —Sarah Penner, New York Times bestselling author of The Lost Apothecary and The London Seance Society
“Two sisters, dual time periods, a magical secret place, an abiding mystery–The Secret Book of Flora Lea is an enchanting story of survival against all odds. With her trademark warmth and a feather-light touch, Patti Callahan Henry weaves together events both real and imagined. Transporting, heartfelt, and atmospheric.” –Christina Baker Kline, New York Times bestselling author of Orphan Train and The Exiles
The Secret Book of Flora Lea is a beguiling blend of hope, mystery, and true familial love. It exposes the deep wounds of a family tragically separated because of war. Told in an utterly fresh way with dual timelines and a host of unforgettable characters, this is a story that is both necessary and satisfying through the last page. Powerful and spellbinding!” –Sadeqa Johnson, Internationally bestselling author of The House of Eve and The Yellow Wife
Join New York Times bestselling author and former National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature Jason Reynolds for a moderated discussion at the Pickens County Hampton Memorial Library (304 Biltmore Road, Easley, SC 29640) on Friday, May 5th, at 7pm. Jason will discuss his new book, Miles Morales Suspended: A Spider-Man Novel, take questions from the audience, and will be available afterwards for a book signing and photographs. He will personalize all copies of Miles Morales Suspended and sign (no personalizations) up to two additional books per attendee. Staff will be available to take a photo of you with Jason with your phone.
There are two ticket options to this event. A $21 ticket admits one & includes 1 copy of Miles Morales Suspended. A $30 ticket admits two & includes 1 hardcover copy of Miles Morales Suspended + 1 paperback copy of Ghost. We will have additional books for sale at the event.
Event tickets can be purchased online through Friday, May 5th at noon. Tickets may be purchased at the door if still available, but buy ahead to guarantee your spot. Refunds can be requested up until the ticket cutoff.
Join us for a Pop-Up with photographer Mike Poggioli and his book of prints Blue Ridge Dreaming!
Blue Ridge Dreaming celebrates the magic and drama of one of the most breathtaking landscapes in the United States. When New York native Mike Poggioli moved to Asheville, North Carolina, he traded in cityscapes for the towering peaks, lush forests, and sparkling rivers of the Blue Ridge Mountains. His moody, dreamy landscapes follow golden light and delicate fog through the changing seasons with his distinctive color palette of oranges and blues.
About Mike Poggioli:
Originally from just outside New York City, Mike Poggioli came to see photography as a serious creative outlet when he moved to Chicago in 2015 and became enamored by the beauty of the city’s architecture. He then brought his newfound love for cityscapes with him to Cincinnati, Ohio, where he studied clinical psychology. Photography became an opportunity to cultivate mindfulness – a way to see the world with a beginnerʼs mind – in both his personal life and professional practice. It wasn’t until he began a clinical internship in Asheville, North Carolina, that he ventured into landscape photography. During his time there, Mike discovered a passion for capturing the layers of the Blue Ridge Mountains. He has since listened to the call of the mountains by deciding to settle in Asheville.
Come meet Mike and get a signed copy!
Best for ages 3 & up | Story-based performance with dancers from the International Ballet.