Events

Southern mystery writer Patricia Sprinkle, best know for her Thoroughly Southern Mystery Series, jumps genres and gives us something different with her new book Hold Up the Sky.  The title comes from an old African proverb:  women hold up half the sky.  One summer, that saying proves true for four women in Solace, Georgia, who find the strength to lift one another high. 

In the book, Mamie Fountain believes that our lives are part of a rich and complex tapestry woven by God.  But when her retirement is put on hold by a secret she can’t bring herself to share, she can’t see a life pattern that makes any sense to her.  Margaret Baxter, Billie Waits, and Emerita Gomez are in similar situations.  One month ago, Margaret had the home and family she’d always wanted.  Now they’ve been taken away.  Billie managed to care for her severely handicapped daughter with a little help from her estranged husband-until he disappeared.  Emerita became an immigrant from Mexico when she was forced to choose between losing her husband and breaking the law. 

These four women were accustomed to taking care of themselves and those around them.  Suddenly, they’re overwhelmed by tough times.  When they band together on a drought-stricken farm, they must open their hearts and share their burdens before they can find the bounty that lies hidden in their changed circumstances…and see the glorious pattern in the tapestry that was there all along. 

Patricia Sprinkle grew up in North Carolina and northern Florida, graduated from Vassar College, and spent a winter writing in the Scottish Highlands before settling in Atlanta. Although as an adult she has also lived in Chicago and Miami, her mysteries and novels reflect her love for and the strength of her Southern roots. Sprinkle is a member of Sisters in Crime and Mystery Writers of America.  Sprinkle writes novels drawn from her own Southern roots, chronicling the lives of women in the contemporary South.  In addition to writing, she is active in organizations that serve neglected, deprived, and abused children.  She and her husband have two grown sons and live in Smyrna, Georgia, where she enjoys reading, gardening, and doing nothing. 

Hold Up the Sky sprang from a seed planted in 1986 while the Sprinkle’s were eating at a Japanese steakhouse with three strangers whose conversation sparked the idea for the novel.  At the time, Sprinkle was just getting contracts signed for publication of her first two mystery novels.  The mystery genre took off, grew to twenty novels, and the seed for Hold Up the Sky languished.  Twenty years later, Sprinkle rekindled the idea for the novel she had germinated in 1986, and Hold Up the Sky was completed.

Summerville, NC resident, photographer, and poet Jeff Cooper will be at the Bookpost with his two new photography books, the first, a beautiful, coffee-table sized art book, released in November, and a second just released this month.

Poet Jessie Carty visits the shop to read from and sign her new, just released book, as well as her two previously released chapbooks.

A second installment of the popular publishing workshop begun last month at Literary Bookpost will continue on Saturday, April 24^th, beginning at 1:30 p.m.  This time around the workshop will be led by Anne Clinard Barnhill.  Barnhill holds an MFA degree from UNC Wilmington, and over the last twenty years she has published articles, book and theater reviews, poetry and short stories.  Barnhill is the author of the memoir At Home in the Land of Oz:  Autism, My Sister and Me, published in 2007 by Jessica Kingsley Publishers, and the book of short stories What You Long For, published by Main Street Rag Publishing in 2009.  She has recently signed a two-book contract with St. Martin’s Press; her first historical novel, tentatively entitled The Queen’s Whore, will be published with them in 2011.

 

Barnhill’s installment of the publishing workshop will focus on “dealing with rejection” from publishers and agents.  Just as in the first workshop, at the conclusion of Barnhill’s presentation, the floor will be open for questions and solutions to all phases of the problems the publishing process can involve.  Participants need not have attended the first workshop to benefit from what Barnhill will discuss and cover in this one, and in the Q & A Barnhill will cover any topics her audience wishes to discuss.

 

Barnhill will also read from her body of works, concentrating on her recent short story collection, and will conclude the afternoon with a book signing.  Both her memoir and her short story collection will be available at the workshop.

Rose Senehi returns to Literary Bookpost with her newest novel, The Wind in the Woods.  Part family saga, part mystery based on the capture in 2008 of a serial killer in the Georgia mountains, Senehi’s fifth novel is certain to bring in her fans as well as develop new ones.

L. Diane Wolfe returns to Literary Bookpost with the fifth and final book in her Circle of Friends series, Heather.  Wolfe will speak at 2 p.m. about her book as well as her other writing, and sign books afterward.

Local author Janet McCanless returns to Literary Bookpost to sign copies of her newest Beryl Cove mystery, The Haunted Chapel.