Tag author event

A boy with a flashlight stands on an open curving staircase, with a spooky hand reaching out of the shadows toward the back of his head. The background is an eerie green.

The Reason That I Read: Mary Downing Hahn 

Kristen B. Leave a comment
Top down view of feet in sneakers, a muddy creek, and a man's face in the lower right corner

by Julie N.

I am excited to be able to host my favorite author at Central Branch on Friday, August 19 at 3 pm and to have the opportunity to celebrate her extensive career. She is a fan favorite, a kid favorite, and my favorite! Over the years, many students have been captivated by the stories she creates, the worlds she builds, and the magic in her words. Mary Downing Hahn thoughtfully weaves ghosts, history, and local places into her books.

As an awkward, homeschooled seventh grader I would hardly have called myself a reader. Far from it, in fact! I enjoyed looking at books, but to be honest I can name only a few that ever stood out to me as a child. While visiting the old Miller Branch, I found a book called The Wind Blows Backward by Mary Downing Hahn. Many of you probably know Mary Downing Hahn for her incredibly popular ghost stories such as Wait Till Helen Comes, Deep and Dark and Dangerous, and Took (also in graphic format), but I first fell in love with her realistic fiction. I devoured her adventures like The Spanish Kidnapping Disaster and mysteries such as The Dead Man in Indian Creek.

A boy with a flashlight stands on an open curving staircase, with a spooky hand reaching out of the shadows toward the back of his head. The

At some point, I tried one of Mary Downing Hahn ghost stories, Time for Andrew, and immediately bought my first bag of marbles. I quickly followed that with one of her most popular books, Wait Till Helen Comes, about a young girl at odds with her new step-siblings, a farmhouse complete with a backyard graveyard, and the ghost of a young girl named Helen. 

Mary began her career as an illustrator and a children’s librarian before, thankfully, directing her sights on writing children’s books. Her first book was published in 1979 and she has authored dozens of books since then. Most known for her ghost stories, she doesn’t shy away from writing genuinely scary books for children, and they love her for it! Notably, she has won more than 50 child-voted state awards for her work. 

I love reading her stories and recognizing the locations where they took place. Mary Downing Hahn is the author of the first book I loved and many more that followed. She is a valued author, a local favorite and she is, without a doubt, the reason that I read.

Julie is the teen instructor and research specialist at Central Branch.

Cover of Michael Twitty's new book shows him in formal vest and tie, sitting at a table covered in braided bread, reading a book.

Author Works with Michael Twitty

Kristen B. Leave a comment
Portrait of Michael W. Twitty, wearing a zip-up hoodie and touching his beard.

Thursday, Aug 11 from 7 – 8 pm at Miller Branch.

Please register to attend. Limited seats.
Register at bit.ly/twittyhcls

In partnership with the Howard County Jewish Federation and Baltimore Jewish Council

In his new book KosherSoul, Michael Twitty, author of the acclaimed The Cooking Gene (read a review), explores the cultural crossroads of Jewish and African diaspora cuisine and issues of memory, identity, and food.

Twitty examines the creation of African/Jewish global food as a conversation of migrations, a dialogue of diasporas, and the rich background for people who participate in it. At the same time, he shares recipes for Southern culinary touchstones like apple barbecue sauce, watermelon and feta salad, and collard green lasagna, while blending the traditions of his mixed identity into new creations such as Louisiana style latkes and kush. KosherSoul is more than a cookbook, it’s an exploration of selfhood when born at a crossroads of race.

The question is not just who makes the food and who it belongs to, but how food makes the people, reflects the journey, and validates the existence of these marginalized identities. Twitty aims to move beyond the idea of Jews of Color as outliers, but as significant and meaningful cultural creators in both Black and Jewish civilizations.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

A highly sought-after speaker and consultant, Twitty has appeared on programs with Andrew Zimmern, Henry Louis Gates, Padma Lakshmi, and most recently on Michelle Obama’s Waffles and Mochi.

He is a TED Fellow and was just named as a National Geographic Emerging Explorer. His first MasterClass course, “Tracing Your Roots Through Food,” is now available. Over the past year he has partnered with Atlas Obscura to teach multiple online seminars and was the first guest on a new web series for their food division. Michael will also be a Consulting Producer on a new food competition program coming soon from OWN. He lives in Fredericksburg, Virginia.

Head shot of author, a Black woman with her long hair straight, wearing black, smiling.

Author Works: Anna Gifty Opoku-Agyeman

Kristen B. Leave a comment
Head shot of author, a Black woman with her long hair straight, wearing black, smiling.

Wednesday, Jul 27; 7 – 8 pm
Equity Resource Center, second floor of HCLS Central Branch

Register at bit.ly/boldsolutionshcls

The Black Agenda: Bold Solutions For a Broken System features Black voices across economics, education, health, climate, and technology, speaking to the question “What’s next?” as it pertains to centering Black people in policy matters in our country.

Black background with title in slightly distressed large block letter, "agenda" in red.

Essays by Dr. Sandy Darity, Dr. Hedwig Lee, Mary Heglar, Janelle Jones, and others present groundbreaking ideas ranging from Black maternal health to reparations to AI bias to inclusive economic policy, with the potential to uplift and heal not only Black America, but the entire country.

Anna Gifty Opoku-Agyeman is an award-winning Ghanaian-American researcher, entrepreneur, and writer. Her new book, The Black Agenda: Bold Solutions for a Broken System, is the first collection to exclusively feature Black scholars and experts across economics, education, health, climate, criminal justice, and technology. She graduated from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County in 2019 with a Bachelors of Arts in Mathematics and a minor in Economics. Currently, she is a graduate student at Harvard Kennedy School studying public policy and economics. Her advocacy, research, and commentary are featured widely by media outlets such as Bloomberg, NPR, Teen Vogue, Slate, and The New York Times.

She will be in conversation with Dr. Sheri Parks, the vice president for strategic initiatives for Maryland Institute College of Art. A noted public intellectual, Parks has appeared frequently in national and international media and is a regular cultural critic for WYPR-NPR and the Baltimore Sun podcast, Roughly Speaking. Her research specializes in public aesthetics, particularly the ways in which people find and create meaning and beauty in their everyday lives, with specific emphasis on race, gender, social class, sexuality, popular culture, and media. Her most recent publication is Fierce Angels: Living with a Legacy from the Sacred Dark Feminine to the Strong Black Woman. In all of her work, Parks strives to explain the deeper cultural histories that inform the expectations, attitudes, and relations that individuals in our country have with each other so that richer understandings will lead to more sophisticated and mutually rewarding interactions.

Cover art has an illustration of a Black teenager in a slightly off-center ball cap, adjusting his mirrored sunglasses. In the glasses, you can see two other Black kids. The title of the book appear in script on the orange hat.

Author event with Kekla Magoon

Kristen B. Leave a comment
Photo of author Kekla Magoon, who has a wide smile, rectangular glasses, and short hair with lots of curls. She's wearing a deep V-neck in a black and white print, pictured with a green yard behind her.

One of this year’s Battle of the Books titles is The Season of Styx Malone by Kekla Magoon. The author is visiting virtually on April 14 for a 30-minute live Q&A! You may type your questions in advance within registration or hold them for the event.

The Season of Styx Malone tells the funny, poignant story about one amazing summer in small-town Indiana, when Caleb and Bobby Gene make friends with the slightly older, way cooler Styx Malone. Let’s be clear: Styx Malone is definitely too cool for school! He knows things… like about elevator trading, where you can essentially make something out of nothing. These boys are going to make a bag of fireworks (obtained by temporarily trading their baby sister) into a green moped. All these brothers want is to see the big city of Indianapolis, but their (maybe overly) protective father wants them to stay close to home in Sutton. The desire for adventure wars against the need for safety throughout the family’s interactions.

The boys follow foster child Styx into one “interesting” choice after another, hoping to achieve their dream of having independent mobility via the green moped, affectionately nicknamed Grasshopper. When things take a turn for the worse, everyone has to reconsider what a happy ending will look like. As Caleb and Bobby Gene lobby for adopting Styx, it turns out that adults can sometimes make good things happen. It’s a delightful book full of good humor from the point of view of three bored friends longing for more from summer than watering holes and doing chores (Mom was not happy about the baby sister trading).

Kekla Magoon is the author of many novels and nonfiction books for young readers, including The Season of Styx Malone, The Rock and the River, How It Went Down, and the Robyn Hoodlum Adventure series. 

She has received the Margaret A. Edwards Award, the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award, the John Steptoe New Talent Award, three Coretta Scott King Honors, the Walter Award Honor, an NAACP Image Award, and been longlisted for the National Book Award. 

Kekla conducts school and library visits nationwide and serves on the Writers’ Council for the National Writing Project. She holds a B.A. from Northwestern University and an M.F.A. in Writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts, where she now serves as faculty. Visit her online at keklamagoon.com.

Cover art has an illustration of a Black teenager in a slightly off-center ball cap, adjusting his mirrored sunglasses. In the glasses, you can see two other Black kids. The title of the book appear in script on the orange hat.

The book is also available as an ebook, on CD, and as an eAudiobook.

The book cover depicts a woodsy scene in grays and blues, with a lone figure inverted on a path in the center, framed by three interlocking triangles in pink, green, and gold.

What is Home? asks Brandon Hobson

Rohini G. Leave a comment
The book cover depicts a woodsy scene in grays and blues, with a lone figure inverted on a path in the center, framed by three interlocking triangles in pink, green, and gold.

by Rohini G.

Brandon Hobson, author of The Removed, believes that good fiction starts with a question. 

“The big question here was how do we grieve, and how do we heal. But I’m also interested in the question of what is home?” Examining these questions is the starting place for his writing, Hobson says in an interview with Zibby Owens.  

In The Removed, Hobson hauntingly weaves together two strands. First is the story of personal loss experienced by the Echota family; second, the devastating loss experienced by the Cherokee Nation – the traumatic heritage of the Trail of Tears, the forced removal by the U.S. government from 1830 to 1850 of an estimated 100,000 indigenous people (including Cherokee, Creek, Chickasaw, Choctaw, and Seminole, among other nations) from their homes. 

After fifteen years, the Echotas are still struggling to come to terms with the death of their son, Ray-Ray, who was killed in a police shooting at the mall. Maria tries to keep the flame of remembrance alive for her son, as she deals with her husband Ernest’s struggle with Alzheimers, son Edgar’s meth use, and daughter Sonja’s detachment. As the family’s annual bonfire approaches – an occasion marking both the Cherokee National Holiday and Ray-Ray’s death – Maria takes in a foster child, Wyatt. Buoyant and quirky, Wyatt is a born storyteller, spinning gripping tales about snakes and birds and an underworld, called the Darkening Land. 

While reading this book, I was enthralled with the way Hobson shifted perspective with each character and got into the skin of that person, especially Tsala, a Cherokee spirit who tells a story of his own murder for refusing to be removed. Written in a lyrical, minimalistic style, The Removed is a a powerful story, a profound yet quick read, available in book format and also as an eaudiobook and ebook from Libby/OverDrive. 

Hear author Brandon Hobson in person on Wednesday, March 10. For information, click here.

The book cover depicts a stylized eagle in black silhouette with outstretched wings against an orange background, with a single feather fallen to the ground beneath.

Hobson is an enrolled citizen of the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, with a PhD in English and seven years’ experience as a social worker for disadvantaged youth. His previous book, Where the Dead Sit Talking (also available as an eaudiobook from Libby/OverDrive) was a finalist for the 2018 National Book Award for Fiction and winner of the Reading the West Book Award. He is an assistant professor of creative writing at New Mexico State University and teaches in the MFA program at the Institute of American Indian Arts.

A RECOMMENDED BOOK FROM

USA Today * O, the Oprah Magazine * Entertainment Weekly * Harper’s Bazaar * Buzzfeed * Washington Post * Elle * Parade * San Francisco Chronicle * Good Housekeeping * Vulture * Refinery29 * AARP * Kirkus * PopSugar * Alma * Woman’s Day * Chicago Review of Books * The Millions * Biblio Lifestyle * Library Journal * Publishers Weekly * LitHub 

Rohini is the Adult Curriculum Specialist with HCLS. She loves literature and rainy days.

The bright yellow cover features an illustration of two people, a man and a woman, with their backs to the viewers. He's in black pants and blue shirt; she's wearing a brighter blue belted coat. The author and title appear in a hand written font in white.

Virtual Author Visit with Fredrik Backman

Kristen B. Leave a comment
The author, dressed in a dark grey button down shirt, stands with his hands in his jeans pockets. He has short brown hair, and a slight beard.

Frederik Backman discusses his newest book, Anxious People, on Thursday, September 10 at 5 pm. Signed copies of Anxious People are available for online pre-order through the Curious Iguana bookstore. This poignant comedy tells the story of a crime that never took place, a bank robber who disappears into thin air, and eight extremely anxious strangers who find they have more in common than they ever imagined.

Rich with Backman’s, “pitch-perfect dialogue and an unparalleled understanding of human nature,” according to Shelf Awareness, Anxious People’s whimsical plot serves up unforgettable insights into the human condition and a gentle reminder to be compassionate to all the anxious people we encounter every day. 

Backman is the New York Times bestelling author of A Man Called Ove, My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She’s Sorry, and Britt-Marie was Here, among other titles. He lives in Stockholm with his wife and two children.

A Man Called Ove is the classic story of a curmudgeon, but with a twist: he didn’t develop this attitude in old age, he’s been “a grumpy old man since he started elementary school.” As we learn more about Ove through glimpses of his past, we realize that the rule-following, the caustic comments, the meticulous planning, all ensue from a beautiful love story and Ove’s resulting losses. With dismayingly unconventional new neighbors, can he find a path forward and live up to the example of his wife, Sonja, a wonderful woman whose thoughtfulness and kind nature would welcome them with open arms? Or will he continue to be his cantankerous, resistant self? Read this delightful story to find out, if you are not already one of the millions who have loved this book full of hilarity and heart.

My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She’s Sorry describes a touching relationship between 7-year-old Elsa and her 77-year-old Grandmother. The two of them have a secret world, where they escape to tell stories and play make-believe (or so you think). The regular world holds many scary realities for a precocious little girl, including big dogs, bullies, impending new siblings, and cancer. Sometimes grandmothers, even the eccentric ones, know exactly what their grand-daughters need. This story rewards the reader’s patience, as all the seemingly disparate pieces slowly form a highly satisfactory, emotional resolution.

Whether you jump in with the newest book or treat yourself to some of Backman’s older titles, you will be entertained and enlightened. Register now for the online author event!

The event is cosponsored by Maryland Humanities, Frederick County Public Library, Curious Iguana, and the Weinberg Center for the Performing Arts.