Author Events

Venue: St. Louis Public Library - Central Branch 

New York Times best-selling author Eric Jerome Dickey returns to the life of Nia Simone Bijou (of Pleasure fame) as she embarks on a quest to enhance her artistic gifts through heightened sensory experience, Hollywood-style. Eric Jerome Dickey's newest tale of excess--and its sky-high costs--is a thrilling portrait of a glittering world.

Venue: Tavern of Fine Arts 

River Styx at the Tavern welcomes the poets of Loosely Identified. In 2004, Loosely Identified published its anthology Breathing Out. Members who will be reading include Mary Ruth Donnelly, Grace duMaine, Rebecca Ellis, gay gambell-peterson, Gail Marshall, Karen Mondale, Niki Nymark, Regina Popper, Marlene Schuman, Jennifer Tappenden, and Lauren Wilding. For more information, visit riverstyx.org. $5 at the door.

Venue: Schlafly Bottleworks 

St. Louis Poetry Center's Observable Readings series presents readings with poets Michael Collier, whose latest work, An Individual History, is a cycle of pathbreaking poems about the history of a family set against the backdrop of the last century, and Joanne Diaz, whose first book, The Lessons, includes ruminations on natural history, science, music, longing and more. For more information, visit stlouispoetrycenter.org/observable.

Venue: Left Bank Books - Central West End 

Readers generally know only one of the two famous James brothers. Literary types known Henry James; psychologists, philosophers, and religion scholars know William James. In reality, the brothers' minds were inseparable, as the more than eight hundred letters they wrote to each other reveal. In this book, J.C. Hallman mines the letters for mutual affection and influence, painting a moving portrait of a relationship between two extraordinary men.

Webster University, East Academic BuildingBob Dotson's long-running series, "American Story with Bob Dotson," is a regular feature on TODAY and other NBC news programs and has won more than 100 national and international awards for writing. For forty years, Dotson has traveled the U.S. seeking solutions from everyday people whose comments others might ignore or dismiss. The eight-time Emmy winner will give a talk, answer questions, and sign copies of his new book, American Story.

Venue: Christ Church Cathedral Nobel Peace Prize nominee Dr. Hawa Abdi, her daughter Deqo, and her co-author Sarah Robbins will share an incredible story at this Joyce Trebilcot Memorial Fund event. After the Somali government collapsed in 1991 and famine struck, Dr. Abdi turned her 1300 acres of farmland into a camp that has numbered up to 90,000 displaced people. She inspired her daughters to become doctors, and together, they have saved tens of thousands of lives in her hospital, while providing displaced children an education. After being kidnapped in 2010 by radical insurgents, she convinced the rebels to let her go and to write her an apology. Dr. Abdi's story of incomprehensible bravery and perseverance will inspire readers everywhere.

Venue: St. Louis County Library 

An Oprah Book Club selection, Wild is a blazingly honest memoir: the story of an eleven-hundred-mile solo hike that broke down a young woman reeling from catastrophe--and built her back up again. Wild captures the terrors and pleasures of Chery Strayed's journey that maddened, strengthened, and ultimately healed her. Cheryl Strayed will speak as part of Read St. Louis, a community-wide initiative develped by the St. Louis area library systems to encourage St. Louisans to read and discuss great books.

Venue: Maryville University Library 

Elizabeth Strout "animates the ordinary with astonishing force," wrote The New Yorker on the publication of her Pulitzer Prize-winning Olive Kitteridge. Tender, tough-minded, loving, and deeply illuminating about the ties that bind us to family and home, The Burgess Boys follows brothers Jim and Bob Burgess, who escaped from their Maine hometown as soon as they possibly could after their father's death... until Susan--the Burgess sibling who stayed behind--urgently calls them home to help with her troubled teenage son. Maryville Talks Books is sponsored by Left Bank Books, Maryville University, St. Louis Public Radio, and HEC-TV.

Venue: St. Louis Public Library - Central Branch 

Clean is a myth-shattering look at drug abuse by David Sheff, the #1 New York Times best-selling author of Beautiful Boy. Based on the latest research in psychology, neuroscience, and medicine, Clean is a leap beyond the traditional approaches to prevention and treatment and the mental illnesses that usually accompany it. Clean offers clear, cogent counsel for parents and others who want to prevent drug problems and for addicts and their loved ones no matter what stage of the illness they're in. But it is also a book for all of us--a powerful rethinking of the greatest public health challenge of our time.

Venue: Missouri Athletic Club Please join Assistance League St. Louis for their Eighth Annual Authors Brunch, this year featuring guest author John Searles and local author Antony John. British-born author Antony John has a Ph.D. in Classical Music Composition and is popular among the young adult genre with novels including Five Flavors of Dumb and Elemental. Tickets are $60 and $100 and must be purchased in advance by calling 636.227.6200 or visiting stlouis.assistanceleague.org.*NOTE - The original program included Thrity Umrigar.  She is unable to attend.