The annual Savannah Local Author Day & the Flannery O’Connor Birthday Party are back! Local Author Day is sponsored by The Book Lady Bookstore and we are once again joining forces with the Flannery O’Connor Childhood Home, because after all, Flannery is Savannah’s most famous local author!

2025 marks Flannery’s 100th Birthday and there will be an entire weekend of Centennial Events culminating in the annual “Fair in the Square” with games, live music, crafts, birthday cake, and a quirky costumed parade strolling around beautiful Lafayette Square. So don your best Flannery or Flannery-fictional-character costume, pack up the kids, and join the fun.

Come meet and mingle with local and regional literati: over 40 authors will be selling their latest books and sharing stories about their creative process.

Enjoy a Sunday afternoon among the azaleas with artsy activities, a Flannery look-alike contest, a Panhandle Slim exhibition, games, including chicken-cornhole (you’ll just have to see it), a random gorilla (can you guess why?, you will be “Wise” if you can!), a Moon River Opera sing-along, Starlandia craft and sign-making table, Sweet Thunder Band at the peacock bandshell and parade, and so much more.

Read on for more details on Local Author Day and Centennial Weekend events…

Savannah’s most idyllic oyster roast is back! And The Book Lady tent will be there with an amazing selection of books about our irreplaceable coastal home!

There is no place like coastal Georgia. Precious, vulnerable and ours to conserve. For 58 years, the Georgia Conservancy, with the support of individuals like you, has passionately worked to protect and conserve coastal Georgia. With celebration in our hearts and the future of Georgia's coast on our minds, we cordially invite you to our 2025 Oyster Roast, hosted at Grove Point in Savannah on Saturday, February 22 from 2 PM to 5 PM. The Oyster Roast will feature local oysters and clams from Sapelo Sea Farms, live music, local Georgia beer from Creature Comforts, and much, much more! 

OYSTER ROAST TICKETS

$125 - General Admission  JUST A FEW TIX REMAIN
includes Sapelo Sea Farm oysters and clams, BBQ, beer from Creature Comforts, GC-branded Sili pint glass, non-alcoholic refreshments, campfires, nature tours and talks, live music, and silent auction opportunities.

$225 - VIS (Very Important Shucker) SOLD OUT
all General Admission perks, plus early entry (1:30 PM), ASW Distillery specialty cocktails, wine, coastal delicacies from Erica Davis Lowcountry Catering, and a token of our appreciation.

*The 2025 Oyster Roast is a rain-or-shine event, however in the case that severe weather necessitates that Grove Point management cancel the event, your ticket purchase will be converted to a 100% tax-deductible donation to the Georgia Conservancy.

Read on for more about Georgia Conservancy and Oyster Roast 2025 details…

The New Yorker turns 100 this year, and Charles Bethea has been writing for the magazine for over 15 of those years, both as a contributor since 2008 and, since 2018, as a staff writer! Join us at The Learning Center once again to hear Bethea talk about the 1925 origins of this legendary magazine—self-consciously created for the “sophisticated reader”—and chronicle milestones along a century of literary and journalistic evolution.

CHARLES BETHEA’s investigative reporting has centered on politics, true crime and the south. He broke the news of Roy Moore's mall ban, as well as Mark Meadows's involvement with creationist paleontology and apparent commission of voter fraud. He has also covered the attempt to change the U.S. Census, the consequences of news deserts, the absence of adequate public defense in the Southern District of Georgia, a brewery run by active rival gang members, and the most lucrative fraud ever perpetrated by a prison inmate. Bethea has published more than sixty Talk of the Town pieces, too, on such subjects as the creator of barackobama@gmail.com, Alex Honnold's attempt to scale a skyscraper, Pete Buttigieg's Oxford years, Kanye West's presidential run, and a sculptor obsessed with Donald Trump.

Previously, Bethea was an editor at Outside magazine and a writer-at-large for Atlanta magazine. His work has also appeared in Grantland, The New Republic, the Wall Street Journal, GQ, Rolling Stone, and Wired.

In 2020, Bethea was named to Georgia Trend's list of "40 Under 40" in the state. In 2021, he won The Mirror Award for "Best Single Article/Story" for his reporting on the loss of local news in Jones County, North Carolina. In 2023, he was nominated for a James Beard Award, in the "feature reporting" category, for his investigation into TRU Colors Brewing Company. His New Yorker story, “The Americans Prepping for a Second Civil War”, was chosen as one of the “Top Twenty-Five New Yorker Stories of 2024”. Read more about the Top 25 list HERE
He lives in Atlanta and goes mountain biking a lot.

Get your TICKETS HERE or at the door

Books about the history of The New Yorker and a selection of anthologies will be available for sale onsite!

Read on for more about The New Yorker and The Learning Center…

Join us at The Learning Center, a frequent author event partner with us at The Book Lady, for a multiple speaker event combining the best the South has to offer!

Social Roots, published by The University of Georgia Press, connects nature and culture via foodways and art of the Georgia and Carolina Coasts. Cultural expressions of Native Americans and enslaved Africans lie uneasily alongside European colonial traditions to create a tragic yet rich tapestry. Sarah Ross and Roosevelt Brownlee introduce southeastern foodways while Betsy Cain mirrors the experience with her unforgettable art. *Books will be available for sale onsite, and are also available now at The Book Lady!

Sarah Ross served as executive director of UGA’s Center for Research and Education at Wormsloe, president of the Wormsloe Foundation, and director of the Wormsloe Institute for Environmental History.

Roosevelt Brownlee is a private chef who worked formerly preparing food for musicians on the jazz circuit in Canada and Europe, and has been called a “Soul Food Master” by Southern Fork.

Betsy Cain is a Savannah-based artist influenced by coastal vistas. Her works have been exhibited at the Museum of Contemporary Art and the High Museum in Atlanta, and the Jepson Center for the Arts in Savannah.

Get your TICKETS HERE or pay at the door.

READ ON for much more about Social Roots, our speakers and The Learning Center…

The Georgia Poetry Circuit returns to Savannah with National Book Award finalist and Whiting Award winner (and so many other awards too!), Shane McCrae.

SHANE MCCRAE is the author of ten books of poetry, including New and Collected Hell (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2024), a book-length poem; The Many Hundreds of the Scent (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2023); Cain Named the Animal (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2022), a finalist for the Forward Prize; Sometimes I Never Suffered (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2020), a finalist for the Maya Angelou Book Award, the T. S. Eliot Prize, and the Rilke Prize; In the Language of My Captor (Wesleyan University Press, 2017), winner of the 2018 Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, and a finalist for the National Book Award as well as the Los Angeles Times Book Prize; and The Animal Too Big to Kill (Persea Books, 2015), winner of the 2014 Lexi Rudnitsky/Editor’s Choice Award.

McCrae’s critically acclaimed 2023 memoir, Pulling the Chariot of the Sun: A Memoir of a Kidnapping (Simon & Schuster), was lauded by Pulitzer Prize winning author Hilton Als, “Shane McCrae’s powerful, indelible poet’s voice has now extended to the memoir, and how fortunate are we that the very things that distinguish his verse—truth-telling, sharp observation, more than a sense of the moment, profundity worn lightly—grace his harrowing and enlightening tale about race, and what makes an American family, and why. An essential story for our times.”

Shane McCrae, “peer to the peerless” (New York Journal of Books), takes up and turns on its head the mantle of Dante in his newest poetry collection, New and Collected Hell (Farrar, Straus and Giroux), acontemporary vision of Hell.
Of death the muse is death the muse of Hell
Is death the muse of Heaven I don’t know
O muse of where howcan I hope to go
To where I pray I’ll go sing at least tell

McCrae, one of the most prophetic and powerful poetic voices of our time, has created a twenty-first-century epic in New and Collected Hell. As David Woo wrote in Poetry, “McCrae’s poems allude to literary precursors like Dante, Milton, and the Bible, but the voice is unabashedly of our time . . . By seeking to heal the rift in his own identity, McCrae has listened intently to the literary echoes emanating from the English language and transmuted them through his own dynamic voice.” Here, he gathers new and previous work as a culmination of his long-standing poetic project: a new and unforgettable journey through Hell. McCrae’s work is indelible, and this collection brings his searing vision to new depths.

*This FREE (but come early for a good seat) public event is brought to you by Savannah State University's Department of English Languages and Cultures, The Book Lady Bookstore, and Estuary Creative Arts Club.

READ ON for more about Shane McCrae and The Georgia Poetry Circuit…

The crew at Seersucker Live Presents: The Resolutions Episode!

Thursday, January 9th, 5:30 PM at Front Porch Improv on Savannah's Victory Drive. Kick off 2025 with The Book Lady and the most entertaining author event group on the planet!

1st, New York Times bestelling author and #1000wordsofsummer founder Jami Attenberg will be offering a creativity workshop at 5:30 p.m., followed by a social hour (that means a bar, folks!) and our fun-filled signature show at 7 p.m. The Resolutions Episode also features acclaimed YA author Keith F. Miller, Jr. and award-winning author of historical fiction Denny S. Bryce.

Authors' books available for pre-purchase now at The Book Lady bookshop or pick up your copies at the show and get them signed.

Get your tickets HERE: https://frontporchimprov.fourthwalltickets.com/shows/seersucker-live-the-resolutions-episode

Tickets for workshop and show: $20
Show only: $15 online, $18 at the door
Show only (students): $10

Read on for more about the authors and Seersucker Live…

Coming up THIS week at The Book Lady bookshop in downtown Savannah!

This event is open to the public!

LESLIE SAINZ is the author of Have You Been Long Enough at Table (Tin House, 2023), winner of the 2024 Audre Lorde Award and a finalist for the Poetry Society of America’s Norma Farber First Book Award, the New England Book Award, and the Vermont Book Award. The daughter of Cuban exiles, her work has appeared in the Academy of American Poets’ Poem-a-Day, the Yale Review, Kenyon Review, American Poetry Review, and elsewhere.

Terrance Hayes, author of American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin, says,
"Have You Been Long Enough at Table is both a question and an invitation in Leslie Sainz’s marvelous debut. Sainz probes spirituality with the verve and vitality of Emily Dickinson if Dickinson had been born Cuban American at the end of the last century. Sainz probes the overlap of imagination and experience like Sylvia Plath if Plath was born to a Cuban American landscape between “field crickets, memory, lesser parasites” and “the stain of guava on a plastic cutting board.” Have You Been Long Enough at Table articulates the bonds and tensions of independence and tradition, spirit and form, home and exile. Leslie Sainz is a poet who has been long at the table reading and writing poems and long at the table listening to the poetry of culture and family. She makes questions invitations and memory visible… Come bear witness to a remarkable poet bearing witness."

*This FREE (but come early for a good seat) public event is brought to you by Savannah State University's Department of English Languages and Cultures, The Book Lady Bookstore, and Estuary Creative Arts Club.

READ ON for more about Leslie Sainz and The Georgia Poetry Circuit…

Savannah’s most entertaining literary group is back and they are bringing THREE terrific authors and the hilarious Seersucker Live crew to Front Porch Improv. And of course The Book Lady is partnering up again and will have lots of wonderful books available onsite for sale and signing.

Social hour (yep, a cash bar, and conversation is free) begins at 6 pm; then curtain is up at 7 pm, featuring readings from:

KRISTEN ARNETT , two-time finalist for the Lambda Literary Award and author of the NYT bestseller Mostly Dead Things and With Teeth: A Novel

SAM RUSH, National Poetry Slam finalist and Georgia Author of the Year nominee

KEITH F. MILLER, JR., author of the novel Pritty and an award-winning educator, artist, and researcher

Get your TICKETS here!

Read on for more info about the authors, the venue, and Seersucker Live…

Georgia Poetry Circuit is traveling back to Savannah, bringing another nationally acclaimed poet both to Savannah State University to meet with students, and then to The Book Lady Bookstore for a free, public event with poet Chen Chen. These readings are some of the most dynamic events all year, so don’t miss it!

Chen Chen’s second book of poetry, Your Emergency Contact Has Experienced an Emergency, is out from BOA Editions and Bloodaxe Books (UK). His debut, When I Grow Up I Want to Be a List of Further Possibilities (BOA, 2017; Bloodaxe, 2019), was longlisted for the National Book Award and won the Thom Gunn Award, among other honors. Chen is also the author of five chapbooks, including Explodingly Yours (Ghost City Press, 2023), and the forthcoming book of craft essays, In Cahoots with the Rabbit God (Noemi Press, 2024). His work appears in many publications, including Poetry, Poem-a-Day, and three editions of The Best American Poetry (2015, 2019, & 2021). He has received two Pushcart Prizes and fellowships from Kundiman, the National Endowment for the Arts, and United States Artists.

Chen Chen earned an MFA from Syracuse University and a PhD from Texas Tech University. He has taught in the University of Massachusetts Boston MFA program and at Brandeis University as the 2018 to 2022 Jacob Ziskind poet-in-residence. He teaches in the low-residency MFA programs at New England College and the Stonecoast MFA program at the University of Southern Maine. Chen edits the journals Underblong and the lickety~split.

*This FREE (but come early for a good seat) public event is brought to you by Savannah State University's Department of English Languages and Cultures, The Book Lady Bookstore, and Estuary Creative Arts Club.

Read on for more about The Georgia Poetry Circuit…

Join us at The Learning Center for another fascinating talk!

Susan Terrio’s Forced Out (NYU Press) tells the stories of undocumented mothers who reunite with their children in the US years after fleeing violence at home. Facing escalating chaos and violence in their home countries, many Central American mothers have found that a desperate flight to the north was their only choice. Many left their children behind in order to spare them the hardships of the journey. If they made it across the border without getting locked up or deported, they entered a country increasingly unwilling to recognize claims of asylum.
Featured are the stories of women who crossed the border without encountering immigration authorities, in some cases several times, and settled in the greater Washington, DC, area, living in the shadows for years. By centering on the voices of the women themselves, it offers an intimate look at what drove them from home and the challenges they face in reuniting years later with their children.

This program is presented in partnership with the Savannah Council on World Affairs. The Savannah Council on World Affairs’ promotional partnership with The Learning Center does not imply endorsement of the content of any lecture or printed work (that means, let’s hold our horses on the social media gripes, please). The Book Lady will be onsite with copies of Forced Out available for sale and signing.

REGISTER HERE

Read on for more about the author and The Learning Center…

It’s not every day that a new chapter in Georgia’s colonial history is written. Most Georgians know (and brag about) Georgia as the lone colony in British North America founded without slavery. Largely unknown, though, is founder James Oglethorpe’s personal evolution on the subjects of slavery and freedom before the era of abolition. Michael Thurmond discusses his new book, James Oglethorpe, Father of Georgia: A Founder’s Journey from Slave Trader to Abolitionist (University of Georgia Press).

Join us at The Learning Center for Thurmond’s lunchtime talk and book signing (yes, The Book Lady will be onsite), and while you are there learn about The Learning Center’s other wonderful talks and programs offered throughout the year!

This program is a partnership between TLC and the Savannah-Yamacraw Branch of the Association for the Study of African American History (ASALH). REGISTER HERE

Read on for more about Thurmond and The Learning Center…

Annual Savannah Local Author Day & the Flannery O’Connor Birthday Party are back! Local Author Day is sponsored by The Book Lady Bookstore and we are once again joining forces with the Flannery O’Connor Childhood Home, because after all, Flannery is Savannah’s most famous local author!

2024 is Flannery’s 99th Birthday and there will be a “Fair in the Square” with games, live music, crafts, cake, and a quirky costumed parade strolling around beautiful Lafayette Square. So don your best Flannery or Flannery-fictional-character costume, pack up the kids, and join the fun.

Come meet and mingle with local and regional literati: over 40 authors will be selling their latest books and sharing stories about their creative process.

Enjoy a Sunday afternoon among the azaleas with artsy activities, a Flannery look-alike contest, a Panhandle Slim exhibition & silent auction, chicken-cornhole (you’ll just have to see it), a random gorilla (can you decipher why?), a Moon River Opera sing-along, Starlandia craft and sign-making table, Sweet Thunder Band at the peacock bandshell, and so much more.

Read on for more about this free public event…

Georgia Conservancy’s annual Oyster Roast at beautiful Grove Point is coming up soon!

Where? Live Oaks, saltwater marsh and historic buildings - Savannah's Grove Point makes the perfect backdrop for celebrating Georgia's Coast. Graciously donated by Great Dane Trailers, the Oyster Roast is a rare opportunity for guests to enjoy this historic property overlooking the Little Ogeechee.

Oysters you say? Hands down, Charlie Phillips and Sapelo Sea Farms harvest some of the best clams and oysters we've ever enjoyed. Straight from Charlie's dock in Crescent, Georgia on Pelican Point, these bivalves could have landed in some of the finest restaurants on the East Coast - instead, they found your table at our 2024 Oyster Roast! 

Books too? Yes, indeed! We are proud to once again join Georgia Conservancy at The Book Lady tent with lots of terrific books on offer about the history and conservation of the Georgia Coast. Take home some fantastic reads about the saltmarsh, sea islands, Atlantic Right Whales, Longleaf conservation, Georgia waterways and much, much more.

*Get your GA Conservancy Oyster Roast tickets here! Oysters and Books on the Marsh!

READ ON for more information…

The Georgia Poetry Circuit is coming back to Savannah with another nationally acclaimed poet!

PATRICK ROSAL is the author of five full-length poetry collections including The Last Thing: New and Selected Poems, winner of the William Carlos Williams Book Award from the Poetry Society of America. He currently serves as Campus Co-director of the Institute for the Study of Global Racial Justice at Rutgers-Camden, where he coordinates the programming series Occasions for Gathering and Quilting Water, a five-year public art project collecting interviews about water from around the world. He is also Professor of English teaching courses on poetry, performance, improvisation, collaboration, and community art. He has received fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Fulbright Research Scholar program. and the New Jersey State Council for the Arts. He is co-founding editor of Some Call It Ballin’, a literary sports magazine.

Rosal has recently completed a setting of the Lucille Clifton poem “sorrows” for voice and piano. He has provided recorded arrangement and live accompaniment for his wife, soprano Mary Rose Go. He is well versed in hip hop production techniques as well as analog and digital synthesis. He is a student of Afro-Cuban percussion, sacred music, improvised/creative modes, and many folkloric traditions from the Philippines, the Pacific, South America and the Caribbean.

*This FREE (but come early for a good seat) public event is brought to you by Savannah State University's Department of English Languages and Cultures, The Book Lady Bookstore, and Estuary Creative Arts Club.

*Books will be available for sale & signing after the talk and Q&A

READ ON for more about The Georgia Poetry Circuit and Patrick Rosal…

The mission of the amiable environmental warriors at Coastal WildScapes is to “connect residents to the habitats of coastal Georgia and empower them to be stewards of their natural environment”. What could be more fundamental to the future of our beautiful coastal home?!

Join us for a day of terrific talks on “Coastal Native Plants and Their Uses” and discover fascinating new environmental books at The Book Lady’s curated table (lots for both the more experienced and novice science/nature readers). Speakers include Miya Timmons on “Exploring Gullah Geechee Plants Through Illustration and Personification”; Lauren Dorminey on “Native Wild Herbs for Wellness and Reciprocity in South Georgia Communities”; Lou Thomann on “Ceremony, Medicine and Caffeinated Tea”; and Betsy Harris on “I Eat Flowers (and other things)…A Year of Seasonal Eating Along the Southeast Coast”.

*This ticketed event will be held at the handsome Richmond Hill City Center and lunch is also provided with your online registration: www.coastalwildscapes.org/EVENTS

READ ON for more about Coastal WildScapes…

This Savannah book launch kicks off the new year with cookbook author and gifted storyteller, Johnathon Scott Barrett. In his first novel, Ship Watch, as author Cassandra King (award-winning author of Tell Me a Story: My Life with Pat Conroy) says, “…Barrett mixes up a delightful brew of Southern eccentricities and serves it with a dash of romance, adventure and intrigue. Ship Watch is a colorful and rollicking good read!”

Johnathon Scott Barrett is a seventh-generation Georgian with a deep appreciation for the South’s literary and culinary traditions. He is the author of three acclaimed cookbooks, which critics hailed for their entertaining stories and extensive recipes. Barrett is a CPA and has worked as a nonprofit executive for the past three decades; he is the director of development for the State Botanical Garden of Georgia at UGA. He splits his time between two Georgia homes: Winterville and Savannah.

*This is a ticketed event hosted by The Learning Center, and ticket price includes hors d’ouevres and cocktails (of course, y’all, or it wouldn’t be Savannah!) Get your tickets HERE

*Books will be available for sale and signing at the event by The Book Lady Bookstore (if you can’t make it, give us a call and we’ll get one signed for you, 912-233-3628

Read on for more info…

It’s the time of year for wonderful stories by the fireplace! Join us for some holiday cheer with the author of the beautiful new picture book, Merry and Hark: A Christmas Story (Algonguin/Hachette), April Genevieve Tucholke. April will be joined by our opening reader, Antwan Eady, author of the inspiring Nigel and the Moon (HarperCollins). Bring the kids! Adults will be enchanted too! And everybody gets cookies!

Merry and Hark, beautifully illustrated by Rebecca Santo, is a whimsical story about the connection between humans and nature, and the magic of Christmas. Merry has always wanted to go on a grand adventure, like the great Hero Owls from her favorite stories. But she is just a little owl. Little owls don't have adventures. Then one day, Merry falls asleep in her favorite tree—and wakes up in a big, noisy city! Can a little owl on a grand adventure find her way home?

Nigel and the Moon, illustrated by Gracey Zhang, is a glowing tale about the young dreaming big. When Nigel looks up at the moon, his future is bright. He imagines himself as…an astronaut, a dancer, a superhero, too! Among the stars, he twirls. Nigel is the most brilliant body in the sky. But it’s Career Week at school, and Nigel can’t find the courage to share his dreams. It’s easy to whisper them to the moon, but not to his classmates—especially when he already feels out of place.

This is a FREE holiday event! Both authors’ books will be available for sale and signing following their readings.

Read on for more about our readers…

The Georgia Poetry Circuit is coming back to Savannah with another nationally acclaimed poet!

CM Burroughs is Associate Professor of Poetry at Columbia College Chicago. She is the author of two collections: The Vital System (Tupelo Press, 2012) and Master Suffering (Tupelo Press, 2020.) Burroughs has been awarded fellowships and grants from Yaddo, the MacDowell Colony, Djerassi Foundation, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and Cave Canem Foundation. She has received commissions from the Studio Museum of Harlem and the Warhol Museum to create poetry in response to art installations. Burroughs’ poetry has appeared in journals and anthologies including Poetry magazine, Callaloo, jubilat, Ploughshares, VOLT, Best American Experimental Writing Anthology, and The Golden Shovel Anthology: New Poems Honoring Gwendolyn Brooks. Burroughs has been a featured reader and has given poetry lectures and writing workshops at institutions and reading series across America and internationally.

*This FREE (but come early for a good seat) event is brought to you by Savannah State University's Department of English Languages and Cultures, The Book Lady Bookstore, and Estuary Creative Arts Club.

*Books will be available for sale & signing after the talk and Q&A

READ ON for more about The Georgia Poetry Circuit…

The Book Lady Bookstore, Ogeechee Riverkeeper, and The Learning Center are teaming up for an author talk with Sally Sierer Bethea, author of Keeping the Chattahoochee (University of Georgia Press) and one of the first women in America to become a “riverkeeper”—a vocal defender of a specific waterway who holds polluters accountable.

In Keeping the Chattahoochee, Bethea tells stories that range from joyous and funny to frustrating—even alarming—to illustrate what it takes to save an endangered river. Her tales are triggered by the regular walks she takes through a forest to the Chattahoochee over the course of a year, finding solace and kinship in nature.

*Get your TICKETS HERE! Tickets ($10) also available at the door on the day of the event.

*Book are available for sale & signing at the event; for pre-orders, please call the bookstore at 912-233-3628. All book proceeds go to support the work of Ogeechee Riverkeeper and are much appreciated!

*Ample free parking on Jasper Street beside the easily accessible entrance to TLC’s event facility.

For more about Sally Bethea, Ogeechee Riverkeeper, and The Learning Center READ ON…

The Book Lady, Coastal WildScapes, and The Longleaf Alliance are teaming up to bring you co-authors Carol Denhof and John McGuire for a talk about their new book, published by the University of Georgia Press, The Forest That Fire Made: An Introduction to the Longleaf Pine Forest. All proceeds from book sales go to support the incredible work that is being done by these 5013c organizations to preserve our wild Georgia!

Longleaf pine forests are an iconic forest of the southeastern United States. Although these forests were often called “pine barrens” by early explorers and colonists, they were far from barren. Frequent and low-intensity surface fires are fueled by the unique plant diversity of the forest itself and serve as the catalyst that perpetuates the ecosystem on which many rare species depend. With this guide, authors John McGuire, Carol Denhof, and Byron Levan reveal the forest’s unique characteristics by shining a light on its inhabitants, the ecological processes that are necessary for their survival, and how we as humans play a role in shaping this ecosystem.

*This is a FREE event to attend, but donations and book purchases are MOST appreciated!

*Read on for more about The Forest that Fire Made, co-authors Denhof and McGuire, and both Coastal WildScapes and The Longleaf Alliance…

Join us for the launch party of Helen P. Bradley’s debut novel, Breach of Trust (Moonshine Cove Publishing), at the Islands Cottage Art-Studio and Gallery on Wilmington Island. Light refreshments and wine will kick off the fun and free event and Bradley’s talk and book signing will follow.

Copies of Breach of Trust are currently available at The Book Lady, and we will be at the book launch so you can buy extras for friends!

A compelling story of corruption vs. courage, community and friendship, Breach of Trust is, according to Susan Earl, author of We Part To Meet Again, “…a humdinger of a debut novel. Helen used her insider’s knowledge as former long-time head of a Savannah-based, nationally-recognized crime victim advocacy program to create this compelling read. Despite facing an agonizing moral decision, Anne Gardner — Helen’s fully-drawn main character —maintains her zany sense of humor, providing a welcome respite from the novel’s mounting tension.”

A native of Bethune, SC, Bradley has lived all her adult life in Savannah, where she headed a nationally recognized victim advocacy program in the district attorney’s office. Inspired by the resilience of thousands of crime victims and their families, she spearheaded passage of a dozen pieces of legislation, including the Georgia Crime Victims’ Bill of Rights and a crime victims’ compensation program. Familiar with the MeToo movement before it became a catchphrase, Helen also served on the boards of several child advocacy, domestic violence, and sexual assault organizations.

Read on for more about the author and venue…

Victor Luckerson, author of Built From The Fire: The Epic Story of Tulsa’s Greenwood District, America’s Black Wall Street, has, after years of painstaking research, penned a multigenerational saga of a family and a community in Tulsa’s Greenwood district, known as “Black Wall Street,” that in one century survived the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre, urban renewal, and gentrification.

Luckerson will be in conversation with Wanda S. Lloyd for this public talk, co-sponsored by The Learning Center, the Savannah Yamacraw branch of ASALH (Association for the Study of African American Life and History), and The Book Lady Bookstore. Lloyd, local program chair of ASALH, is the author of Coming Full Circle: From Jim Crow to Journalism (NewSouth Books). Learn more about Lloyd’s long career in journalism and teaching HERE.

TICKETS may be pre-purchased HERE! Tickets may also be purchased at the door on the day of the event.

Tiya Miles, National Book Award–winning author of All That She Carried says about Luckerson’s work, “In a kaleidoscope of colorful details and moving moments, journalist Victor Luckerson profiles the people who built ‘Black Wall Street’ and then lost nearly all to a violent, racially motivated attack. Built from the Fire is a sensitively rendered account of a family and community that persists.”
In Built from the Fire, journalist Victor Luckerson moves beyond the mythology of Black Wall Street to tell the story of an aspirant black neighborhood that, like so many others, has long been buffeted by racist government policies. Through the eyes of dozens of race massacre survivors and their descendants, Luckerson delivers an honest, moving portrait of this potent national symbol of success and solidarity—and weaves an epic tale about a neighborhood that refused, more than once, to be erased.

Read on for more about Luckerson and additional praise for Built From The Fire…

Join us in the McGowan Library on the UGA Skidaway Marine Science Campus, part of Savannah’s Skidaway Institute of Oceanography, for a talk with Michael Gunter, author of Climate Travels: How Ecotourism Changes Mindsets and Motivates Action.

This is a FREE public event brought to you by The Book Lady Bookstore, no pre-registration required.

In his newest book, published just this spring by Columbia University Press, Michael Gunter takes readers around the United States to bear witness to the many faces of the climate crisis. He argues that conscientious travel broadens understanding of climate change and makes its dangers concrete and immediate. Vivid vignettes explore the consequences for people and communities: sea level rise in Virginia, floods sweeping inland in Tennessee, Maine lobsters migrating away from American territorial waters, and imperiled ecosystems in national parks, from Alaskan permafrost to the Florida Keys. But Gunter finds inspiring initiatives to mitigate and adapt to these threats, including wind turbines in a tiny Texas town, green building construction in Kansas, and walkable urbanism in Portland, Oregon. These projects are already making a difference—and they underscore the importance of local action.

Michael M. Gunter, Jr. is a Cornell Distinguished Faculty Member and Arthur Vining Davis Fellow at Rollins College. His books include Building the Next Ark: How NGOs Work to Protect Biodiversity (2004) and Tales of an Ecotourist: What Travel to Wild Places Can Teach Us About Climate Change (2018).

Serving up some Zucchini Love just in time for warm weather! The Book Lady Bookstore and Chef Darin's Kitchen Table are proud to welcome James Beard Award-winner Cynthia Graubart for a lunchtime cooking demonstration, tasting, and book signing to celebrate Graubart's newest cookbook, Zucchini Love, a mouthwatering collection of 43 Garden-Fresh Recipes for Salads, Soups, Breads, Lasagnas, Stir-Fries, and More (Storey Publishing).

Get Your Tickets HERE! Don’t miss out, reserve your place early because space is limited!

Graubart is the author of 12 cookbooks, culinary television producer, and a frequent guest on morning TV. She is co-founder with Virginia Willis of Culinary Media Training and Productions, a full-service company designed to help food related companies and individuals succeed in the modern digital world. Graubart's recipes have appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times, Atlanta Journal Constitution, SeriousEats.com, Better Homes & Gardens, Southern Living, and Taste of the South, among many others. She’s passionate about helping cooks conquer their kitchen fears and helping families spend more time at the dinner table together.

For answers to FAQs, to learn more about the event, or to order an extra copy of Zucchini Love, READ ON…..OR just give the bookshop a ring at 912-233-3628 OR email us at books@thebookladybookstore.com

Wanna check out Chef Darin Sehnart’s beautiful demo kitchen? Click HERE

And, click HERE to learn more about Cynthia Graubart and her many yummy cookbooks!

Seersucker Live is proud to present their first live show of 2023, featuring:

- Andre Frattino, graphic novelist and author of "Tokyo Rose: Zero Hour"

- Brian Ralph, creator of the graphic novel and Netflix show "Daybreak"

- Dennis Robinson II, creative mastermind and author "Gwen Tells and the House of Shroom"

Get your tickets in advance at frontporchimprov.com/calendar-tix, and of course The Book Lady will be there offering all the book “goodies” at The Book Lady table. We wouldn’t miss it!

Read on for more about Seersucker Live…

The Angel Makers is a true-crime story like no other—a 1920s midwife who may have been the century’s most prolific killer leading a murder ring of women responsible for the deaths of at least 160 men.

Author Patti McCracken will be at The Book Lady for a reading and signing of her new book just published with Wiiliam Morrow, an imprint of Harper Collins (copies already available for sale at the shop!).

‬For over twenty years, McCracken’s articles have appeared in the Chicago Tribune, San Francisco Chronicle, Wall Street Journal, Guardian, Smithsonian Magazine, and many more outlets‭. She is a member of PEN America and was twice a Knight International Press Fellow‭. Given a Starred Review by Publisher’s Weekly, Angel Makers is truly riveting. Caitlin Rother, New York Times–bestselling author of Death on Ocean Boulevard, writes, “Patti McCracken takes you on a historical ride, rich with velvety description, through 1920s rural Hungary, where women used serial murder by arsenic to solve real-time problems of poverty, sickness, abuse, and sometimes greed. Horrifying yet fascinating.”

FREE event, but come early for a good seat!

Read on for more about Patti McCracken and The Angel Makers…

The Georgia Poetry Circuit is coming back to Savannah with another nationally acclaimed poet!

Allison Adelle Hedge Coke, a Fulbright scholar, First Jade Nurtured SiHui Female International Poetry Award recipient, recent Dan and Maggie Inouye Distinguished Chair in Democratic Ideals, and Library of Congress Witter Bynner fellow, has written seven books of poetry, one book of nonfiction, and a play.

Hedge Coke is the author of the poetry chapbook Year of the Rat (1996); the full-length poetry collections Dog Road Woman (1997), Off-Season City Pipe (2005), Blood Run (2006 UK, 2007 US), Streaming (2014), an illustrated (by Dustin Illetewahke Mater) special edition Burn (2017); a memoir Rock, Ghost, Willow, Deer (2004, 2014); and, the book-length poem Look At This Blue , which was a National Book Award finalist in 2022.

About Look At This Blue, the NBA called it, “An assemblage of historical record and lyric fragments, these poems form a taxonomy of threatened lives—human, plant, and animal—in a century marked by climate emergency…[Hedge Coke’s work] insists upon a reckoning with and redress of America’s continuing violence toward Earth and its peoples, as Hedge Coke’s cataloguing of loss crescendos into resistance.”

This FREE (but come early for a good seat) event is brought to you by Savannah State University's Department of English Languages and Cultures , The Book Lady Bookstore, and Estuary Creative Arts Club.

Read on for more about Hedge Coke and her work…

Georgia Conservancy’s annual Oyster Roast at Grove Point is coming up soon!

Where? Live Oaks, saltwater marsh and historic buildings - Savannah's Grove Point makes the perfect backdrop for celebrating Georgia's Coast. Graciously donated by Great Dane Trailers, the Oyster Roast is a rare opportunity for guests to enjoy this historic property overlooking the Little Ogeechee.

Oysters you say? Hands down, Charlie Phillips and Sapelo Sea Farms harvest some of the best clams and oysters we've ever enjoyed. Straight from Charlie's dock in Crescent, Georgia on Pelican Point, these bivalves could have landed in some of the finest restaurants on the East Coast - instead, they found your table at our 2023 Oyster Roast! 

Books too? Yes, indeed! We are proud to once again join Georgia Conservancy at The Book Lady tent with lots of terrific books on offer about the history and conservation of the Georgia Coast. Take home some fantastic reads about the saltmarsh, sea islands, Atlantic Right Whales, Longleaf conservation, Georgia waterways and much, much more.

Get your GA Conservancy Oyster Roast tickets here! Oysters & Books on the Marsh

Cave Canem Poetry Prize winner Courtney Faye Taylor is coming to The Book Lady in Savannah for another round of Georgia Poetry Circuit’s tour of nationally acclaimed poets.

Taylor’s collection, Concentrate (Graywolf Press, 2022), has been called “breathtaking, brilliant, and radical” and in its starred review Publishers Weekly said, “This is a monumental work in the vein of Claudia Rankine’s Citizen from a remarkable new talent.”

Taylor earned her BA from Agnes Scott College and her MFA from the University of Michigan Helen Zell Writers’ Program where she received the Hopwood Prize in Poetry. She is also the winner of the 92Y Discovery Prize and an Academy of American Poets Prize. The recipient of residencies and fellowships from Cave Canem and the Charlotte Street Foundation, Courtney’s work can be found in Poetry Magazine, The Nation, Ploughshares, Best New Poets, The New Republic and elsewhere.

This FREE (but come early for a good seat) event is brought to you by Savannah State University's Department of English Languages and Cultures , The Book Lady Bookstore, and Estuary Creative Arts Club.

READ ON FOR MORE ABOUT COURTNEY FAYE TAYLOR’S WORK…

“Welcoming Wildlife Into Our Landscapes” is the theme for the Coastal WildScapes 2023 Symposium, which is something we could all do today! This year speakers will include Diana Churchill on “Backyard Bird Feeding and Spring Migration”, Gage LaPierre on “Urban Habitats”, and Sam Holst on “Suporting Bats of the Lowcountry”, among others.

Join us at the beautiful Richmond Hill City Center for a day of talks, great lunch, and The Book Lady’s book table with our wide selection on urban habitats, Lowcountry nature & conservation, and backyard wildlife cultivation.

Get your tickets here! Register with Coastal WildScapes