Tuesday, February 18, 2014

Upcoming Anniversary Events

Hard as it is to believe, Chapters Books & Gifts is celebrating ten years in business in 2014.  When we opened in August of 2004, my youngest son was in first grade, you could buy a gallon of gas for $1.87, and Harry Potter was only on book number five.  Look how far we've come!  Nate got his driver's license last month, we don't even talk about the price of gasoline anymore, Harry Potter is all grown up, and the books have been made into eight blockbuster movies.

To celebrate our anniversary year, Chapters is launching an occasional "Second Saturday Series" of events featuring local and nationally-known authors.  Our series kicks off Saturday, March 8 at 1:00 p.m. with a reading and signing to celebrate the release of Stephanie Grace Whitson's new book, A Captain for Laura Rose. Special guests who will also be signing their books will be Michael Curd, author of Through the Valley, and Kathy Wiens, author of Bars, Dumps, and other Childhood Hangouts.
  
Stephanie Grace Whitson visited Chapters several years ago.  If I can find a photo, I'll post it here. Stephanie, an award-winning author of Christian/inspirational historical fiction, lives in Lincoln, Nebraska. Her recent books include three books in her Quilt Chronicles series. Her upcoming book, A Captain for Laura Rose, is set in 1867 aboard a Missouri River steamboat. When tragedy strikes, Laura must make the two month journey from St. Louis to Fort Benton and back in order to save her family's legacy, her home, and the only life she's ever known. Although she herself is a skilled riverboat captain, the only way for her to overcome the nearly insurmountable odds is with the help of her brother's disreputable friend Finn MacKnight, a skilled pilot with a terrible reputation. Learn more about her by following her on  facebook  or  her blog, http://www.stephaniegracewhitson.blogspot.com/.

Joining Stephanie on March 8 will be Michael Curd, retired pastor of the Methodist Church in Milford, Nebraska, who now resides in Omaha.  His book, Through the Valley, is a novelized account of a chaplain's experiences in a large urban hospital.  Kathy Wiens, also formerly of Milford, now lives in Newton, Kansas.  Her memoir Bars, Dumps, and other Childhood Hangouts, details her early life in Lincoln, Nebraska, as a child of an alcoholic mother who was taken in and whose life was turned around by a family from Milford.

The second event in our "Second Saturday Series" will feature debut author Lydia Kang reading from her young adult dystopian thriller Control.  Joining her will be Carol Bicak, author of The Littlest Lion, and Seward's own Linda Svoboda, author of picture books for young children including her newest, Loving Times with Grandma.  Read more about them in a future blog post.

Meanwhile, mark your calendar and don't miss our signing with Stephanie, Michael, and Kathy on Saturday, March 8!