Images courtesy of the Princeton Public Library.
Ticket Prices
Free admission. Pre-registration is requested as space is limited.
Celebrate summer reading with a free gathering of area book lovers featuring two historical fiction authors, Ann Hood and Laura Spence-Ash, discussing their recent novels. The event includes refreshments, door prizes, and more. Registration requested; space is limited. Presented by the Princeton Public Library in partnership with Morven Museum & Garden and Labyrinth Books.
A popular Princeton Public Library tradition since 2016, the Summer Reading Soirée features sparkling beverages, sorbet and other sweets as well as door prizes and giveaways. Attendees will mix and mingle with library staff and other area book lovers, share what they have been reading, and discover titles they may want to read this summer. This year's soirée is also a chance to stroll around the grounds of Morven Museum and Garden.
Registration for this free event is requested as space is limited to 125 participants.
About the the featured books:
"The Stolen Child" by Ann Hood: Haunted by a decision he made as a young soldier in World War I, involving a French artist and her baby, Nick Burns, with only months left to live, enlists Jenny, a college dropout, to help him unravel the mystery, forcing them both to reckon with regret, betrayal and the lives they've left behind.
"Beyond That, the Sea" by Laura Spence-Ash: As German bombs fall over London in 1940, working-class parents Millie and Reginald Thompson make an impossible choice: they decide to send their 11-year-old daughter, Beatrix, to America to live with another family for the duration of the war. When Beatrix returns to post-war London, the memory of her American family stays with her, never fully letting her go, and always pulling on her heart as she tries to move on and pursue a life of her own
About the featured authors:
Ann Hood is the editor of "Knitting Yarns: Writers on Knitting" and the bestselling author of more than a dozen books including "The Book That Matters Most," "The Knitting Circle," "The Red Thread," "Comfort," and "An Italian Wife," among other works. She is the recipient of two Pushcart Prizes, a Best American Spiritual Writing Award, a Best American Food Writing Award, a Best American Travel Writing Award, and the Paul Bowles Prize for Short Fiction. She lives in Providence, Rhode Island.
Laura Spence-Ash’s fiction has appeared in One Story, New England Review, Crazyhorse, and elsewhere. Her critical essays and book reviews appear regularly in the Ploughshares blog. She received her MFA in fiction from Rutgers–Newark, and she lives in New Jersey.