RSVP HERE

About the Event

Join us for a special Women’s History program on women in leadership roles with Laurie Ruettimann author of Betting on You, and Christina Reynolds and Stephanie Schriock co-authors of Run to Win: Lessons in Leadership for Women Changing the World. 
 

About Laurie Ruettimann

Laurie Ruettimann is a former human resources leader turned writer, entrepreneur and speaker. CNN recognized her as one of the top five career advisers in the United States, and her work has been featured on NPR and in the New Yorker, USA Today, the Wall Street Journal and Vox. She frequently delivers keynote speeches at business and management events around the world and hosts the popular podcast Punk Rock HR. She lives with her husband and cats in Raleigh, North Carolina.
 

About Stephanie Schriock 

Raised in the copper mining town of Butte, Montana, Stephanie Schriock has been working to get Democrats elected for twenty-five years. Since Schriock became EMILY’s List president in 2010 she has overseen a decade of phenomenal growth in the organization, raising hundreds of millions of dollars, helping elect record numbers of women to the House and Senate, and recruiting and training hundreds more. EMILY’s List is now more than five million members strong.
 

About Christina Reynolds

Christina Reynolds grew up in and around Marine bases across the country but considers herself a Tar Heel. She has worked for two decades for Democratic officials, from five presidential campaigns to Democratic campaign committees to the Obama White House. She currently serves as the Vice President of Communications for EMILY’s List.

 

About Betting on You - Purchase your copy here!

Chances are you’ve spent the past few months cooped up inside, buried under a relentless news cycle and work that never seems to switch off. Millions of us worldwide are overworked, exhausted, and trying our hardest—yet not getting the recognition we deserve. It’s time for a fix.
 

Top career coach and HR consultant Laurie Ruettimann knows firsthand that work can get a hell of a lot better. A decade ago, Ruettimann was uninspired, blaming others and herself for the unhappiness she felt. Until she had an epiphany: if she wanted a fulfilling existence, she couldn’t sit around and wait for change. She had to be her own leader. She had to truly take ahold of life—the good, the bad, and the downright ugly—in order to transform her future. Purchase your copy here! 
 

About Run to Win - Purchase your copy here!

For the past thirty-five years EMILY’s List has helped the campaigns of thousands of pro-choice Democratic women, but the hardest part has always been convincing more women to run. Then Donald Trump was elected, and something shifted into place. American women who were furious and frustrated were looking for a way to channel their outrage into action, united in proclaiming, “If that guy can get elected, why not me?” 
 

The day after the 2016 election, dozens of women searched out an old sign-up link buried on the EMILY’s List website. By Thanksgiving, those dozens had grown to a few thousand. And that was only the beginning. By the end of 2018, there were nearly fifty thousand women signed up to run for office, with scores more signing up each day. 
 

Run to Win is for all women who are looking to lead. Organized around the steps that EMILY’s List coaches its candidates through (from deciding to run through celebrating victory), this book is full of essential lessons for any woman trying to succeed in a male-dominated field. Their arena is politics but their message is universal.

Join the Bad Romance Book Club in discussing Morgan Roger's Honey Girl in March! Purchase Honey Girl from Old Town Books and mention BRBC at checkout to get added to the virtual event and to get 10% off the book club picks!

About the book:
When becoming an adult means learning to love yourself first.

With her newly completed PhD in astronomy in hand, twenty-eight-year-old Grace Porter goes on a girls’ trip to Vegas to celebrate. She’s a straight-A, work-through-the-summer certified high achiever. She is not the kind of person who goes to Vegas and gets drunkenly married to a woman whose name she doesn’t know…until she does exactly that.

This one moment of departure from her stern ex-military father’s plans for her life has Grace wondering why she doesn’t feel more fulfilled from completing her degree. Staggering under the weight of her parent’s expectations, a struggling job market and feelings of burnout, Grace flees her home in Portland for a summer in New York with the wife she barely knows.

In New York, she’s able to ignore all the constant questions about her future plans and falls hard for her creative and beautiful wife, Yuki Yamamoto. But when reality comes crashing in, Grace must face what she’s been running from all along—the fears that make us human, the family scars that need to heal and the longing for connection, especially when navigating the messiness of adulthood.

“HONEY GIRL is an emotional, heartfelt, charming debut, and I loved every moment of it.” — Jasmine Guillory, New York Times bestselling author of The Proposal

RSVP Here
 

About the Event 

Join Old Town Books in conversation with Laura Hooper of Foxhill Garden in a beginners guide q&a to growing dahlias and discussing the new book Discovering Dahlias by Erin Benzakein. Event is free-with-book-purchase. 
 

About Laura Hooper

In a secluded corner of Alexandria’s historic Mount Vernon, Laura Hooper of Foxhill Garden has been nurturing the kempt property of her private dwelling turned micro flower farm for over seven years. Passionate about florals that reflect the changing seasons, Laura’s love for horticulture began during childhood, where outings to the local nursery provided an opportunity to select flowers and foliage for the family’s California home. 
 

Bringing a deep-rooted passion for cultivation with her when she moved East in 2013, today Laura’s Foxhill Garden boasts an ever changing variety of floral abundance that reflects the distinct yet delightful differences of the Virginian seasons.
 

Instagram: @foxhillgarden Website: lhcalligraphy.com/foxhillgarden
 

About Discovering Dahlias 

A stunning guide to growing, harvesting, and arranging gorgeous dahlia blooms from celebrated farmer-florist andNew York Times bestselling author Erin Benzakein, founder of Floret Flower Farm.

World-renowned flower farmer and floral designer Erin Benzakein reveals all the secrets to growing, cultivating, and arranging gorgeous dahlias. These coveted floral treasures come in a dazzling range of colors, sizes, and forms, with enough variety for virtually every garden space and personal preference, making them one of the most beloved flowers for arrangements.

RSVP HERE
 

About the Club

Old Town Books' Sci Fi and Fantasy Book Club is free and open to the public. While buying the book at Old Town Books is not required to attend, we would greatly appreciate it to help keep our free literary programming sustainable! You can purchase a copy of Winter's Orbit with your Eventbrite ticket or on Old Town Books' website (note that you're planning to attend book club to receive 10% off the book)!

About the Book

Ancillary Justice meets Red, White & Royal Blue in Winter’s Orbit, Everina Maxwell’s gut-wrenching and romantic debut.
 

A famously disappointing minor royal and the Emperor's least favorite grandchild, Prince Kiem is summoned before the Emperor and commanded to renew the empire's bonds with its newest vassal planet. The prince must marry Count Jainan, the recent widower of another royal prince of the empire.

But Jainan suspects his late husband’s death was no accident. And Prince Kiem discovers Jainan is a suspect himself. But broken bonds between the Empire and its vassal planets leaves the entire empire vulnerable, so together they must prove that their union is strong while uncovering a possible conspiracy.

Their successful marriage will align conflicting worlds.

Their failure will be the end of the empire.

RSVP HERE 
 

About the Book - Purchase Your Copy Here! 

A chilling true story—part memoir, part crime investigation—reminiscent of Ann Rule’s classic The Stranger Beside Me, about a little girl longing for love and how she found friendship with her charismatic babysitter—who was also a vicious serial killer.
 

Growing up on Cape Cod in the 1960s, Liza Rodman was a lonely little girl. During the summers, while her mother worked days in a local motel and danced most nights in the Provincetown bars, her babysitter—the kind, handsome handyman at the motel where her mother worked—took her and her sister on adventures in his truck. He bought them popsicles and together, they visited his “secret garden” in the Truro woods. To Liza, he was one of the few kind and understanding adults in her life. Everyone thought he was just a “great guy.”
 

But there was one thing she didn’t know; their babysitter was a serial killer.
 

Some of his victims were buried—in pieces—right there, in his garden in the woods. Though Tony Costa’s gruesome case made screaming headlines in 1969 and beyond, Liza never made the connection between her friendly babysitter and the infamous killer of numerous women, including four in Massachusetts, until decades later.

Haunted by nightmares and horrified by what she learned, Liza became obsessed with the case. Now, she and cowriter Jennifer Jordan reveal the chilling and unforgettable true story of a charming but brutal psychopath through the eyes of a young girl who once called him her friend.

 

RSVP HERE
 

About the Event

Join Old Town Books in conversation with Priyanka Champaneri, award-winning author of The City of Good Death, as well as novelist and critic Ilana Masad.
 

About Priyanka Champaneri

Priyanka Champaneri received her MFA in creative writing from George Mason University and has been a fellow at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts numerous times. She received the 2018 Restless Books Prize for New Immigrant Writing for The City of Good Death, her first novel.
 

About Ilana Masad
Ilana Masad is a queer Israeli-American writer of fiction, nonfiction, and criticism. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, New York Times, LA Times, Washington Post, NPR, StoryQuarterly, Tin House’s Open Bar, 7x7, Catapult, Buzzfeed, and many more. She is the founder and host of The Other Stories, an interview podcast featuring fiction writers. A graduate of Sarah Lawrence College, she has received her Masters in English from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln where she is currently a doctoral student. She is the author of the novel All My Mother’s Lovers.

 

About The City of Good Death

Banaras, Varanasi, Kashi: India’s holy city on the banks of the Ganges has many names but holds one ultimate promise for Hindus. It is the place where pilgrims come for a good death, to be released from the cycle of reincarnation by purifying fire. As the dutiful manager of a death hostel in Kashi, Pramesh welcomes the dying and assists families bound for the funeral pyres that burn constantly on the ghats.The soul is gone, the body is burnt, the time is past, he tells them. Detach.
 

After ten years in the timeless city, Pramesh can nearly persuade himself that here, there is no past or future. He lives contentedly at the death hostel with his wife, Shobha, their young daughter, Rani, the hostel priests, his hapless but winning assistant, and the constant flow of families with their dying. But one day the past arrives in the lifeless form of a man pulled from the river—a man with an uncanny resemblance to Pramesh.
 

Called “twins” in their childhood village, he and his cousin Sagar are inseparable until Pramesh leaves to see the outside world and Sagar stays to tend the land. After Pramesh marries Shobha, defying his family’s wishes, a rift opens up between the cousins that he has long since tried to forget. Do not look back. Detach. But for Shobha, Sagar’s reemergence casts a shadow over the life she’s built for her family. Soon, an unwelcome guest takes up residence in the death hostel, the dying mysteriously continue to live, and Pramesh is forced to confront his own ideas about death, rebirth, and redemption.
 

Told in lush, vivid detail and with an unforgettable cast of characters, The City of Good Death is a remarkable debut novel of family and love, memory and ritual, and the ways in which we honor the living and the dead.

RSVP HERE

Join us for a special event to discuss The Babysitter: My Summers with a Serial Killer with authors Liza Rodman and Jennifer Jordan.
 

About the Book - Purchase Your Copy Here!
 

A chilling true story—part memoir, part crime investigation—reminiscent of Ann Rule’s classic The Stranger Beside Me, about a little girl longing for love and how she found friendship with her charismatic babysitter—who was also a vicious serial killer.
 

Growing up on Cape Cod in the 1960s, Liza Rodman was a lonely little girl. During the summers, while her mother worked days in a local motel and danced most nights in the Provincetown bars, her babysitter—the kind, handsome handyman at the motel where her mother worked—took her and her sister on adventures in his truck. He bought them popsicles and together, they visited his “secret garden” in the Truro woods. To Liza, he was one of the few kind and understanding adults in her life. Everyone thought he was just a “great guy.”
 

But there was one thing she didn’t know; their babysitter was a serial killer.
 

Some of his victims were buried—in pieces—right there, in his garden in the woods. Though Tony Costa’s gruesome case made screaming headlines in 1969 and beyond, Liza never made the connection between her friendly babysitter and the infamous killer of numerous women, including four in Massachusetts, until decades later.

Haunted by nightmares and horrified by what she learned, Liza became obsessed with the case. Now, she and cowriter Jennifer Jordan reveal the chilling and unforgettable true story of a charming but brutal psychopath through the eyes of a young girl who once called him her friend.
 

About the Authors
 

Liza Rodman attended the University of Massachusetts/Amherst and received her Bachelor of Arts with a concentration in Creative Writing from Vermont College. She has balanced life as a mother, stepmother, writer and tax accountant for more than thirty-five years. In 2005, she began researching the story of Tony Costa when she realized her personal connection to the infamous Cape Cod killer. She has gathered thousands of documents, testimonies, and interviews, perhaps more than any other investigator or journalist who’s worked on this case. She and her husband live outside Boston and have three children and five grandchildren. The Babysitter is her first book.
 

Jennifer Jordan is an award-winning author, filmmaker, and screenwriter with decades of experience as a news anchor and investigative journalist. She has worked for NPR and PBS, and her work has also appeared in a variety of national and international newspapers and magazines. She has directed and produced several documentaries, including 3000 Cups of Tea, which revealed the flawed 60 Minutes report on renowned philanthropist, Greg Mortenson. In addition to her own books Savage Summit and Last Man on the Mountain, she has ghost written two others. The Babysitter is her fifth book.

RSVP HERE
 

About the Event

Join Old Town Books for a virtual author event featuring Naima Coster in conversation with DC bookstagrammer Lupita Aquino (@LupitaReads).
 

About Naima Coster

Naima Coster is the author of two novels. Her debut, Halsey Street, was a finalist for the 2018 Kirkus Prize for Fiction and longlisted for the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award. It was recommended as a must-read by People, Essence, BitchMedia, Well-Read Black Girl, The Skimm, and the Brooklyn Public Library among others.
 

Naima’s stories and essays have appeared in The New York Times, Kweli, The Paris Review Daily, The Cut, The Sunday Times, Catapult, The Rumpus, and elsewhere. She is a National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 Honoree for 2020.

Naima has taught writing for over a decade in community settings, youth programs, and universities. Most recently, she has taught writing in the MFA programs at the City College of New York, Antioch University in L.A., and the University of Michigan.

Naima tweets as @zafatista and writes the newsletter Bloom How You Must. She lives in Brooklyn with her family.

 

About What's Mine and Yours

A community in the Piedmont of North Carolina rises in outrage as a county initiative draws students from the largely Black east side of town into predominantly white high schools on the west. For two students, Gee and Noelle, the integration sets off a chain of events that will tie their two families together in unexpected ways over the span of the next twenty years.

 

On one side of the integration debate is Jade, Gee's steely, ambitious mother. In the aftermath of a harrowing loss, she is determined to give her son the tools he'll need to survive in America as a sensitive, anxious, young Black man. On the other side is Noelle's headstrong mother, Lacey May, a white woman who refuses to see her half-Latina daughters as anything but white. She strives to protect them as she couldn't protect herself from the influence of their charming but unreliable father, Robbie.

 

When Gee and Noelle join the school play meant to bridge the divide between new and old students, their paths collide, and their two seemingly disconnected families begin to form deeply knotted, messy ties that will shape the trajectory of their adult lives. And their mothers—each determined to see her child inherit a better life—will make choices that will haunt them for decades to come.

 

As love is built and lost, and the past never too far behind, What's Mine and Yours is an expansive, vibrant tapestry that moves between the years, from the foothills of North Carolina, to Atlanta, Los Angeles, and Paris. It explores the unique organism that is every family: what breaks them apart and how they come back together.
 

About Lupita Aquino

Lupita Aquino—better known as Lupita Reads—is a passionate reader active in both the local and online book community through her Instagram account- @Lupita.Reads. She is the creator of the #LatinxBookstagramTour, a columnist for the Washington Independent Review of Books, a contributor for the Reading Women podcast, a book curator for BESE media company founded by Zoe Saldana, and the co-founder and current moderator/curator for LIT on H St. Book Club.

RSVP HERE
 

About the Event

Join Old Town Books for a virtual author event featuring Genevieve Gornichec.
 

About the Author

Genevieve Gornichec earned her degree in history from The Ohio State University, but she got as close to majoring in Vikings as she possibly could, and her study of the Norse myths and Icelandic sagas became her writing inspiration.

She lives in Cleveland, Ohio. The Witch's Heart is her debut novel.
 

About the Book
 

When a banished witch falls in love with the legendary trickster Loki, she risks the wrath of the gods in this moving, subversive national bestselling debut novel that reimagines Norse mythology.
 

Angrboda’s story begins where most witches' tales end: with a burning. A punishment from Odin for refusing to provide him with knowledge of the future, the fire leaves Angrboda injured and powerless, and she flees into the farthest reaches of a remote forest. There she is found by a man who reveals himself to be Loki, and her initial distrust of him transforms into a deep and abiding love.
 

Their union produces three unusual children, each with a secret destiny, who Angrboda is keen to raise at the edge of the world, safely hidden from Odin’s all-seeing eye. But as Angrboda slowly recovers her prophetic powers, she learns that her blissful life—and possibly all of existence—is in danger.
 

With help from the fierce huntress Skadi, with whom she shares a growing bond, Angrboda must choose whether she’ll accept the fate that she’s foreseen for her beloved family...or rise to remake their future. From the most ancient of tales this novel forges a story of love, loss, and hope for the modern age.

Join the Bad Romance Book Club in discussing in April to discuss Deception and Hidden Sins by Selena Montgomery (aka the estimable Stacey Abrams)! Purchase your reads from Old Town Books and mention BRBC at checkout to get added to the virtual event and to get 10% off the book club picks!

About the Books
Deception:
Always on the run . . .

Playing the odds has always been Fin Borders' forte. She knows when to get out to keep from losing everything. But an innocent woman has been accused of murder, and to help, Fin will have to go back to the small southern town of her birth. It's a place she's been running from her entire life, a place of violence, where she got by with nothing more than her wits. Returning to Hallden, Georgia, means facing the ghosts of a brutal crime that Fin will never forget—and risking her own life.

But Fin isn't the only one in Hallden hunting for a killer. FBI Special Agent Caleb Matthews is deep undercover, hiding his true identity and his own desperate history. Working alone is far too dangerous, so he and Fin must learn to trust each other. But as they grow closer, they are unprepared for the passion that takes hold . . . and the shocking deception that could destroy everything they hold dear.

Hidden Sins

Mara Reed's been stirring up trouble since she was eighteen—running scams, living on the edge, always on the run. Now, when two thugs are after her with murder on their minds, she's forced into hiding in her small Texas hometown. But cornered in an alley, only seconds from death, an unexpected rescuer comes to her aid—Dr. Ethan Stuart, the dark and beautiful scientist whose heart she once broke and betrayed . . . the only man Mara ever loved.

A forensic anthropologist, Ethan is investigating a gruesome discovery—nearly one hundred dead bodies dating back fifty years—a mystery linked to the church once headed by Mara's father. Ethan needs Mara's help; she needs his protection. And their search for a shocking, devastating truth could lead them to forgiveness, salvation, passion, and back to love . . . if they can survive the journey.

RSVP HERE

About the Event

Old Town Books True Story! Nonfiction Book Club is free and open to the public. Note that you're planning to attend book club at check out to receive 10% off this month's pick. While buying the book at OTB is not required to attend, we would greatly appreciate it to help keep our free literary programming sustainable!

Purchase A Fiery Heart here!

About the Book

Charlotte Brontë famously lived her entire life in an isolated parsonage on a remote English moor with a demanding father and with siblings whose astonishing creativity was a closely held secret. The genius of Claire Harman’s biography is that it transcends these melancholy facts to reveal a woman for whom duty and piety gave way to quiet rebellion and fierce ambition. Drawing on letters unavailable to previous biographers, Harman depicts Charlotte’s inner life with absorbing intensity. Brontë’s blazingly intelligent female characters brimming with hidden passions transformed English literature, even as a heartrending series of personal losses followed the author’s literary success. Charlotte Brontë: A Fiery Heart is a groundbreaking view of the beloved writer as a young woman ahead of her time.

RSVP HERE
 

About the Event

Share your favorite passages from Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre on this Zoom meeting read-aloud. We all know Jane is no bird and no net ensnares her; let’s dig deeper into both popular and lesser-known quotes from this classic text.

Need a copy? Purchase Jane Eyre here!

About the Book

A novel of intense power and intrigue, Jane Eyre has dazzled generations of readers with its depiction of a woman's quest for freedom. Having grown up an orphan in the home of her cruel aunt and at a harsh charity school, Jane Eyre becomes an independent and spirited survivor-qualities that serve her well as governess at Thornfield Hall. But when she finds love with her sardonic employer, Rochester, the discovery of his terrible secret forces her to make a choice. Should she stay with him whatever the consequences or follow her convictions, even if it means leaving her beloved?

RSVP HERE

About the Club

Old Town Books' Sci Fi and Fantasy Book Club is free and open to the public. While buying the book at Old Town Books is not required to attend, we would greatly appreciate it to help keep our free literary programming sustainable! You can purchase a copy of We Could Be Heroes with your Eventbrite ticket or on Old Town Books' website (note that you're planning to attend book club to receive 10% off the book)!

Purchase the book here!

About the Book

An extraordinary and emotional adventure about unlikely friends and the power of choosing who you want to be.

 

Jamie woke up in an empty apartment with no memory and only a few clues to his identity, but with the ability to read and erase other people’s memories—a power he uses to hold up banks to buy coffee, cat food and books.
 

Zoe is also searching for her past, and using her abilities of speed and strength…to deliver fast food. And she’ll occasionally put on a cool suit and beat up bad guys, if she feels like it.
 

When the archrivals meet in a memory-loss support group, they realize the only way to reveal their hidden pasts might be through each other. As they uncover an ongoing threat, suddenly much more is at stake than their fragile friendship. With countless people at risk, Zoe and Jamie will have to recognize that sometimes being a hero starts with trusting someone else—and yourself.
 

"Incredibly fun and thoughtful.” —Buzzfeed

RSVP HERE

About the Event

Spring into Writing

 

Saturday, April 24 from 12:00-1:30pm

Saturday, May 22 from 12:00-1:30pm

Saturday, June 26 from 12:00-1:30pm

 

Join Kristen Zory King and Old Town Books for three free, monthly workshops to spring into writing! Throughout each session, we will examine contemporary pieces around a theme and then generate our own work based on prompts and guided discussion. This month, inspired by the natural world blooming around us, we will explore the small, joyful details of life and incorporate them into our writing, planting literary seeds to sprout. You do not need to be an experienced writer or poet to participate—beginners, journal-ers, and award-winning writers all welcome. This workshop is free for all with a suggested pay-what-you-can donation to Book Love, Old Town Books’ charitable giving program that delivers new books to area kids in need.

 

About the Teaching Artist:

Kristen Zory King is a writer and teaching artist based in Washington, DC. A passionate advocate for the arts and community, Kris is the founder of MoonLit, an organization that creatively connects community through accessible literary workshops and programming. Recent work can be found or is forthcoming in Electric Lit, Emerge Literary Journal, Rejection Letters, mac(ro)mic, and SWWIM among others. Learn more or be in touch at www.kristenzoryking.com.

RSVP HERE
 

About the Event:
 

We're making Indie Bookstore Day (April 24) a whole week at Old Town Books. Join us for a class with author and editor Alysia Li Ying Sawchyn on strategies for editing and submitting your essays to literary publications. Where is the best place to submit my work? How does one piece stand out from another in a queue of 100+ essays? Does it actually matter what's in my cover letter? Bring your questions and curiosity.  
 

About the Author:
 

Alysia Sawchyn is a features editor for The Rumpus and currently lives in the DC area. Her debut essay collection, A Fish Growing Lungs, was published by Burrow Press in June 2020 and has been longlisted for the Believer Book Awards. 

RSVP HERE!

April is National Poetry Month!
 

Can you write a poem a day? Give it a try with our month-long poetry challenge. Follow the hashtag #OTBWrites, stay tuned on our social channels for poetry-inspired prompts and giveaways, then join us for this virtual poetry slam to celebrate your work!

RSVP HERE

About the Event

A toast, to Shakespeare! Join us for a special outdoor reading of our favorite sonnets. Enjoy Shakespeare-inspired sips - there will be mocktails, cocktails, and poetry galore.
 

This is a ticketed event produced in partnership with Alexandria Cocktail Week. All funds raised will go to support Book Love, our charitable giving program.

RSVP HERE
 

About the Club

Old Town Book(s) Club is free and open to the public. While buying the book at Old Town Books is not required to attend, we would greatly appreciate it to help keep our free literary programming sustainable! You can purchase a copy of We Run the Tides with your Eventbrite ticket or on Old Town Books' website (note that you're planning to attend book club to receive 10% off the book)!

Purchase your book here!

About the Book

In misty, coastal Washington State, Isaac lives alone with his dog, grieving the recent death of his teenage son, Daniel. Next door, Lorrie, a working single mother, struggles with a heinous act committed by her own teenage son. Separated by only a silvery stretch of trees, the two parents are emotionally stranded, isolated by their great losses—until an unfamiliar sixteen-year-old girl shows up, bridges the gap, and changes everything.
 

Evangeline’s arrival at first feels like a blessing, but she is also clearly hiding something. When Isaac, who has retreated into his Quaker faith, isn’t equipped to handle her alone, Lorrie forges her own relationship with the girl. Soon all three characters are forced to examine what really happened in their overlapping pasts, and what it all possibly means for a shared future.
 

With a propulsive mystery at its core, What Comes After offers an unforgettable story of loss and anger, but also of kindness and hope, courage and forgiveness. It is a deeply moving account of strangers and friends not only helping each other forward after tragedy, but inspiring a new kind of family.

RSVP HERE
 

About the Book - Purchase Your Copy Here! (Mention that your purchase is for book club and receive 10% off.)
 

An audacious novel of feminine rage about one of the most prolific female serial killers in American history--and the men who drove her to it.
 

They whisper about her in Chicago. Men come to her with their hopes, their dreams--their fortunes. But no one sees them leave. No one sees them at all after they come to call on the Widow of La Porte.
 

The good people of Indiana may have their suspicions, but if those fools knew what she'd given up, what was taken from her, how she'd suffered, surely they'd understand. Belle Gunness learned a long time ago that a woman has to make her own way in this world. That's all it is. A bloody means to an end. A glorious enterprise meant to raise her from the bleak, colorless drudgery of her childhood to the life she deserves. After all, vermin always survive.

Join the Bad Romance Book Club in discussing Martha Waters' To Love and To Loathe in May! Purchase To Love and To Loathe from Old Town Books and mention BRBC at checkout to get added to the virtual event and to get 10% off the book club picks!

About the book:
The widowed Diana, Lady Templeton and Jeremy, Marquess of Willingham are infamous among English high society as much for their sharp-tongued bickering as their flirtation. One evening, an argument at a ball turns into a serious wager: Jeremy will marry within the year or Diana will forfeit one hundred pounds. So shortly after, just before a fortnight-long house party at Elderwild, Jeremy’s country estate, Diana is shocked when Jeremy appears at her home with a very different kind of proposition.

After his latest mistress unfavorably criticized his skills in the bedroom, Jeremy is looking for reassurance, so he has gone to the only woman he trusts to be totally truthful. He suggests that they embark on a brief affair while at the house party—Jeremy can receive an honest critique of his bedroom skills and widowed Diana can use the gossip to signal to other gentlemen that she is interested in taking a lover.

Diana thinks taking him up on his counter-proposal can only help her win her wager. With her in the bedroom and Jeremy’s marriage-minded grandmother, the formidable Dowager Marchioness of Willingham, helping to find suitable matches among the eligible ladies at Elderwild, Diana is confident her victory is assured. But while they’re focused on winning wagers, they stand to lose their own hearts.

With Martha Waters’s signature “cheeky charm and wonderfully wry wit” (Booklist, starred review), To Love and to Loathe is another clever and delightful historical rom-com that is perfect for fans of Christina Lauren and Evie Dunmore.

RSVP HERE
 

About the Event
 

Spring into Writing

 

Join Kristen Zory King and Old Town Books for three free, monthly workshops to spring into writing! Throughout each session we will examine contemporary pieces around a theme and then generate our own work based on prompts and guided discussion. This month, we will explore poems and prompts that think through sensory memories and how they have shaped the world around us. You do not need to be an experienced writer or poet to participate—beginners, journal-ers, and award-winning writers all welcome. This workshop is free for all with a suggested pay-what-you-can donation to Book Love, Old Town Books’ charitable giving program that delivers new books to area kids in need.

About the Teaching Artist:
 

Kristen Zory King is a writer and teaching artist based in Washington, DC. A passionate advocate for the arts and community, Kris is the founder of MoonLit, an organization that creatively connects communities through accessible literary workshops and programming. Recent work can be found or is forthcoming in Electric Lit, Emerge Literary Journal, Rejection Letters, mac(ro)mic, and SWWIM among others. Learn more or be in touch at www.kristenzoryking.com.

RSVP HERE
 

About the Club

Old Town Books' Sci Fi and Fantasy Book Club is free and open to the public. While buying the book at Old Town Books is not required to attend, we would greatly appreciate it to help keep our free literary programming sustainable! You can purchase a copy of The Galaxy, and the Ground Within with your Eventbrite ticket or on Old Town Books' website (note that you're planning to attend book club to receive 10% off the book)!

Purchase your book here!

About the Book

Return to the sprawling, Hugo Award-winning universe of the Galactic Commons to explore another corner of the cosmos—one often mentioned, but not yet explored—in this absorbing entry in the Wayfarers series, which blends heart-warming characters and imaginative adventure.
 

With no water, no air, and no native life, the planet Gora is unremarkable. The only thing it has going for it is a chance proximity to more popular worlds, making it a decent stopover for ships traveling between the wormholes that keep the Galactic Commons connected. If deep space is a highway, Gora is just your average truck stop.
 

At the Five-Hop One-Stop, long-haul spacers can stretch their legs (if they have legs, that is), and get fuel, transit permits, and assorted supplies. The Five-Hop is run by an enterprising alien and her sometimes helpful child, who work hard to provide a little piece of home to everyone passing through.
 

When a freak technological failure halts all traffic to and from Gora, three strangers—all different species with different aims—are thrown together at the Five-Hop. Grounded, with nothing to do but wait, the trio—an exiled artist with an appointment to keep, a cargo runner at a personal crossroads, and a mysterious individual doing her best to help those on the fringes—are compelled to confront where they’ve been, where they might go, and what they are, or could be, to each other.

 

RSVP HERE

About the Club

Old Town Book(s) Club is free and open to the public. While buying the book at Old Town Books is not required to attend, we would greatly appreciate it to help keep our free literary programming sustainable! You can purchase a copy of Last Night at the Telegraph Club with your Eventbrite ticket or on Old Town Books' website (note that you're planning to attend book club to receive 10% off the book)!

Purchase your book here!

About the Book

Seventeen-year-old Lily Hu can't remember exactly when the feeling took root—that desire to look, to move closer, to touch. Whenever it started growing, it definitely bloomed the moment she and Kathleen Miller walked under the flashing neon sign of a lesbian bar called the Telegraph Club. Suddenly everything seemed possible.
 

But America in 1954 is not a safe place for two girls to fall in love, especially not in Chinatown. Red-Scare paranoia threatens everyone, including Chinese Americans like Lily. With deportation looming over her father—despite his hard-won citizenship—Lily and Kath risk everything to let their love see the light of day.

RSVP HERE
 

About the Club

Old Town Books True Story! Nonfiction Book Club is free and open to the public. Note that you're planning to attend book club at check out to receive 10% off this month's pick. While buying the book at OTB is not required to attend, we would greatly appreciate it to help keep our free literary programming sustainable!

Pre-order your paperback copy of Fathoms here!

About the Book

A “delving, haunted, and poetic debut” (The New York Times Book Review) about the awe-inspiring lives of whales, revealing what they can teach us about ourselves, our planet, and our relationship with other species.
 

When writer Rebecca Giggs encountered a humpback whale stranded on her local beachfront in Australia, she began to wonder how the lives of whales reflect the condition of our oceans. Fathoms: The World in the Whale is “a work of bright and careful genius” (Robert Moor, New York Times bestselling author of On Trails), one that blends natural history, philosophy, and science to explore: How do whales experience ecological change? How has whale culture been both understood and changed by human technology? What can observing whales teach us about the complexity, splendor, and fragility of life on earth?
 

In Fathoms, we learn about whales so rare they have never been named, whale songs that sweep across hemispheres in annual waves of popularity, and whales that have modified the chemical composition of our planet’s atmosphere. We travel to Japan to board the ships that hunt whales and delve into the deepest seas to discover how plastic pollution pervades our earth’s undersea environment.

With the immediacy of Rachel Carson and the lush prose of Annie Dillard, Giggs gives us a “masterly” (The New Yorker) exploration of the natural world even as she addresses what it means to write about nature at a time of environmental crisis. With depth and clarity, she outlines the challenges we face as we attempt to understand the perspectives of other living beings, and our own place on an evolving planet. Evocative and inspiring, Fathoms “immediately earns its place in the pantheon of classics of the new golden age of environmental writing” (Literary Hub).

Join the Bad Romance Book Club in discussing Casey McQuiston's highly-anticipated One Last Stop in June! Purchase One Last Stop from Old Town Books and mention BRBC at checkout to get added to the virtual event and to get 10% off the book club picks!

About the Book
From the New York Times bestselling author of Red, White & Royal Blue comes a new romantic comedy that will stop readers in their tracks...

For cynical twenty-three-year-old August, moving to New York City is supposed to prove her right: that things like magic and cinematic love stories don’t exist, and the only smart way to go through life is alone. She can’t imagine how waiting tables at a 24-hour pancake diner and moving in with too many weird roommates could possibly change that. And there’s certainly no chance of her subway commute being anything more than a daily trudge through boredom and electrical failures.

But then, there’s this gorgeous girl on the train.

Jane. Dazzling, charming, mysterious, impossible Jane. Jane with her rough edges and swoopy hair and soft smile, showing up in a leather jacket to save August’s day when she needed it most. August’s subway crush becomes the best part of her day, but pretty soon, she discovers there’s one big problem: Jane doesn’t just look like an old school punk rocker. She’s literally displaced in time from the 1970s, and August is going to have to use everything she tried to leave in her own past to help her. Maybe it’s time to start believing in some things, after all.

Casey McQuiston’s One Last Stop is a magical, sexy, big-hearted romance where the impossible becomes possible as August does everything in her power to save the girl lost in time.
 

RSVP HERE
 

About the Book - Purchase Your Copy Here! (Mention that your purchase is for book club and receive 10% off.)
 

The gripping true story, told here for the first time, of the Last Call Killer and the gay community of New York City that he preyed upon.
 

The Townhouse Bar, midtown, July 1992: The piano player seems to know every song ever written, the crowd belts out the lyrics to their favorites, and a man standing nearby is drinking a Scotch and water. The man strikes the piano player as forgettable.
 

He looks bland and inconspicuous. Not at all what you think a serial killer looks like. But that’s what he is, and tonight, he has his sights set on a gray haired man. He will not be his first victim.
 

Nor will he be his last.
 

The Last Call Killer preyed upon gay men in New York in the ‘80s and ‘90s and had all the hallmarks of the most notorious serial killers. Yet because of the sexuality of his victims, the sky-high murder rates, and the AIDS epidemic, his murders have been almost entirely forgotten.

This gripping true-crime narrative tells the story of the Last Call Killer and the decades-long chase to find him. And at the same time, it paints a portrait of his victims and a vibrant community navigating threat and resilience.

RSVP HERE
 

About the Club

Old Town Books' Sci-Fi and Fantasy Book Club is free and open to the public. While buying the book at Old Town Books is not required to attend, we would greatly appreciate it to help keep our free literary programming sustainable! You can purchase a copy of The Bone Shard Daughter with your Eventbrite ticket or on Old Town Books' website (note that you're planning to attend book club to receive 10% off the book)!

Purchase your book here!

About the Book

The emperor's reign has lasted for decades, his mastery of bone shard magic powering the animal-like constructs that maintain law and order. But now his rule is failing, and revolution is sweeping across the Empire's many islands.
 

Lin is the emperor's daughter and spends her days trapped in a palace of locked doors and dark secrets. When her father refuses to recognize her as heir to the throne, she vows to prove her worth by mastering the forbidden art of bone shard magic.
 

Yet such power carries a great cost, and when the revolution reaches the gates of the palace, Lin must decide how far she is willing to go to claim her birthright - and save her people.

RSVP HERE
 

About the Event
 

Spring into Writing

Join Kristen Zory King and Old Town Books for three free, monthly workshops to spring into writing! Throughout each session, we will examine contemporary pieces around a theme and then generate our own work based on prompts and guided discussion. This month, we will explore poems and prompts that think through sensory memories and how they have shaped the world around us. You do not need to be an experienced writer or poet to participate—beginners, journal-ers, and award-winning writers all welcome. This workshop is free for all with a suggested pay-what-you-can donation to Book Love, Old Town Books’ charitable giving program that delivers new books to area kids in need.
 

About the Teaching Artist:

Kristen Zory King is a writer and teaching artist based in Washington, DC. A passionate advocate for the arts and community, Kris is the founder of MoonLit, an organization that creatively connects communities through accessible literary workshops and programming. Recent work can be found or is forthcoming in Electric Lit, Emerge Literary Journal, Rejection Letters, mac(ro)mic, and SWWIM among others. Learn more or be in touch at www.kristenzoryking.com.