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Author Ana Hebra Flaster will be presenting her memoir, Property of the Revolution: From a Cuban Barrio to a New Hampshire Mill Town at Temple Isaiah.
After being kicked out of their Havana barrio, a young Flaster and her family had to rebuild their lives in New Hampshire while still holding onto the memories of their previous home.
Ana Hebra Flaster is a Cuban American writer and and activist for human rights in Cuba. She was nearly six when her family fled Cuba and settled in Nashua, New Hampshire. After graduating from Smith College and enjoying a career in software consulting, she began her writing career. Her writing about Cuba and Cuban Americans has appeared in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe and elsewhere.
Come join us for an author event with Woody Holton, author of Liberty is Sweet: The Hidden History of the American Revolution, and Robert A. Gross, author of The Minutemen and Their World.
About Woody Holton: Woody Holton’s 2009 book, Abigail Adams: A Life, which he wrote on a Guggenheim fellowship, won the Bancroft Prize. Holton is the author of Unruly Americans and the Origins of the Constitution (2007), a finalist for the George Washington Book Prize and the National Book Award. His first book, Forced Founders: Indians, Debtors, Slaves and the Making of the American Revolution in Virginia (1999), won the Organization of American Historians’ Merle Curti award. He teaches Early American history, especially the American Revolution, with a focus on economic history and on African Americans, Native Americans, and women.
About Robert A. Gross: Robert A. Gross is the James L. and Shirley A. Draper Professor of Early American History Emeritus at the University of Connecticut. He is the author of The Minutemen and Their World (1976), which won the Bancroft Prize; Books and Libraries in Thoreau’s Concord (1988); and The Transcendentalists and Their World (2021). With Mary Kelley, he is the coeditor of An Extensive Republic: Print, Culture, and Society in the New Nation, 1790–1840 (2010). A former assistant editor of Newsweek, he has written for such periodicals as Esquire, Harper’s Magazine, The Boston Globe, and The New York Times, and his essays have appeared in The American Scholar, The New England Quarterly, Raritan, and The Yale Review.
Come join us for an author event with Maria Vetrano, author of QUEEN BESS: A Tudor Comes to Save America, in conversation with Melissa Ludtke, author of Locker Room Talk: A Woman’s Struggle to Get Inside.
QUEEN BESS introduces readers to Dakota Wynfred, a tech billionaire with a social conscience who lives in Cambridge and works in Charlestown. Dakota is convinced that the only way to save American democracy—and her cybersecurity company—from the U.S. president who is setting fire to the Constitution is to enlist a time-traveling Elizabeth Tudor. The action races ahead as Dakota and her hand-picked cohorts prepare Elizabeth for a 2028 presidential run.
About Maria Vetrano: Maria Vetrano tried to save the whales when she was nine-years old. It didn’t quite work. But that didn’t quell her desire to ease some of the world’s ills in some small way, even if only through fiction.
She lives with her human and animal family in Massachusetts and is the mother of one young-adult daughter. When she's not writing, Maria is principal of Vetrano Communications, the PR and marketing firm that she founded in 2004, which specializes in technology companies as clientele. Maria is also a lounge singer who’s entertained audiences in Boston, Cambridge, and Provincetown. With her wife, she founded Against the Tide, a fundraising event to fight breast cancer. She is a graduate of Colgate University with a B.A. in English Literature. She is represented by Maura K. Phelan of Green Light Literary + Media.
About Melissa Ludtke: In her award-winning journalism career, Melissa Ludtke reported at Sports Illustrated, was a correspondent at Time, and was the editor of Nieman Reports at Harvard University’s Nieman Foundation for Journalism. Melissa’s lifelong engagement with issues revolving around girls and women’s lives led her to write two books, On Our Own: Unmarried Motherhood in America, and Touching Home in China: in search of missing girlhoods.
Melissa’s new book, Locker Room Talk: A Woman's Struggle to Get Inside (published August 2024 by Rutgers University Press), revisits her federal lawsuit, Ludtke v. Kuhn, which in 1978 secured equal access for women sports reporters. This meant women could interview players, coaches and the manager in the locker room, as male reporters had done for decades. She is a graduate of Wellesley College and lives in Cambridge, MA. She is the mother of a young-adult daughter, Maya.
Children’s author Carrie Finison is coming to Maxima Book Center to read her latest book, Pigs Dig a Road! In addition to the storytime, Carrie Finison will be teaching kids about real trucks involved in road construction, singing a song about construction trucks, and providing coloring pages, construction vests, and construction hats.
A rhyming picture book featuring pig construction workers that’s perfect for fans of Good Night, Good Night, Construction Site.
Construction crew chief Rosie and her team are building a new road to the Hamshire County Fair. It’s time to put on hard hats and boots, grab their hammers and stakes, and, of course, bring out the big trucks: bulldozers, excavators, pavers, rollers, and more!
Unfortunately, work with Rosie’s crew doesn’t always go as planned, and Curly, Pinky, and Stinky end up making one huge mess. Rosie is there to save the day, but she can’t do such a big job all by herself. The county fair is starting soon, and there’s only one way to get the road done on time . . . teamwork!
Carrie Finison writes children’s books with humor and heart, including Dozens of Doughnuts; Lulu & Zoey: A Sister Story; Hurry, Little Tortoise, Time for School; and Don’t Hug Doug, which was named an ALA Notable Children’s Book in 2022. Her newest book is Pigs Dig a Road, a humorous story about road construction and teamwork. She lives in the Boston area. Visit her online at www.carriefinison.com , or follow her on social media @CarrieFinison.
Come meet Meredith Bergmann and some of the artists who created the new "Something Is Being Done" Monument at the Depot/Historical Society in Lexington Ctr @7PM. In partnership with Lexington Community Ed.
Meredith Bergmann’s preliminary sketch for "Something Is Being Done!" recognizes contributions made by bold Lexington women who, when faced with injustice or seemingly insurmountable obstacles, determined that “Something Must Be Done.” Visitors will be welcomed to stand amidst these courageous women, draw strength from them, and help lead the future!
Meredith Bergmann is an American sculptor, poet, and essayist whose work is said to "forge enriching links between the past and the concerns of the present." She studied at Wesleyan University and graduated from The Cooper Union with a BFA. For over 40 years, Meredith Bergmann has been making sculpture that deals with complex themes in an accessible, beautiful, and provocative way. Working within the tradition of narrative sculpture, she draws on her love of the history of art, literature, and mythology to make the past speak to the present. Blending the sensuality and power of representational sculpture with her own subtle sense of mischief, her work evokes multilayered responses. Meredith lives in Massachussets with her husband Michael Bergmann, a writer and director, and their son.
More than 40 years ago, Jon Waterman worked as a mountaineering ranger at Alaska’s Denali National Park. His 1983 patrol to the Noatak River in Gates of the Arctic National Park sparked a lifetime fascination with the wild, remote regions of the North. Waterman has since embarked on scores of expeditions to the North, often traveling solo by boat and on foot to document the natural wonders and cultural heritage across Arctic North America.
After a long hiatus from the Noatak headwaters, he returned with his son in 2021, witnessing firsthand the effects of climate change that he chronicled in a New York Times story, “36 Years Later, the Climate Changes at This National Park Stunned Me.” Amid a river now flooded, overgrown with brush, and bereft of once-abundant caribou, he was deeply disheartened by the many transformations.
In 2022, Waterman took a final, extended expedition “into the thaw” with the professional kayaker and photographer Chris Korbulic to carefully document the environmental and cultural changes precipitated by the climate crisis. They covered more than 500 miles on foot and by packraft down the entire river, then up the coast, passing through three different National Park Service managed lands to meet with scientists, interview Iñupiat (the Alaskan Inuit), investigate the many impacts of the Arctic climate crisis, and celebrate the enduring wonder of this special place. This book will be available in bookstores on November 12th.
Jon found his calling as a writer while shooting photographs on expeditions more than four decades ago. Drawn to the physical challenge and peace he felt in the natural world, he continually fell short explaining this allure to others. The necessity of being fully present in the outdoors to witness beauty, and then to preserve the natural world, became essential to Jon. So he turned to writing to explain both adventure and conservation.
He has also shot and written television films, including “The Logan Challenge,” “Surviving Denali,” “Odyssey Among the Inuit,” “ANWR Trek," and "Chasing Water."
Jon is mostly known for his Northern explorations, detailed in many of his books and countless journals since 1978. Beginning in 2007, the rivers of the Southwest began to call, with an extended journey and National Geographic Society research projects. For two ambitious water and river conservation expeditions, he lectured extensively, produced a comprehensive river map and a photography exhibit, then published two books, Running Dry and The Colorado River.
Lexington's Marjan Kamali, our friend and a wonderfully inspiring author will be at the Depot @7PM to read from and sign copies of her newest book The Lion Women of Tehran. In partnership with Lexington Community Ed.
From the nationally bestselling author of the “powerful, heartbreaking” (Shelf Awareness) The Stationery Shop, a heartfelt, epic new novel of friendship, betrayal, and redemption set against three transformative decades in Tehran, Iran.
Marjan Kamali is the award-winning author of The Lion Women of Tehran, an instant national bestseller, The Stationery Shop, a national and international bestseller, and Together Tea, a Massachusetts Book Award finalist. She is a 2022 recipient of the National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellowship.
Sarah Carlisle from Rascal Relish will be at LexFarm from 5:30-7PM for a zero-waste cooking event.
"In challenge to the manufactured urgency and disconnection of the Anthropocene, a Rascal Relish offers comfort, nourishment, and an invitation to slow down through handcrafted, plant-infused products and services. By practicing reciprocity with the natural world, gratitude and frugality through purposeful reuse, and gentle self-sufficiency, my offerings act as a supportive resource to help you deepen your sense of self & place through reverence, curiosity, and connection." -arascalrelish.com
We will also be selling the book Perfectly Good Food.
Want to cook better while saving money and reducing your trash? Learn to eat less wastefully and more sustainably in this combination cookbook and field guide, full of ingenious use-it-up tips, smart storage ideas, and infinitely adaptable Hero Recipes. Whether you’ve got a lingering bunch of herbs or an abundance of summer tomatoes, Perfectly Good Food will help rescue everything in your fridge while getting a delicious dinner on the table quickly and easily—you’ll be inspired never to waste good food again.
Zelly Ruskin will be in the Book Center @7PM to read from and sign her new book Not Yours to Keep, that explores adoption, fertility, and motherhood. Perfect for fans of Little Fires Everywhere and The Last Thing He Told Me by Laura Dave, just in time coincide with Adoption Awareness Month in November. Refreshments will be served.
Called a “sensational debut” by Rea Frey, this psychological thriller delves into themes of reproductive rights and healthcare, confronting the complexities that define family—or the risks that lose it all.
Zelly Ruskin is a former social worker and adoption consultant. She loves traveling with her family, is a (sometimes) artist, and is passionate about and volunteers for brain aneurysm awareness. She writes women’s fiction spiced with suspense about motherhood, relationships, loss and love. Zelly and her ridiculous doodle, Strudel, currently live in New York City.
Poet Li-Young Lee will be at the Depot discussing and signing his newest book The Invention of the Darling @7PM. In partnership with Lexington Community Ed.
Acclaimed poet Li-Young Lee offers a revelatory volume of ecstatic poems that search out divine voices in the silences of life, love, and death.
Li-Young Lee was born in 1957 in Jakarta, Indonesia, to Chinese parents. His father had been a personal physician to Mao Zedong while in China and relocated the family to Indonesia, where he helped found Gamaliel University. In 1959, the Lee family fled the country to escape anti-Chinese sentiment and, after a five-year trek through Hong Kong, Macau, and Japan, they settled in the United States in 1964.
Lee is the author of The Invention of the Darling (W. W. Norton, 2024); The Undressing (W. W. Norton, 2018); Behind My Eyes (W. W. Norton, 2008); Book of My Nights (BOA Editions, 2001), which won the 2002 William Carlos Williams Award; The City in Which I Love You (BOA Editions, 1990), which was the 1990 Lamont Poetry Selection; and Rose (BOA Editions, 1986), which won the Delmore Schwartz Memorial Poetry Award.
April 2024
April is National Poetry Month! Joining us are local poets Quintin Collins, Matthew E. Henry, and Sarah Kersey. Stop by our Lexington location on Sunday the 28th for a reading and discussion on their following books:
The Dandelion Speaks of Survival is Quintin Collins's debut poetry collection. The work celebrates the persistence of African Americans, and all people, to triumph in the face of systems that would restrict their growth.
Honor Book, 2023 Black Caucus of the American Library Association Literary Awards, Poetry Category
In Claim Tickets for Stolen People, Quintin Collins embraces a range of poetic forms and registers to show the resilience of Blackness in a colonized world. The tension between mortality and vitality is ever-present, whether Collins is charting his daughter’s emergence into being, cataloging the toll of white violence, or detailing the exuberance of community, family, and Chicago and Boston life. In Collins’s hands, the world is exquisitely physical and no element is without its own perspective, whether it is a truck sheared by a highway bridge or bees working through the knowledge that humans will kill them, burn their homes, and steal their honey. All goes toward honoring Black grief, Black anger, Black resistance, Black hope—and the persistence of Black love.
This stunning new poetry collection by Matthew E. Henry (MEH), the Colored page, is a visceral meditation on the multi-layered experience of a Black body in educational spaces. Sprawling with metaphors and allusions to both the contemporary and the historic, Henry brings us an intense narrative chronicle of the speaker's life as student, educator, and finally as a writer. At the center there is a reckoning with the racism written into the pages of America, and Henry leads us from the microaggressions of educational oversight, to the horror of blatant dehumanization.
Join author Henry Grabar for a talk about how the search for parking has shaped our world, from affordable housing to the enviroment. The evening will also include a panel discussion and Q&A. You won't want to miss this!
In a beguiling and absurdly hilarious mix of history, politics, and reportage, Slate staff writer Henry Grabar brilliantly surveys the nation’s parking crisis, revealing how the compulsion for car storage has exacerbated some of our most acute problems— from housing affordability to the accelerating global climate disaster—and, ultimately, how we can free our cities from parking’s cruel yoke.
Henry Grabar is a staff writer at Slate who writes about housing, transportation, and urban policy. He has contributed to The Atlantic, The Guardian, and The Wall Street Journal, and was the editor of the book The Future of Transportation. He received the Richard Rogers Fellowship from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design and was a finalist for the Livingston Award for excellence in national reporting by journalists under thirty-five.
Joining us at our Lexington location is local author Cara Bean to discuss and sign copies of her book "Here I Am, I Am Me: An Illustrated Guide to Mental Health". Copies of the book are available for purchase ahead of the event at both our Arlington and Lexington locations, or can be special ordered by calling 781-457-6185.
Author-illustrator Cara Bean takes readers on an illustrated journey to the center of the brain in Here I Am, I Am Me. Each of the 9 chapters in this therapist-recommended book explores a different aspect of mental health, from the brain and the mind, to feelings and emotions. By portraying complex neuroscience concepts with a cast of illustrated characters (that represent parts of the brain), the book explains what is really going on in the reader’s head in an accessible, approachable way that ultimately serves to empower the reader.
Cara Bean is the author of Draw 500 Funny Faces and Features and taught art at Lexington High School in Massachusetts for twelve years. She has an MFA in Drawing and Painting from the University of Washington in Seattle and received a certificate in cartooning from the Sequential Artists Workshop in Gainesville, Florida.
She provides interactive workshops on creativity with people of all ages and backgrounds in various public forums. Cara is passionate about drawing and believes that the simple act of doodling on paper can lead to the investigation of complex ideas.
When she is not teaching, she makes comics that delve into poetic self introspection, playful storytelling and topics relevant to teens and teaching. Cara is currently working on comics projects that speak directly to kids and address mental health. www.carabeancomics.com
Joining us at our Lexington location is local author Karen Samuelson to discuss her debut novel, Weaving Dreams in Oaxaca!
Weaving Dreams in Oaxaca takes you on a journey with three characters whose lives are riddled with secrets and dilemmas. Frankie, a New York City professional dancer needs space from her past and strong-willed mother to grapple with the decision of having a family or continuing in the spotlight. A personal revelation throws Professor Mac into an identity crisis and sends him to Mexico for answers. Enrique, a mechanic and DJ from Santa Ana struggles with the challenge of coming out as a gay man to a hostile father. This trio crosses paths in the cobblestone streets of Oaxaca where they weave complex friendships in a colorful tapestry of adventure, deceit, discovery, love and pain.
Karen Samuelson is a career/life coach and writer. She has written three screenplays, a play, several dramatic scripts for Sunburst Productions in NY, and the Teacher’s Guide for episodes of Degrassi Jr. High. She was a quarter-finalist in the Cynosure Screenwriting competition in 2015 and 2016 for her screenplay, Sanctuary. In 1987, she received a Certificate of Recognition from the City of Boston for producing City Roots, a documentary about high school dropouts. In 2018, Arlington Friends of the Drama stage-produced her play, Circling Back. She lives with her husband, son, and dog outside of Boston and spends quiet time in Vermont.
November 2023
Come on by the Depot to meet author Nuar Asadir, who will be doing a reading, signing copies, and discussing his book, Animal Joy: A Book of Laughter and Resuscitation!
Join us at LHS to hear Dr. Sally Shaywitz read and discuss her updated edition of her book, Overcoming Dyslexia. Come by to hear an expert discuss the intricacies of identifying, understanding, and overcoming dyslexia; whether you're a parent of someone who struggles with dyslexia, have it yourself, or are just curious to witness a professional discussion on the affliction.
Professor Gary Goshgarian—aka Gary Braver—will be joining us at Maxima Book Center to read and sign copies of his brand new mystery, Rumor of Evil!
Join us at the Depot with best-selling author Adam Gopnick as he reads, signs, and discusses his latest self-help memoir, The Real Work: On the Mystery of Mastery!
Stop by the Depot and meet Morra Aarons-Mele—writer, entrepreneur, mental health advocate, and award-winning podcaster—as she reads, signs, and discusses her latest book, The Anxious Acheiver: Turn Your Biggest Fears into Your Leadership Superpower!
The husband and wife duo from Arlington, MA--Ross Grifkin (author) and Tonya Grifkin (illustrator)--will be visiting us at Maxima Book Center to read us their new children's book, Errol: The Cat Who Wasn't a Cat!
All the way from Ireland, poet Pádraig Ó Tuama will be joining us at Follen Church on October 19th to read, sign, and discuss his books Poetry Unbound: 50 Poems to Open Your World—an anthology based on his podcast Poetry Unbound—and In the Shelter: Finding a Home in the World—a memoir of peace and reconciliation, Celtic spirituality, belonging, and sexual identity.
Sister duo Rina Horiuchi (author) and Risa Horiuchi (illustrator) will be at Maxima Gift Center this month showcase their debut children's book, K is for Kindness! Join us for a book reading, book signings, and arts & crafts!
November 2022
Lexington author Jane Sutton will be joining us at Maxima to read and sign copies of her latest children's book, Gracie Brings Back Bubbe's Smile!
December 2022
Join us and Diamond Middle School teacher Howard Wolke as he reads from and signs his debut fantasy novel: Cryptid Academy.
The book is designed for kids ages 9-12 and makes a great holiday gift!
September 2022
Shabbir Cheema is a Lexington resident. He is a former Senior Fellow at Harvard Kennedy School's Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation and Director of Democratic Governance Division of the UN Development Program. Join us as he reads passages from his book, Journey From Kamalpur: A Memoir!
**Copies ordered in advance will be available for pick-up on the day of the event**
Date: Sunday, September 11, 2022Bill McKibben on his latest bestseller, The Flag, the Cross, and the Station Wagon: A Graying American Looks Back at His Suburban Boyhood and Wonders What the Hell Happened
A selection of titles from Richard Blanco, the fifth inaugural poet in U.S. history:
The Prince of los Cocuyos : A Miami Childhood
One Today
Lauren Aguirre is a Lexington resident. She is an award-winning science journalist who has produced documentaries, short-form video series, podcasts, interactive games, and blogs for the PBS series NOVA. Aguirre’s articles on memory and addiction have appeared in STAT, The Boston Globe Ideas Section, Undark, The Atlantic, The Scientist, and PBS. Join us as she reads from her first book, The Memory Thief, a finalist for the PEN/E.O. Wilson Literary Science Award.