Marilyn Nelson, a former Connecticut Poet Laureate and recipient of many literary awards, has added a new honor: She is the winner of the 2017 NSK Neustadt Prize for children’s literature.
The NSK Prize is given every other year for great achievements in children’s and young adult storytelling. First given in 2003, the prize includes $25,000, a silver medallion, a certificate of recognition and a literary festival in the winner’s honor. The 2017 Neustadt Festival will honor Nelson in the fall.
Nelson, a professor emeritus with the University of Connecticut, is a poet, children’s book author and translator. Her works include “A Wreath for Emmett Till,” based on the 1955 lynching murder of the 14-year-old boy; “Carver: a Life in Poems”; “American Ace”; and a memoir, “How I Discovered Poetry.” She is a chancellor of the Academy of American Poets.
On Sunday, Nov. 20, at 4 p.m., at First Congregational Church, 2 Ferry Road, Old Lyme, Nelson will launch her new book, “The Meeting House” (Antrim House, $15), which celebrates the 350th anniversary of the church to which she belongs. Her reading will be followed by a reception.
Information: 860-434-8686.
King’s Book For Kids
Writing under the pseudonym Beryl Evans, Stephen King has published a book for children, “Charlie the Choo-Choo: From the World of The Dark Tower” (Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, $14.90). The story, adapted from a section of King’s novel “The Dark Tower III: The Waste Lands,” is about a train engine that is secretly alive.
Book Club Bookstore & More, 100 Main St., in the Broad Brook section of East Windsor, will celebrate the release with a Stephen King Trivia party led by the store’s King Book Club leader on Wednesday, Nov. 23, from 6 to 7 p.m. The prize is a free copy of the book. Information: 860-623-5100.
Shop Small And Indies First
Indies First programs that promote independent book stores and feature local authors will take place during Small Business Saturday, Nov. 26, at some Connecticut stores.
At Book Club Bookstore & More, 100 Main St., in the Broad Brook section of East Windsor, authors Brianna E. Dunlap, Donna Marie Merritt, Lori Sanchez and Cody Leet, along with various artisans, will mingle with shoppers from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. (Information: 860- 623-5100.)
At R.J. Julia Booksellers, 768 Boston Post Road, Madison, authors will be on hand to greet customers and suggest good books, from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. (Information: 203-245-3959.)
At Hickory Stick Bookshop, 2 Green Hill Road, Washington Depot, Marilyn Singer will sign copies of her most recent book, “Miss Muffet, or What Came After” (Clarion Books, $16.99), and other books at 2 p.m. In Singer’s version, Miss Muffett and the spider team up with other nursery rhyme characters to help a monarch who’s lost his three fiddlers. (Information: 860-868-0525).
At Bank Square Books, 53 W. Main St., Mystic, local authors will take part from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. (Information: 860-536-5795).
Poets on Poetry Series
The Connecticut Poetry Society will continues its free monthly poetry book discussions at the Hartford History Center at the Hartord Public Library 10:15 a.m. to 12:15 p.m.
On Saturday, Nov. 26, Connecticut poet Kate Rushin will lead a discussion of work by Gwendolyn Brooks, the first African-American woman to win a Pulitzer Prize for poetry, in 1950. Rushin is the author of “The Black Back-Ups” and “My Lord, What a Morning,” a collection of poems in honor of Marian Anderson. Information: ctpoetry.net.
Authors At R.J. Julia
R.J. Julia Booksellers, 768 Boston Post Road, Madison, will present two free talks by authors. Reservations are required: 203-245-3959 or rjjulia.com.
Fiona Davis will discuss her debut novel, “The Dollhouse” (Dutton Books, $26), on Sunday, Nov. 20, at 2 p.m. The story is set in the 1950s at the glitzy Barbizon Hotel for Women in New York City, where models, secretaries, and editors lived while seeking success, and a long-hidden secret involving a resident and a maid that is unearthed by a journalist decades later. Davis, a former actress, became an editor and writer whose specialties include dance and theater.
John P. Bowes will discuss his nonfiction book, “Land Too Good for Indians: Northern Indian Removal” (University of Oklahoma Press, $29.95) on Tuesday, Nov. 22, at 7 p.m. In it, Bowes, an associate professor of history at Eastern Kentucky University and a scholar of the history of how northern Indians in the United States were removed from their lands. President Andrew Jackson’s Indian Removal Act of 1830 and the Cherokee Trail of Tears are well-known, but this book details Indian removal in the Old Northwest, a more complex story involving the Delaware, Seneca-Cayuga, Wyandot, Ojibwe and other tribes.
Race, Music And Family
The Hickory Stick Bookshop, 2 Green Hill Road, Washington Depot, will present a reading and signing by Daniel Bergner, author of “Sing for Your Life: A Story of Race, Music, and Family” (Lee Boudreaux Books, $28) on Friday, Nov. 25, at 6 p.m.
The true story is about a young black teen, Ryan Speedo Green, who grew up in poverty and in trouble and was incarcerated in solitary confinement at age 12, but went on to achieve a career in opera. With the help of teachers, he found his calling in music at age 24 and won a nationwide competition hosted by New York’s Metropolitan Opera. He now performs major roles at the Met and opera houses in Europe.
Bergner is a contributing writer for the New York Times Magazine and the author of a novel, “Moments of Favor,” and four books of nonfiction: “What Do Women Want?,” “The Other Side of Desire,” “In the Land of the Magic Soldiers” and “God of the Rodeo.” Information: 860-0868-0525 or hickorystickbookshop.
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