Our wildly popular Book Bar is back! This is an upbeat social event for book lovers who want to mingle, read, or both.

Let’s be honest, our last Book Bar was a page-turning hit. With signature cocktails and an engaged crowd, we set the bar (pun intended) pretty high!

We’re bringing Book Bar to a brand-new spot—Grandview Cafe—and we can’t wait to welcome you for another round of good books, good drinks, and good conversation. Whether you're deep into a novel or just dipping into your latest poetry collection, this is your chance to sip, snack, and settle in with a book among fellow readers. Grab a cocktail (yes, there’ll be a themed one), order a bite to eat, and enjoy a space where you can read quietly, chat casually, or both. Stay for a few chapters or the whole night—it’s up to you.

Choose from the Event Only ticket (includes admission, one standard drink, and snacks) or upgrade to an Event + Blind Date Book Bundle ticket (includes one randomly selected “Blind Date” book, admission, one standard drink, and snacks).

I SEE YOU’VE CALLED IN DEAD

The Office meets Six Feet Under meets About a Boy in this coming-of-middle-age tale about having a second chance to write your life’s story.

Bud Stanley is an obituary writer who is afraid to live. Yes, his wife recently left him for a “far more interesting” man. Yes, he goes on a particularly awful blind date with a woman who brings her ex. And yes, he has too many glasses of Scotch one night and proceeds to pen and publish his own obituary. The newspaper wants to fire him. But now the company’s system has him listed as dead. And the company can’t fire a dead person. The ensuing fallout forces him to realize that life may be actually worth living.

As Bud awaits his fate at work, his life hangs in the balance. Given another shot by his boss and encouraged by his best friend, Tim, a worldly and wise former art dealer who is now confined to a wheelchair, Bud starts to attend the wakes and funerals of strangers to learn how to live.

Thurber Prize winner and New York Times bestselling author John Kenney tells a funny, touching story about life and death, about the search for meaning, about finding and never letting go of the preciousness of life.

ABOUT JOHN KENNEY

The one and only John Kenney is the author of three novels and four books of poetry, including Truth in Advertising, which won The 2014 Thurber Prize for American Humor in Writing, and Love Poems for Married People, which was a finalist for The 2019 Thurber Prize (it’s safe to say he’s funny!). Truth in Advertising was optioned and John wrote the screenplay. He is also the author of Talk to Me, which received a starred Kirkus review. John is a long-time contributor to The New Yorker magazine’s Shouts & Murmurs.

You will have the opportunity to ask the speaker questions after the event, purchase books, and get your books signed.

TROUBLE ISLAND

A gripping new novel inspired by a real place and events from the author’s family, Trouble Island is the standalone suspense debut from historical mystery writer Sharon Short.

Many miles from anywhere in the middle of Lake Erie, Trouble Island serves as a stop-off for gangsters as they run between America and Canada. The remote isle is also the permanent home to two women: Aurelia Escalante, who serves as a maid to Rosita, lady of the mansion and wife to the notorious prohibition gangster, Eddie McGee. In the freezing winter of 1932, the women anticipate the arrival of Eddie and his strange coterie: his right-hand man, a doctor, a cousin, a famous actor, and a rival gangster who Rosita believes murdered their only son.

Aurelia wants nothing more than to escape Trouble Island, but she is hiding a secret of her own. She is in fact not a maid, but a gangster’s wife in hiding, as she runs from the murder she committed five years ago. Her friend Rosita took her in under this guise, but it has become clear that Rosita wants to keep Aurelia right where she is.

Shortly after the group of criminals, celebrities, and scoundrels arrive, Rosita suddenly disappears. Aurelia plans her getaway, going to the shore to retrieve her box of hidden treasures, but instead finds Rosita’s body in the water. Someone has made sure Aurelia was the one to find her. An ice storm makes unexpected landfall, cutting Trouble Island off from both mainlands, and with more than one murderer among them.

ABOUT SHARON SHORT

Sharon Short is the award-winning author of more than fifteen published books. Her newest, Trouble Island, is historical suspense (Minotaur Books), set in 1933 and partly inspired by true family history. Short is a contributing editor to Writer’s Digest, for which she writes the column, “Level Up Your Writing (Life).” She is also a three-time recipient of the Individual Excellence Award in Literary Arts from Ohio Arts Council and has been a John E. Nance Writer in Residence at Thurber House. When not writing, Sharon enjoys spending time with family and friends, reading, swimming, and occasionally hiking. Learn more about her work at www.sharonshort.com or www.jessmontgomeryauthor.com.

You will have the opportunity to ask the speaker questions after the event, purchase books, and get your books signed.

BLACK NIGHT IS FALLING

Scott Woods' third book of poetry wrestles with ecstatic notions of blackness, the beauty and grief to be found in every 'hood carryout, the colonization of pumpkin spice, and backstage tales of the vaunted and mythical Cookout. At turns funny, fearlessly irreverent and dark, Woods composes a love letter to the existential and emotional blues, gathering up all of the love and woe that can be held in the face of a world seemingly resigned to its own blues.

ABOUT SCOTT WOODS

Scott Woods is the author of Black Night Is Falling, We Over Here Now, Urban Contemporary History Month, and Prince and Little Weird Black Boy Gods. Scott has published and edited work in a variety of publications and has been featured multiple times in national press, including several appearances on National Public Radio. Scott is the Founder/Executive Director of Streetlight Guild, which focuses on Columbus art and underrepresented voices. Scott is the former President of Poetry Slam Inc. and co-founder of Writers’ Block Poetry Night, an open mic series in Columbus, Ohio. In 2006, he became the first poet to ever complete a 24-hour solo poetry reading, a feat he bested with six more annual 24-hour readings without repeating a single poem. In October 2020, Scott won an Ohio Valley Regional Emmy Award for contributions to A House That Cannot Fall.

ABOUT HANIF ABDURRAQIB

Hanif Abdurraqib is a poet, essayist, and cultural critic from Columbus, Ohio, and the recipient of a MacArthur Foundation “Genius” grant. His poetry and essays have been published in Muzzle, Vinyl, PEN American, The FADER, Pitchfork, The New Yorker, and The New York Times. Hanif has two award-winning poetry collections, The Crown Ain't Worth Much and A Fortune for Your Disaster. His first collection of essays, They Can't Kill Us Until They Kill Us, was named a book of the year by Buzzfeed, Esquire, NPR, Oprah Magazine, The Los Angeles Review, Pitchfork, and The Chicago Tribune. He released Go Ahead In The Rain: Notes To A Tribe Called Quest in 2019, which became a New York Times bestseller, was a finalist for the Kirkus Prize, and was longlisted for the National Book Award. In 2021, Hanif released the book A Little Devil In America, which won the 2022 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction and the Gordon Burn Prize, and was a finalist for the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award. In 2024, Hanif released There’s Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension, which was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, was longlisted for the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction, and was named a best book of the year by The New York Times Book Review, Time, The Washington Post, NPR, The Boston Globe, The New York Public Library, Chicago Public Library, Publishers Weekly, Kirkus Reviews, and Book Riot.

You will have the opportunity to ask the speakers questions after the event, purchase books, and get your books signed.

RAGE

In this gripping new installment of the Edgar Award winning series, Chief of Police Kate Burkholder investigates a brutal double murder that takes her into the dark underbelly of society and exposes the dangers of Amish lives gone wrong.

Summer has arrived with a vengeance in Painters Mill, and a macabre discovery by three Amish children brings the quiet to a grinding halt. Chief of Police Kate Burkholder arrives on scene to find the dismembered body of 21-year-old Samuel Eicher, a local Amish man who owned a successful landscaping business. What twisted individual murdered him in such a sadistic way?

The investigation has barely begun when, miles away, a second body is found, stuffed into a barrel and dumped in a ravine. The deceased is 21-year-old Aaron Shetler, Samuel Eicher’s best friend. What could these two young Amish men have done to deserve such violent ends?

With a heat wave bearing down, Kate learns quickly that, for reasons she doesn’t understand, no one is willing to talk about what happened to the men. Just as she begins to fear the case may be hopeless, a mystery woman comes forward and reveals that fun-loving Aaron and Samuel had recently befriended some very unsavory characters―individuals who may have ties to a larger, more sinister, black market.

To solve the case, Kate must delve into the most sordid corners of her community, but when she gets too close, the killers target Kate herself. Will the secrets simmering beneath the surface of Painters Mill take another life before she can expose the truth? Or will Kate be the final victim?

ABOUT LINDA CASTILLO

Linda Castillo is the author of the New York Times and internationally bestselling Kate Burkholder mystery series, set in the world of the Amish. The first book, Sworn to Silence, was adapted into a Lifetime original movie titled An Amish Murder, starring Neve Campbell as Kate Burkholder. Critically acclaimed as “the master of the genre” by People magazine, Linda is the recipient of numerous awards, including an Edgar Award and the Sue Grafton Memorial Award, and was nominated by the International Thriller Writers for Best Hardcover, as well as for an Audie Award for best mystery audiobook and was on Boston Globe’s shortlist for best crime novel. Her books have sold over four million copies worldwide and have been translated into fourteen languages. In addition to writing, Castillo’s other passion is horses. She lives on a ranch in Texas with her husband, three Appaloosas, and two feisty but loveable Blue Heelers. She loves hearing from readers.

You will have the opportunity to ask the speaker questions after the event, purchase books, and get your books signed.

Join us at historic Green Lawn Cemetery for this family-friendly event to celebrate the work of one of America’s most beloved humorists (and cemetery resident), James Thurber!

Relax among the 200 year old trees and over 175 years of history as you eat a delicious picnic dinner from our friends at City Barbeque, enjoy live music, and listen to dramatic tellings of some of James Thurber’s most famous stories, including “The Night the Ghost Got In” and “The Dog That Bit People.” Thurber’s timeless tales will be told by special guest readers, bringing his wit and charm to life under the open sky.

Green Lawn Cemetery’s knowledgeable historians will also lead tours of the Thurber family gravesite, where our namesake humorist is buried and the iconic statue of James Thurber’s infamous Airedale terrier Muggs, “The Dog That Bit People,” has watched over his family since its installation in 2021.

ABOUT GREEN LAWN CEMETERY & THE GRAND GAZEBO

Green Lawn Cemetery opened in 1849 as 84 acres and has since grown to 325 acres, making it Ohio’s second largest cemetery. Its majestic grounds feature a native forest, historic mausoleums and unique monuments, and the Tiffany-decorated Huntington Chapel. Green Lawn is the final resting place of several U.S. presidential families, five governors, five Medal of Honor recipients, artists, actors, and over 6,000 U.S. veterans.

In 2024, the Grand Gazebo at Green Lawn Cemetery was placed on a grassy lawn at the original east entrance, now the center of the cemetery, to commemorate the 175th anniversary of the consecration and opening of the grounds. The theme of both the structure and the anniversary year is "175 Years of Love and Remembrance."  The Grand Gazebo was intended to provide an event centerpiece that is both impressive and practical—a spot for performances, services, weddings, photography, and other memorable occasions.

DINNER SPONSOR: CITY BARBEQUE

A special thank you to City Barbeque for generously sponsoring our picnic dinner at Green Lawn Cemetery! Thanks to their support, guests will enjoy delicious, mouthwatering BBQ.