One of this weekend’s top literary events in North Carolina has already gotten a plug earlier this week, when an interview with Emyl Jenkins appeared on this site. Jenkins will kick off the tour of her new Sterling Glass mystery, The Big Steal, tonight — Friday, June 26 — at Quail Ridge Books in Raleigh. And for anyone who already has Friday evening plans, Jenkins will be reading again on Sunday at McIntyre’s Books in Fearrington Village.
But she’s not the only author worth catching over the next few days. Tonight she has stiff competition from Bob Zellner, discussing his book, The Wrong Side of Murder Creek: A White Southerner in the Freedom Movement, at Durham’s Regulator Bookshop. And on Wednesday, July 1, Jeffrey Deaver brings his latest crime novel, Roadside Crosses, to the Barnes and Noble at Brier Creek Commons in Raleigh.
On the lighter side, however, and with a local twist (or shag, more accurately), two bookstores will be hosting N.W. “Red” Pope this weekend The Dance Band from Deacontown, a memoir about the 12-piece orchestra The Southerners, formed at Wake Forest College in the 1950s and going on the road to perform for “college, high school and military dances, festivals, special occasions and ‘shag-dancing’ beachgoers.” Red was the drummer (and I think it’s a rule somewhere that the drummer always has the best stories). He’ll be at McIntyre’s Books on Saturday, July 27, and down in Wilmington at Pomegranate Books on Sunday the 28th.
