Connecting writers and readers for ten years, the Fox Cities Book Festival celebrates books, ideas, stories, and community in the Fox River Valley this October.
In January 2017 I joined the board and have been excited about this year’s new developments. This is the first year the festival will be held in the fall instead of the spring. The Fox Cities Reads program—one book one community—continues to be held in the spring. This year Sharon Draper’s Stella by Starlight brought the Fox Cities together to examine the history of race relations and its relevance today.
The fall lineup of 50 authors and 60 events across a dozen venues throughout the Fox Cities of Neenah, Menasha, Appleton, Kaukauna, Kimberly, and Little Chute is impressive. The 2017 Book Festival celebrates its tenth year by bringing back many favorite authors, along with new authors from Wisconsin and across the country.
Will Schwalbe, author of End of Your Life Book Club and his new title, Books for Living, will speak to the power and joy of books and how they help us have life’s difficult conversations. Host of the radio program, Books and Brews, Laura Vosika is author of the time travel tale, 
Blue Bells Chronicles. Nickolas Butler, The Hearts of Men, Benjamin Ludwig, Ginny Moon, Benjamin Percy, The Dark Net, and Laurie Halse Anderson are only a few of the authors who I’m excited to hear and see. Anderson speaks at UW-Fox Valley on October 10 on “Censorship in America: Why Are Adults so Afraid of the Real World?”
I’m also thrilled to meet two of my clients face-to-face for the first time when they come to the Fox Cities Book Festival 2017 as speakers this October. Ann Marie Ackerman will speak about Death of an Assassin: The True Story of the German Murderer who Died Defending Robert E. Lee (Kent State University Press, September 1, 2017). Ann Marie travels from her home in Germany for the month of October on her book tour and I’m delighted she will be speaking at the Appleton Public Library on October 10 at 3 p.m.
Elizabeth Rynecki will also present at the Fox Cities Book Festival 2017. Author of Chasing Portraits: A Great-Granddaughter’s Quest for Her Lost Art Legacy, Elizabeth Rynecki lives in Oakland and will be coming up to Appleton after an event on Sunday, October 8 at the Deerfield Public Library. She kicks off the week of the Fox Cities Book Festival on Monday, October 9 at 6:30 pm at the Appleton Public Library.
Ten years makes this an exciting time in the festival’s history. There’s a gorgeous new website, great new board members with enthusiasm for all things books, and plans to keep the festivities going all year long. The amazing part of this festival is that all events are free and open to the public. Our goal is to focus on the importance of literacy education and provide a fun culture-building experience for readers and writers of all ages and all walks of life. If you would like to lend your support to the Fox Cities Book Festival, a 501(c) 3 non-profit organization, you can make a donation here.
Writing and Listening — an Interview with Brooke Randel
As a young girl Brooke Randel knew little about the Holocaust—just that it was a catastrophe in which millions were murdered, and that her grandma Golda Indig barely escaped that fate. But her Bubbie never spoke about what happened, and the two spent most of their time together making pleasant memories: baking crescent roll cookies, playing gin rummy, and watching Baywatch. Until an unexpected phone call when Golda said, out of the blue: “You should write about my life. What happened in the war.” What results is a fascinating memoir—about one woman’s harrowing survival, and another’s struggle to excavate theRead more…