Join UC Libraries at Books by the Banks October 20

Posted on by

Join UC Libraries and celebrate the joy of reading and books at the 6th annual Books by the Banks: Cincinnati USA Book Festival, Saturday, October 20, from 10am to 4pm at the Duke Energy Convention Center downtown. The day-long festival will feature over 100 regional and national  authors, book signings, author panels and book talks, plus activities for the entire family to  enjoy in the Kids’ Corner presented by The Carol Ann and Ralph V. Haile, Jr./U.S. Bank Foundation. All events are free and open to the public.

At the  festival, attendees will have the opportunity to meet authors and to purchase  signed copies of their books. Books by the Banks features writers in various categories including fiction, non-fiction, cooking, children’s literature, local  travel, sports, and more. Nationally known authors such as Gillian Flynn (Gone Girl), Karl Marlantes (What It Is Like to Go to War), Katherine Howe (The House of Velvet and Glass), and Robert & Cortney Novogratz (Home by Novogratz) will join local favorites Loren Long (Nightsong), Robert Flischel (Messages of Glory: The Narrative Art of Roman Catholocism), and Ellen Schreiber (Immortal Hearts) in the Author Pavilion.

Three University  of Cincinnati authors will be among the 100+ authors at the festival. The UC authors are:

  • Joel B. Peckham, Jr., associate professor of English, UC Clermont College. His book, Resisting Elegy: On Grief and Recovery, is a collection of narratives that explore the transformative power of emotional and physical pain from the vantage point of a husband and parent who lost his wife and a child in an accident that left him in chronic distress. Along the way, Peckham fills a need for a brutally honest, literary examination of not only grief and suffering, but also of recovery.
  • Leah Stewart, associate professor of English in the McMicken College of Arts and Sciences. Stewart will interview author Gillian Flynn in an open book discussion at 2:30pm. In addition, a limited number of galley copies of Stewart’s upcoming book The History of Us will be given away.
  • Luke Geddes, PhD student in the English and Comparative Literature Department in the McMicken College of Arts and Sciences. Geddes’ publishing debut, I Am A Magical Teenage Princess, is a collection of 17 short stories that take a cracked-lens look at the past five decades of troubled teens, American pop culture, and media mania. Read more.

Other participating authors with ties to UC include: Dan Andriacco, author of Holmes Sweet Holmes, UC graduate; David Bell, author of The Hiding Place, attended UC; Edward Paxton and Jerry Glenn Harris, authors of Straight White Shield: A Life and Works of John Hauser 1859-1913, both retired UC professors, Nancy Herriman, author of The Irish Healer, UC graduate; and Christopher Bennett, Only Superhuman, UC graduate.

A  commemorative Books by the Banks poster by local artisit Marlene Steele will be available for purchase at the festival for $15.

Books by the Banks is organized by UC Libraries, the Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County, The Mercantile Library, Joseph-Beth Booksellers, Northern Kentucky University Library, Clermont County Library, Midpointe Library System, and Lane Libraries.

The Books by the Banks website has information on the authors scheduled to appear at the event, a schedule of panel sessions, activities scheduled in the Kids’ Corner, as well as directions and parking information for Duke Energy Convention Center. For more information, visit www.booksbythebanks.org.