Jennifer Senior, "All Joy and No Fun." 8 p.m. April 23. Lecture and signing. $10, reservations required. Atlanta History Center, 130 W. Paces Ferry Road, N.W., Atlanta. 404-814-4150, atlantahistorycenter.com/visit/event/394?calendar=month. Senior examines ordinary mothers and fathers and the many ways in which children reshape their lives.
Stuart Woods, "Carnal Curiosity." 7 p.m. April 23. Signing. Free. Eagle Eye Book Shop, 2076 N. Decatur Road, Decatur. 404-486-0307, eagleeyebooks.com/calendar.html. Stone Barrington is back in the latest adventure in Woods' best-selling series. When Manhattan's elite are beset by a series of clever crimes, Stone and his former partner find themselves drawn into the world of high-end security and fraud.
Drew Perry, "Kids These Days." 7 p.m. April 23. Talk and signing. Free. Manuel's Tavern, 602 N. Highland Ave., Atlanta. 404-525-3447, manuelstavern.com. A couple expecting their first baby relocates to Florida, where the husband, Walter, finds work with his brother-in-law. Before long, there are more frightening developments in Walter's world than the prospect of having a baby — like the two FBI agents who keep popping up and the way his brother-in-law pays him a year's salary in advance in cash.
Jennifer Dickey, "A Tough Little Patch of History." 7:15 p.m. April 23. Talk and signing. Free. Decatur Library Auditorium, 215 Sycamore St., Decatur. 404-370-8450, Ext. 2225; georgiacenterforthebook.org/Events/show.php?id=691. Dickey's book explores how the book and film "Gone With the Wind" threw a spotlight on Atlanta, and how the tiny Midtown apartment where the book was written became a symbol for all that was right and wrong with Margaret Mitchell's writing.
Sara Henning, B.J. Love and Erika Jo Brown. 8 p.m. April 24. Poetry readings. Free. Barnes & Noble @ Emory, 1390 Oxford Road, Atlanta. 404-727-6222, poetrycouncil.campuslifetech.org/the-whats-new-in-poetry-reading-series/2013-2014. Henning's chapbook "To Speak of Dahlias" came out in 2012; Love is the author of "Michigander" (2010); and Brown's chapbook "What a Lark!" was published in 2011.
Jesmyn Ward, "Men We Reaped." 11:30 a.m. April 24. Talk and signing. Free. Georgia Perimeter College, Dunwoody Campus Auditorium, 2101 Womack Road, Dunwoody. 770-274-5000, the-hooch.com/2014/04/08/tcr-guest-author-series-jesmyn-ward-april-24-at-1130-dunwoody. For map and directions, go to gpc.edu/Campus_Maps/Dunwoody.html. Based on her experiences as a child of the Mississippi Bayou, Ward's National Book Award-winning memoir chronicles the passing of her brother and four other young black men in her community.
Todd Purdum, "An Idea Whose Time Has Come: Two Presidents, Two Parties and the Battle for the Civil Rights Act of 1964." 8 p.m. April 24. Lecture and signing. $10, reservations required. Atlanta History Center, 130 W. Paces Ferry Road N.W., Atlanta. 404-814-4150, atlantahistorycenter.com/visit/event/378?calendar=month. Purdum draws on extensive archival research and dozens of new interviews to tell the story of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and the larger-than-life characters — the Kennedy brothers, Lyndon Johnson, Martin Luther King Jr., Hubert Humphrey and Everett Dirksen among them — who made its passage possible.
Debra L. Rothenberg, "Bruce Springsteen in Focus 1980-2012." 7 p.m. April 25. Talk and signing. Free. Barnes & Noble Buckhead, 2900 Peachtree Road N.E., Atlanta. 404-261-7747, store-locator.barnesandnoble.com/event/4681976. Photographer Rothenberg was born and raised in New Jersey, like Springsteen, whose career is covered in this tribute.
