Meet the Authors: Susanna Kearsley, Ariel Lawhon, Karen White and Kimberly Brock. 6:30 p.m. Jan. 20. Free. FoxTale Book Shoppe, 105 E. Main St., Woodstock. 770-516-9989, www.foxtalebookshoppe.com/events/. In "The Splendour Falls," Kearsley blends history, romance and a bit of the supernatural. Lawhon's "The Wife, the Maid and the Mistress" reimagines the mysterious disappearance of a New York City judge in 1930 as seen through the eyes of the three women who knew him best. "Return to Tradd Street" is the final book in the popular and ghostly series by White, the queen of Southern fiction. Brock won the Georgia Author of the Year award for her debut novel, "The River Witch." All books will be on sale; authors will sign only those books purchased on site.
Lunch and Learn: Richard Cloues, "After the Bungalow, Before the Ranch: The Small American House Phenomenon, 1920s-1950s." Noon Jan. 21. Lecture. Free. Second floor, Superior Courtroom, Historic DeKalb Courthouse, 101 E. Court Square, Decatur. 404-373-1088, www.dekalbhistory.org/dekalb_history_center_events-programs.htm. Bring your lunch to Cloues' informative talk about the growing appreciation for the many small one- or one-and-a-half-story houses in modest Colonial, English or plain styles built from the 1920s to the 1950s. Using examples primarily from Decatur and DeKalb County, he will show that these "second-child-in-a-three-child-family" houses were quite revolutionary in their time, representing profound changes in the way American houses were designed and built in response to economic challenges, new technologies, and changing family circumstances.
Patti Digh, "The Geography of Loss: Embrace What Is, Honor What Was, Love What Will Be." 7:15 p.m. Jan. 21. Talk and signing. Free. Decatur Library Auditorium, 215 Sycamore St., Decatur. 404-370-8450, Ext. 2225, www.georgiacenterforthebook.org/Events/show.php?id=648. The author of "Life Is a Verb" and "Four-Word Self-Help" returns to discuss her unique new guidebook, an atlas of the experiences of loss and grief, a map for living through and into change and impermanence, to moving on anew. You are the navigator through the three main sections: embrace what is: walk into your new landscape; honor what was: be grateful for your old landscape; and love what will be: live into your future landscape.
Jayne Anne Phillips, "Quiet Dell." 6 p.m. Jan. 22. Talk and signing. $10. SCAD Writing Center, Event Space 4C, SCAD Atlanta, 1600 Peachtree St. N.W., Atlanta. 404-253-3206, www.scad.edu/event/author-jayne-anne-phillips-discuss-career-and-new-book-quiet-dell. In her haunting new book, Phillips ("Lark and Termite") reimagines the real-life 1931 murders of an innocent family in West Virginia all the way back to the "lonely hearts" column exchanges that started it all. Serial killer Harry Powers, portrayed in the novel, was the inspiration for the classic 1955 film "The Night of the Hunter."
Also appearing: 7:30 p.m. Jan. 23. Arts & Sciences Auditorium, Georgia College, 231 W. Hancock St., Milledgeville. 478-445-5004, http://events.gcsu.edu/civicrm/event/info?reset=1&id=5670.
Ishmael Beah, "Radiance of Tomorrow." 7 p.m. Jan. 22. Reading and signing. Free. The Carter Presidential Center: Carter Presidential Library & Museum Theater, 441 Freedom Parkway, Atlanta. 404-865-7100, www.jimmycarterlibrary.gov/events/. When Beah's debut memoir, "A Long Way Gone," was published in 2007, it became an instant classic: a harrowing account of Sierra Leone's civil war and the fate of child soldiers forced to fight it. Now Beah returns with his first novel, an affecting, tender parable about postwar life in Sierra Leone.
Erskine Clarke, "By the Rivers of Water: A Nineteenth-Century Atlantic Odyssey." 8 p.m. Jan. 22. Lecture and signing. $10. Atlanta History Center, 130 W. Paces Ferry Road N.W., Atlanta. 404-814-4150, www.atlantahistorycenter.com/cms/Lectures+/494.html. In his new book, award-winning historian and religious scholar Clarke traces the path of a 19th-century missionary couple, John Leighton Wilson and his wife Jane, who left the privileges and comforts of their Southern home to spread the gospel in West Africa. Educated Protestants who came from well-established, slaveholding families, the couple's journey from high society to the shores of Cape Palmas is one of deep contradiction, good intentions and bitter consequences.
Sheila K. Collins, "Warrior Mother: Fierce Love, Unbearable Loss and Rituals that Heal." 7:30 p.m. Jan 22. Suggested donation $5. Charis Books & More, 1189 Euclid Ave N.E., Atlanta. 404-524-0304, www.charisbooksandmore.com/event/warrior-mother-fierce-love-unbearable-loss-and-rituals-heal-evening-sheila-k-collins. Social worker and dancer Collins, tested to the limits of understanding and endurance by her son's battle with AIDS and her daughter's terminal breast cancer, has written a poignant story of love and grief, and about the rituals that help those left behind to heal and to triumph over despair.
