Author events, Jan. 2-8
Wendell Potter, "Deadly Spin: An Insurance Company Insider Speaks Out on How Corporate PR Is Killing Health Care and Deceiving Americans." 7:15 p.m. Jan. 4. Talk and signing. Free. Decatur Library Auditorium, 215 Sycamore St., Decatur. 404-370-8450, Ext. 2225, www.georgiacenterforthebook.org.
Potter made national headlines in 2009 with his scorching testimony before the U.S. Senate panel on health care reform. In “Deadly Spin,” the former senior vice president of CIGNA tells all: how health insurers made promises they had no intention of keeping, broke regulations designed to protect consumers, consistently put profits ahead of patient care, and skewed political debate with multibillion-dollar PR campaigns designed to spread misinformation. Essential reading for anyone trying to understand how the system really works.
Kim Edwards, "The Lake of Dreams." 7 p.m. Jan. 8. Lecture. Members $5, nonmembers $10. Reservations required; call 404-814-4150. Literary Center at Margaret Mitchell House & Museum, 990 Peachtree St. N.E., Atlanta. 404-249-7015, www.margaretmitchellhouse.com.
The author of the best-selling “The Memory Keeper’s Daughter” digs into the past again, this time with a story about a woman still haunted by her father’s death a decade earlier. When she discovers a stack of old letters hidden in a cupboard in her childhood home, she becomes engrossed in a mystery with roots going back generations -- and whose resolution will alter long-established family histories and future plans.
Rebecca Falco, "Everything in Its Own Time." 1-2:30 p.m. Jan. 8. Talk and signing. Free. Eagle Eye Book Shop, 2076 N. Decatur Road, Decatur. 404-486-0307, http://eagleeyebooks.com.
Adoption can be a joyous, frustrating, uplifting, disheartening, frightening and exhilarating experience. Native Atlantan and adoptive mother Falco tells her story.
Murray Tillman, "Meet Me on the Paisley Roof." 5-6:30 p.m. Jan. 8. Signing. Free. Eagle Eye Book Shop, 2076 N. Decatur Road, Decatur. 404-486-0307, http://eagleeyebooks.com.
Tillman, a professor emeritus at the University of Georgia, paints a realistic portrait of adolescence in his coming-of-age novel set in Columbus in the 1950s.