The Moveable Feast
Mostly Fridays, 11 AM-1 PM, $30*
Literary luncheons with exciting authors at area restaurants
The Moveable Feast is held at area restaurants throughout the year on Fridays, 11 AM-1 PM. On occasion, an author’s book tour schedule is accommodated with a mid-week Moveable Feast. For each feast, the chef prepares an exquisite menu, typically unavailable during the restaurant’s public hours. (Food allergies and Lenten observance are accommodated with advance notice.) The presentation precedes the meal. Individuals, couples, friends, book clubs and other groups are assigned table seating. Each literary luncheon is followed by a book signing at Litchfield Books at 2 PM for those unable to participate in the feast. Each is $30 with a $5 rebate when the featured book is purchased at the Moveable Feast, with some *exceptions when the book is included. For reservations, call 843.235.9600 or visit ClassAtPawleys.com.
April 5 ~ Bill Noel (Dark Horse and Joy) at Kimbel’s, Wachesaw
Join one of our favorites for a twofer—the 14th and 15th installments in his Folly Beach Mystery series! In Dark Horse, an accidental drug overdose is ruled the cause of the death of the daughter of Chris Landrum’s neighbor. The young woman’s father, a retired police detective, had accused Chris of murder days after he’d arrived on Folly Beach a decade ago, and they’ve butted heads frequently since then. So, why get involved and question the cause of death? Could it be because the daughter was dating Joel Hurt, a man on the path to unseating Chris’s good friend, Brian Newman, as mayor of the small barrier-island? Then, Joy finds Chris and his friend Barbara Deanelli’s search for shark teeth abruptly changes directions when they discover a woman at water’s edge clinging to a surfboard. How she got there was a mystery—a mystery compounded when she doesn’t remember her name, her past, or who abducted her and nearly sent her to her death in the mid-December waters off the coast of Folly Beach. Chris and a cadre of his quirky pals are determined to learn the woman’s identity and what happened. Whoever said that retirement was to be a time of peace and relaxation never spent time with Chris and his friends.
*Tuesday, April 9 ~ Jennie Holton Fant, ed. (Sojourns in Charleston, South Carolina, 1865–1947:
From the Ruins of War to the Rise of Tourism) at Sea View Inn
Fant continues her excellent compilation of travelers’ descriptions of Charleston (The Travelers’ Charleston: Accounts of Charleston and Lowcountry, South Carolina, 1666-1861). This new work begins after the Civil War, when northern journalists flocked south to report on the “city of desolation” and ruin, continues through Reconstruction, and then moves into the era when national magazine writers began to promote the region as a paradise. From there twentieth-century accounts document a wide range of topics, from the living conditions of African Americans to the creation of cultural institutions that supported preservation and tourism. The most recognizable of the writers include author Owen Wister, novelist William Dean Howells, artist Norman Rockwell, Boston poet Amy Lowell, novelist and Zionist leader Ludwig Lewisohn, poet May Sarton, novelist Glenway Wescott on British author Somerset Maugham in the lowcountry, and French philosopher and writer Simone de Beauvoir. Their varied viewpoints help weave a beautiful tapestry of narratives that reveal the fascinating and evocative history that make Charleston the captivating city it is today.
April 12 ~ A. J. Mayhew (Tomorrow’s Bread) at Pine Lakes, Myrtle Beach
From the author of the acclaimed The Dry Grass of August comes a richly researched yet lyrical Southern-set novel that explores the conflicts of gentrification—a moving story of loss, love, and resilience. In 1961 Charlotte, North Carolina, the predominantly black neighborhood of Brooklyn is a bustling city within a city. Self-contained and vibrant, it has its own restaurants, schools, theaters, churches, and night clubs. There are shotgun shacks and poverty, along with well-maintained houses like the one Loraylee Hawkins shares with her young son, Hawk, her Uncle Ray, and her grandmother, Bibi. Loraylee’s love for Archibald Griffin, Hawk’s white father and manager of the cafeteria where she works, must be kept secret in the segregated South. Loraylee has heard rumors that the city plans to bulldoze her neighborhood, claiming it’s dilapidated and dangerous. The government promises to provide new housing and relocate businesses. But locals like Pastor Ebenezer Polk, who’s facing the demolition of his church, know the value of Brooklyn does not lie in bricks and mortar. Generations have lived, loved, and died here, supporting and strengthening each other. Yet street by street, longtime residents are being forced out. And Loraylee, searching for a way to keep her family together, will form new alliances—and find an unexpected path that may yet lead her home.
April 19 ~ Carla Buckley (Liar’s Child) at Inlet Provision Company
Carla Buckley, the internationally bestselling author of The Good Goodbye, The Deepest Secret, Invisible, and The Things That Keep Us Here, which was nominated for a Thriller Award as a best first novel, is a graduate of Oberlin College and the Wharton School of Business, and currently lives in Chapel Hill. In this intense and intimate family portrait that moves at a thriller’s pace, a troubled woman faces a gripping moral dilemma after rescuing two abandoned children from a hurricane. Buckley crafts a richly rewarding psychological portrait, combining a heart-wrenching family drama with high-stakes suspense, as the lives of three characters intertwine in an unforgettable story of fury, fate—and redemption.
*April 26 ~ Frances Mayes (See You in the Piazza) at Ocean One, Litchfield ($60, incl. book)
Mayes (Under the Tuscan Sun and Women in Sunlight) gives a sparkling and irresistible view of Italy in her eighth book, in which she and her husband explore the country from north to south. Mayes begins in Piedmont and ends in Catania, Sicily. Along the way she treats readers to “oh-pull-over” views, looks inside glorious churches, descriptions of innumerable meals (in Sardegna “the seafood fritto misto comes to us hot and crisp, and the grilled fish under a heap of chopped celery and tomatoes”), and recipes for the dishes they ate (e.g., gnocchi with wild hare from Friuli-Venezia Giulia). Mayes weaves into her narrative historical background (in mid-11th-century Puglia, Frederick II “built castle, mint, treasury and… brought twenty thousand Arab Muslims from Sicily” as troops) and practical travel tips, such as not checking luggage on planes and packing gold-colored sandals (they transform casual to dressy). Mayes has a wonderful eye for detail as she lyrically describes her surroundings, like a river that’s “a long skein in the moonlight, as though a woman has unfurled her silvery gray hair.” Travel, she explains, provides a chance to see life anew and helps form rich memories. Readers will want to take their time, savoring this poetic travelogue like a smooth wine.