Annual Author's Extravaganza in Emporia, Kansas!

This Saturday, June 26, I'll head out on the Kansas turnpike to Emporia, Kansas, home to Town Crier Bookstore for their Fourth Annual Author's Extravaganza booksigning event! This is the last Town Crier bookstore in Kansas. When I was growing up in Wichita there were two or three of them in town. I always liked them because they had big glass jars of pipe tobacco that smelled so good when the clerk removed the lid to dip some out for a customer! In addtion to books, Town Criers featured gifts and cards, and old-fashioned stick candy. Eventually, they closed--perhaps with the coming of the chain bookstores.

As you can see from their website, dozens of authors with several styles and genres of books will be there--who knows if I'll sell any books at all, but at least I'll meet some interesting people!

My mother attended Emporia State Teachers College--now Emporia State University--briefly before World War II; when the young men went off to war she moved to Wichita to work at Boeing. It was in Wichita that she met my father on a blind date (68 years ago this Fourth of July)!