Author Shannon McLeod speaking at New Dominion Bookshop on April 28

New Dominion Bookshop will host a book reading and signing with author Shannon McLeod on Friday, April 28, at 7 p.m..

McLeod will be reading from her new short story collection, Nature Trail Stories, which will be released from Thirty West Publishing in March.

A conversation with author Katharine Schellman will follow.

This in-person event is free to attend and open to the public.

The characters in Nature Trail Stories escape to nature and commune with it. A housewife fantasizes about avenues of her own demise, a young man wants to save his addict brother from himself, a counseling patient tries therapeutic screaming instead, a mother seeks bonding with her teenage son during lockdown, a young woman finds healing through sexual exploration at a music festival. Ruminative and reflective, Nature Trail Stories interrogates humans’ desperation for and struggle with connection, highlighting the power of solitude as an agent of personal alchemy.

McLeod is the author of the novella Whimsy (Long Day Press, 2021) and the short story collection Nature Trail Stories (Thirty West Publishing, 2023). Her writing has appeared in Tin House, Prairie Schooner, Hobart, and SmokeLong Quarterly, among other publications.

Her work has been nominated for Best Small Fictions and Best of the Net and was also featured in the Wigleaf Top 50. Born in Detroit, she now lives in Charlottesville.

Schellman writes historical mysteries filled with intricate plots and smart, gutsy sleuths. Her newest series, set in Jazz Age NYC, launched in 2022 with Last Call at the Nightingale, a gritty, glamorous mystery that was a New York Times editors’ pick for June and named one of the best mysteries of the summer by Publishers Weekly, Bustle, Goodreads and more.

New Dominion Bookshop is located at 404 E Main St. in Charlottesville.

For more information, visit ndbookshop.com.