New Dominion Bookshop and local nonprofit WriterHouse will host a virtual book reading with local author Sharon Harrigan on Saturday, July 11, from 7-8 p.m.
A conversation with local author Kristen-Paige Madonia will follow.
Sharon Harrigan’s debut novel, Half, will be released from the University of Wisconsin Press this month. This virtual launch event is free to attend, and attendees should register here.
About the Book
What if two people were so close they shared everything? Paula and Artis are thirty-year-old identical twins who speak in one voice—until they can’t anymore. Their father’s sudden death threatens their uncanny bond. While growing up, they believed he possessed magical powers, but they also lived in fear of him. At his funeral, they retrace their early life—one year per chapter. Will they find their way back to each other, or finally discover the singularity of their true selves?
Written in spare, lyrical prose, Half is an achingly beautiful coming-of-age story, sprinkled with Greek mythology, magical realism, and murder mystery. In her thought-provoking debut novel, Sharon Harrigan gives voice to the complex relationships within families, showing how our fierce love for one another can also be the very thing that leads us to betrayal.
About the Author
Sharon Harrigan is the author of Playing with Dynamite: A Memoir (Truman State University Press, 2017). Her new book, Half, was a finalist for the AWP Novel Prize, and her story upon which this novel is based won the Cecilia Joyce Johnson Award from Key West Seminars and the Kinder Award from Pleaides Magazine. She has an MFA in creative writing from Pacific University and teaches writing at WriterHouse in Charlottesville, where she lives with her husband and daughter.
About the Moderator
Kristen-Paige Madonia is the author of the young adult novels Invisible Fault Lines (2016) and Fingerprints of You (2012), both published by Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers. She holds an MFA from California State University, Long Beach and has taught creative writing at the University of Virginia, James Madison University, Goochland County High School, WriterHouse, and the Key West Literary Seminar. She lives in Charlottesville, and is a faculty mentor with the University of Nebraska’s low-residency MFA in Writing Program.
To order a copy of Half, which releases on June 9, please email New Dominion Bookshop at [email protected] or call the shop at 434-295-2552. Curbside pickup, local delivery within 5 miles of the shop, and shipping (normal rates apply) available.
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