(Chelsea Update would like to thank Laura Brown for the information in this story.)
Chelsea District Library (CDL) recently announced the 16th Annual Midwest Literary Walk lineup featuring Memoirist & New Yorker Cartoonist Roz Chast, American Book Award Author and Poet Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, and 2023 Michigan Notable Book Award Author Wade Rouse (Viola Shipman).
Each year, Chelsea’s amazing literary event showcases award-winning authors from around the country at historic venues throughout downtown Chelsea. The walk will take place from 1–5 pm on Saturday, April 20. It includes author talks, book signings, and is free and open to the public.
At 1 pm, New York Times bestselling author Roz Chast opens the walk at Main Street Church, 320 N. Main St. He is perhaps most well known for her work for The New Yorker, including covers and cartoons published consistently from 1978 to today. She is also the author of more than a dozen books, including Can’t We Talk about Something More Pleasant? and her latest, I Must Be Dreaming.
Chast is a National Books Critic Circle Award winner, a National Book Award finalist, and a recipient of a Reuben Award and a Heinz Award among many others.
Dr. Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni continues the walk at 2:30 pm. at First Congregational Church of Chelsea, 121 E. Middle St., Chelsea. Divakaruni is the author of more than 20 books, including Mistress of Spices, Oleander Girl, Before We Visit the Goddess, The Last Queen, and her most recent novel, Independence. With her novels and her poetry, Divakaruni captures contemporary life in America and India as well as history, and mythology.
She has received an American Book Award, a PEN Josephine Miles award, a Premio Scanno (also known as the Italian Nobel) award, a Light of India award, and an Allen Ginsberg poetry among many others. Two of her novels, The Mistress of Spices and Ammar Maa, have been made into films.
The walk concludes at 4 pm at Chelsea First United Methodist Church, 128 Park St., Chelsea, with Wade Rouse, internationally bestselling author of fiction and memoir. Rouse writes under both his given name, and under Viola Shipman, a pen name inspired by his grandmother and meant to honor poor Ozarks seamstress whose sacrifices changed his family’s life and inspire his fiction.
Rouse’s books have been NBC’s Today Show Must-Reads, Michigan Notable Books of the Year, featured in the Washington Post and USA Today, chosen three times as Indie Next Picks by the nation’s independent booksellers, and selected as part of the American Library Association’s inaugural “Rainbow List.”
Books will be available for purchase at each location courtesy of Serendipity Books and time will be reserved for book signings following each author session. For more information about this year’s Midwest Literary Walk visit www.midwestliterarywalk.org.
This year’s event is sponsored by the Friends of Chelsea District Library and in partnership with Chelsea Chamber of Commerce and Serendipity Books.
About Us: Chelsea District Library (CDL) is a not-for-profit organization whose mission is to engage, inspire, and equip through evolving services and resources. CDL currently serves 16,126 residents in the Chelsea library district—City of Chelsea, Lyndon and Sylvan Townships, and the portions of Lima and Dexter Townships within the Chelsea School District. For more information visit www.chelseadistrictlibrary.org.
