Jan McCanless, local award-winning, best-selling mystery writer, will be a featured author at the BookMarks festival in Winston-Salem, on Saturday, Sept. 8.

She will sign books and meet fans at the Indigo Sea Press booth from 10 a.m. until 4 p.m.  The event is free and is held in downtown Winston-Salem.

From there she goes to Lumberton, for the Book ‘Em festival Sept. 22 to be held on the Robeson County Community College campus.  McCanless will be there throughout the day. The Book ‘Em Foundation was founded by suspense author P.M.Terrell and Waynesboro, Virginia, Police Officer Mark Kearney as a partnership between authors and law enforcement. The mission of The Book ‘Em Foundation is to raise public awareness of the correlation between high illiteracy rates and high crime rates.

Book ‘Em North Carolina is a one-day event that brings together more than 75 authors, publishers, literary agents and publicists under one roof. The event is open to the public and is free for attendees, participating authors and presenters.

It is hosted by Robeson Community College, The Book ‘Em Foundation, Friends of the Robeson County Public Library, Robeson County Arts Council, Lumberton Visitors Bureau and the city of Lumberton.

McCanless is the author of the Beryls Cove mystery series, as well as a how-to manual for writers, “The In$ and Out$ of Making Money From Writing.” She lives in China Grove, and is working on her 15th book.

Writers group meets Aug. 25

The first organizational  meeting of the Rowan Writers Group will be on Saturday, Aug. 25, at Rowan Public Library in the Hurley Room., from 1-3 p.m.

Bring  ideas, a snack, a short piece to read and have your say. For further information, call 704-433-7390, Peggy Barnhardt.

Literary Festival

The Carolina Mountain Literary Festival will be Sept. 6-8 in Burnsville in Yancey County. Pre-registration ends Aug. 31 for various workshops held during the event.

The Thursday night performance will be by Kane Smego, a National Poetry Slam finalist and Hip Hop artist.

Friday night’s banquet will be prepared by Michael W. Twitty, the 2018 James Beard Award Winner for best writer and best book, “The Cooking Gene.”

Author Gail Godwin is the Saturday night keynote speaker.

For more information and to register, go to cmlitfest.org