Are you e-book curious?

Come to an interactive e-book demonstration on Sunday, March 6 at 3pm.

We'll take you through the process of purchasing a Google e-book via the Concord Bookshop's website.  These books can be read on your computer browser, many e-reader devices, and smart phones.

Please join us March 13th at 3 pm as we welcome Dr. Kevin Nugent, presenting a slide show and discussing his new book, Your Baby is Speaking to You: A Visual Guide to the Amazing Behaviors of Your Newborn and Growing Baby.

Dr. J. Kevin Nugent is the Founder and Director of the Brazelton Institute at Children's Hospital in Boston and is on the faculty of the Harvard Medical School in the Department of Pediatrics. He is also Professor of Child and Family Studies at the University of Massachusettes at Amherst.

We were delighted when Paula Butturini, a Paris-based writer, stopped by the bookshop to sign copies of her memoir Keeping the Feast: One Couple's Story of Love, Food, and Healing.

When Paula Butturini's husband was shot and nearly killed, it marked the abrupt end of what the couple had known together and the beginning of a phase of life neither had planned for.

A story of food and love, trauma and healing, Keeping the Feast is the triumphant memoir of one couple's nourishment and restoration after a period of tragedy, and the extraordinary sustaining powers of food, family, and friendship.

Join us Thursday, March 31 at 7pm to discuss this edge-of-your seat novel by Masha Hamilton, a journalist and novelist.

Jonas is isolated in a safe-house apartment in New York City, pondering his recent religious conversion and his experiences training in Pakistan, preparing for the violent action he has been instructed to take in 31 hours. Jonas's absence from the lives of those who love him causes a cascade of events, and as the novel moves through the streets and subways of New York we come to know intimately the lives of its characters. We also learn to feel deeply the connections and disconnections that occur between young people and their parents not only in this country but in the Middle East as well.

Carried by Hamilton's highly-lauded prose, this story about the helplessness of those who cannot contact a beloved young man who is on a devastatingly confused path is compelling on the most human level. In our world, when a family loses track of an idealistic son an entire city could be in danger. From the author of The Distance Between Us.

"My husband died, my life collapsed."

On a February morning in 2008, Joyce Carol Oates drove her husband, Raymond Smith, to the emergency room of the Princeton Medical Center where he was diagnosed with pneumonia. Both Joyce and Ray expected him to be released in a day or two. But in less than a week, Ray died from a virulent hospital-acquired infection, and Joyce was suddenly faced-totally unprepared-with the stunning reality of widowhood.

A Widow's Story illuminates one woman's struggle to comprehend a life without the partnership that had sustained and defined her for nearly half a century. Joyce Carol Oates shares the derangement of denial, the anguish of loss, the disorientation of the survivor amid a nightmare of "death-duties," and the solace of friendship. She writes unflinchingly of the experience of grief--the almost unbearable suspense of the hospital vigil, the treacherous "pools" of memory that surround us, the vocabulary of illness, the absurdities of commercialized forms of mourning. Here is a frank acknowledgment of the widow's desperation-only gradually yielding to the recognition that "this is my life now."

Enlivened by the piercing vision, acute perception, and mordant humor that are the hallmarks of the work of Joyce Carol Oates, this moving tale of life and death, love and grief, offers a candid, never-before-glimpsed view of the acclaimed author and fiercely private woman.

Joyce Carol Oates is a recipient of the National Book Critics Circle Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award, the National Book Award, and the PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in Short Fiction, and has been nominated for the Pulitzer Prize.  

"I can hardly believe that it is more than half a century since I first stepped on to the stage of the Old Vic Theatre and into a way of life that has brought me the most rewarding professional relationships and friendships.  I cannot imagine now ever doing anything else with my life except acting..." - Judi Dench

And Furthermore is more than the story of a great actress's career.   It is also the story of Judi Dench's life: her early days as a child in a family that was in love with the theatre; her marriage to actor Michael Williams; the joy she takes in her daughter, the actress Finty Williams, and her grandson, Sammy. Filled with Dench's impish sense of humor and diamond-sharp intelligence, And Furthermore is the audiobook every fan of the great Judi Dench will cherish.

Dame Judi Dench is one of the foremost stage, screen, and television actors of our time.  Honored with every award given for performances on stage and screen, she was awarded the Order of the British Empire in 1970, created a Dame of the British Empire in 1988 and a Companion of Honour in 2005.

Author Sy Montgomery is a naturalist, author, documentary scriptwriter, and radio commentator who writes for children as well as adults. Among her award-winning books are The Good Good Pig, Journey of the Pink Dolphins, Spell of the Tiger, and Search for the Golden Moon Bear.   She has traveled extensively to research her books, and lives in New Hampshire.