The public is invited to join our evening book club for a meet and greet with author, Melissa Stephenson. She is the author of Driven: A white-Knuckled Ride to Heartbreak and Back.
Growing up in a blue-collar family in the Midwest, Melissa Stephenson longed for escape. Her wanderlust was an innate reaction to the powerful personalities around her, and came too from her desire to find a place in the world where her artistic ambitions wouldn’t be thwarted. She found in automobiles the promise of a future beyond Indiana state lines.
From a lineage of secondhand family cars of the late ’60s, to the Honda that carried her from Montana to Texas as her new marriage disintegrated, to the ’70s Ford she drove away from her brother’s house after he took his life (leaving Melissa the truck, a dog, and a few mixed tapes), to the VW van she now uses to take her kids camping, she knows these cars better than she knows some of the people closest to her. Driven away from grief, and toward hope, Melissa reckons with what it means to lose a beloved sibling. Driven is a powerful story of healing, for all who have had to look back at pain to see how they can now move forward.
The author will speak via Zoom to attendees. We will meet in the Hickory meeting rooms on Tuesday, June 29, at 6:30. No registration is required. If unable to attend in person, please join us on Zoom from wherever you may be!