Dasher: Saturday Storytime with Matt Tavares
Featured Book
Dasher (Animated Special Cover Edition)
This book will be available for purchase at the event.
About This Event
We are so excited to welcome back to the store Matt Tavares for a very special holiday Saturday Storytime featuring his picture book, Dasher: How a Brave Little Doe Changed Christmas Forever. Return to the beloved Christmas story of Dasher—now with exclusive additions featuring art from the Disney Jr. and Disney+ animated special! Mr. Tavares will be hosting a fun storytime and drawing demo with a book signing to follow.
Dasher is an adventurous young reindeer with a wish in her heart. She spends her days with her family under the hot sun in a traveling circus, but she longs for a different life—one where there is snow beneath her hooves and the North Star above her head. One day, when the opportunity arises, Dasher seizes her destiny and takes off in pursuit of the life she wants to live. It’s not long before she meets a nice man in a red suit with a horse-drawn sleigh—a man named Santa. And soon, with the help of a powerful Christmas wish, nothing will be the same.
Featured Author
Matt Tavares
Matt Tavares is the author-illustrator of the New York Times best-selling picture book Dasher and its sequels, Dasher Can’t Wait for Christmas and Dasher and the Polar Bear, as well as Red and Lulu, the graphic novel Hoops, and several sports biographies, including Becoming Babe Ruth and Growing Up Pedro. He is also the illustrator of Twenty-One Steps: Guarding the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier by Jeff Gottesfeld, The Gingerbread Pirates by Kristin Kladstrup, ’Twas the Night Before Christmas by Clement C. Moore, and Over the River and Through the Wood by L. Maria Child, among many other picture books. Matt Tavares lives in Ogunquit, Maine.
About the Venue
The Book Stall
At The Book Stall, you get great reviews, sage advice/recommendations, and a personalized service for all ages and interests. If You love books, look no further than an indie store!
Visit store pageMore at The Book Stall
The Majesty of Chicago Jazz: A Discussion with Howard Reich
The Book Stall welcomes music journalist Howard Reich for an in-store discussion featuring his new book, The Majesty of Chicago Jazz: Twenty-Five Visionaries Who Define the City's Sound. Author and Chicago native Howard Reich gives readers a front-row seat to the history of Chicago jazz as it roared forth in jazz clubs, concert halls, and festivals. Reich covered Chicago jazz for more than thirty years as the Chicago Tribune’s staff critic, and in this collection, with a musician’s ear and a journalist’s expertise, Reich argues that jazz as an art form is inconceivable without Chicago. The Majesty of Chicago Jazz is captivating for jazz newcomers and aficionados alike—all are guaranteed to learn something surprising here. Howard Reich covered music for the Chicago Tribune for forty-three years and served as the newspaper’s staff jazz critic from 1989 to 2021. Reich is an Emmy Award-winning filmmaker and the author of six other books, including Let Freedom Swing and Portraits in Jazz. Reich served on the jury for the Pulitzer Prize in Music four times, including the year when Wynton Marsalis’ Blood on the Fields became the first jazz composition to win (1997).
The Piano Teacher of Montparnasse: An Evening with Heather Morris
The Book Stall welcomes bestselling author Heather Morris for her new book, The Piano Teacher of Montparnasse. The #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Tattooist of Auschwitz returns with a masterful new novel that captures the astonishing bravery of ordinary people in extraordinary times. Ms. Morris will be in-conversation with author Renée Rosen. Heather Morris is a native of New Zealand, now residing in Australia. For several years, while working in a large public hospital in Melbourne, she studied and wrote screenplays. In 2003, she was introduced to a gentleman who had "a story worth telling," which formed the basis of her first novel, The Tattooist of Auschwitz, and its follow-up, Cilka's Journey. Her third novel, Three Sisters, concluded the Tattooist trilogy. One of the twenty-first century's best-selling books, The Tattooist of Auschwitz was made into an acclaimed miniseries in 2024. Heather's books have sold over nineteen million copies worldwide. Our conversation partner Renée Rosen is a USA Today bestselling author. Her novels include Fifth Avenue Glamour Girl, The Social Graces, Park Avenue Summer, Windy City Blues, White Collar Girl, What the Lady Wants and Dollface as well as the young adult novel, Every Crooked Pot.
Draw Near to Me: An Evening with Michelle Brafman
We excited to host Michelle Brafman for her new book, Draw Near to Me. In this highly-anticipated sequel to Swimming with Ghosts, the discovery of a desperately-hidden secret brings a family to the brink of collapse—the exact place where they may ultimately find true healing and forgiveness. She will be in conversation with Rachel Kamin, Director of Lifelong Learning at North Suburban Synagogue Beth El. Michelle Brafman is the author of Washing the Dead, Bertrand Court: Stories, and Swimming with Ghosts, the companion novel to Draw Near to Me. Her work has appeared in Oprah Daily, O Quarterly, Slate, LitHub, Tablet, The Forward, and elsewhere. She teaches fiction writing in the Johns Hopkins University MA in Writing Program and spoken about her work and the creative process at more than 200 venues, including book stores, literary festivals, classrooms, synagogues, and myriad book groups. Learn more at michellebrafman.com.