Roundabout Books will host Eileen Garvin, bestselling author of The Music of Bees for the paperback release of Crow Talk, a moving story of hope, healing, and unexpected friendship set amidst the wild natural beauty of the Pacific Northwest, in conversation with local author Beth Alvarado. The event will be held at Roundabout Books on May 1 at 6:30pm.
Frankie O’Neill and Anne Ryan would seem to have nothing in common. Frankie is a lonely ornithologist struggling to salvage her dissertation on the spotted owl following a rift with her advisor. Anne is an Irish musician far from home and family, raising her five-year-old son, Aiden, who refuses to speak.
At Beauty Bay, a community of summer homes nestled on the shores of June Lake, in the remote foothills of Mount Adams, it’s off-season with most houses shuttered for the fall. But Frankie, adrift, returns to the rundown caretaker’s cottage that has been in the hardworking O’Neill family for generations—a beloved place and a constant reminder of the family she has lost. And Anne, in the wake of a tragedy that has disrupted her career and silenced her music, has fled to the neighboring house, a showy summer home owned by her husband’s wealthy family.
When Frankie finds an injured baby crow in the forest, little does she realize that the charming bird will bring all three lost souls—Frankie, Anne, and Aiden—together on a journey toward hope, healing, and rediscovering joy. Crow Talk is an achingly beautiful story of love, grief, friendship, and the healing power of nature in the darkest of times.
Eileen Garvin is the author of the national bestselling novel The Music of Bees and the acclaimed memoir How to Be a Sister. The Music of Bees was named a Good Morning America Buzz Pick, a Good Housekeeping Book club Pick, a People Magazine Best New Book, an IndieNext Pick, a Library Reads Pick, a Christian Science Monitor Pick, a Washington Post Best Summer Reads, and named a Most Anticipated Book of 2021 by BookRiot, Bookish, Nerd Daily, The Tempest, Midwestness and others. Born and raised in Washington State, she lives in Oregon, sharing her backyard with four chickens, wild birds of all kinds, and about 120,000 honeybees.
Beth Alvarado’s collection Anxious Attachments, an ode to familial love, won the 2020 Oregon Book Award for Creative Nonfiction and was long listed for the PEN Art of the Essay Award. Her recent Jillian in the Borderlands is a collection of darkly funny tales and features visionary experiences, ghosts, faith healers, and a young woman whose drawings begin to create realities. She lived for many years in the Sonoran Desert before migrating to the high desert of Central Oregon where she joined the faculty of OSU-Cascades Low Residency MFA Program. You can find her at bethalvarado.com.
The purchase of Crow Talk or $5 is your entry ticket. Books and tickets can be purchased through Roundabout Books’ website here, via telephone at 541-306-6564, or in the store. The event will be held at Roundabout Books & Cafe in Bend. For further information, please contact Roundabout Books’ Event Manager, Julie Swearingen, at julie@roundaboutbookshop.com.
Roundabout Books is a full-service independent bookstore, located in the heart of Bend’s Northwest Crossing Community. The staff takes tremendous pride in their highly curated selection of new adult and children’s books. Local Bend resident, Cassie Clemans, founded Roundabout Books with a vision of enhancing the life of our community by providing a warm and comfortable literary space where people of all ages are welcome to read, browse, shop for books, meet a friend, or enjoy an event.