AUTHOR TALK: LARRY BAKER PRESENTS “HARRY AND SUE”

Friends of the Main Library St. Augustine is pleased to welcome nationally acclaimed author, Larry Baker.  Larry Baker’s first novel, “The Flamingo Rising”, premiered in St. Augustine in September of 1997 at the downtown Bookmark Bookstore. The national tour for his final novel, “Harry and Sue”, will conclude at The Waterworks in St. Augustine on September 26.

As Baker, a former St. Augustine resident, describes it, “My career has come full circle.”

That circle has included six critically acclaimed novels and one film adaptation. The Flamingo Rising was a Hallmark television movie, filmed in St. Augustine in 2000.

“The Flamingo Rising” was the story of a family that lived inside a drive-in screen tower, set on a beach in north Florida.

“Harry and Sue” is about a living taxi driver trapped in a theatre full of ghosts, but set in Oklahoma. Baker insists that both stories are based on his own experience.

“Harry and Sue” was also inspired by the Harry Chapin song “Taxi.” The twist? Ghosts abound. The heroine is the ghost of Marilyn Monroe, in a portrayal that one critic has called “brilliantly original and endearing.” Best-selling author Jincy Willett praises the novel as, “A love story with ghosts, exploring mortality with wisdom, humility, and persuasive optimism.”

Baker will be signing copies of “Harry and Sue” after his reading.  Books are available for purchase at the event.

This program is free and open to the public and RSVP is required for this event. The event will take place at The Waterworks, 184 San Marco Ave., which shares a parking lot with the Main Library. Seating begins at 6:00 pm, and the presentation starts promptly at 7:00 pm. Reservations are required due to limited capacity. For more information, please call the Main Library at 904-827-6940.

The Waterworks is available through the generosity of the City of St. Augustine and the St. Johns Cultural Council.

Baker’s work is getting early praise from around the country.

“Larry Baker’s HARRY AND SUE is brilliant in many ways, but the first appearance of Marilyn Monroe’s ghost is surely the most dazzling entrance of any character in recent American fiction. Monroe as Tinker Bell, as magician, and eventually as a comic matchmaker is worth the price of admission all by itself.”–Patty Friedman, author Secondhand Smoke— 

“HARRY AND SUE, a love story with ghosts, explores mortality with wisdom, humility, and persuasive optimism.”——Jincy Willett, author of Winner of the National Book Award.