A basketball player who creates comic strips, a taco-loving writer-artist who also animates for TV and film, a children's book author, a humor-focused illustrator, a Young Adults book author and an expert rhyme crafter will star at two Belmont Shore events this weekend.
Of the two literary events in town, both are hyper-family friendly, but only one is open to the public, as the other is booked up.
First, the unique Authors & Illustrators Night at Lowell Bayside Academy, a free PTA event* at which professional artists and writers share with 350 guests their personal story. Then, the guest experts (see pdf attached) will guide workshops in which Lowell students and parents create a variety of stories, or comic strips, and other fun.
This event has become so popular that it usually books up in the first or second day of reservations, according to the team of parents who spend months organizing the free night. The team of parents (co-chairs Holland Brown and Elizabeth Borsting, Robyn Norwood and Leslie Grenier) recruit artists to come spend a Friday night with more guests than usually attend a typical book signing. Apostrophe Books sells the guests' books or creations, so a local business is helped in a win-win arrangement.
This year, for the first time, all six Authors & Illustrators Night guests will be available to the public: they are spending the next afternoon at Apostrophe Books, meeting Belmont Shore residents and visitors, reading from their child-centric art and signing their books. That event is from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday at the Second Street store. This is a new twist because the school event is not open to the public - no room now - and the store visit allows families who couldn't get into or make the night event another chance.
*Patch Local Editor Nancy Wride, a creator of the event, is not especially impartial to its specialness, but it doesn't seem it should get in the way of covering any free, educational, artistic, parent-powered and business-friendly gathering of 350 people.
