The Huntsville Library Foundation presents the 23^rd annual Vive Le Livre*—Long Live the Book event Thursday, September 10 at 6:00 p.m. in the North Hall of the VBC.  This year’s guest speaker is the elegant and renowned Ann Patchett, author of 6 bestselling books including the PEN/Faulkner award winning novel, Bel Canto, and her most recent work of fiction, Run.  Recognized as one of the great contemporary literary authors of her generation, Ann Patchett will engage and inspire patrons of the Huntsville-Madison County Public Library in an evening that celebrates literature and libraries throughout the ages.  Proceeds will benefit the HMCPL's collections and programs fund.  

(Ticket sales are now closed. Please call (256) 532-5950 to inquire about the waiting list.)

6:00 PM   -  Author Reception in North Hall Gallery (Scholar Level and Up)

7:00 PM  -  Dinner is served in the North Hall

7:45 PM  -  Welcome and Opening Remarks

8:00 PM  -  Keynote Address by Ann Patchett

9:00 PM  -  Q&A with Audience followed by Book Signing

About the Author:

Ann Patchett was born in Los Angeles but raised in Nashville, Tennessee. While at Sarah Lawrence College in New York, she studied with such notable authors as Russell Banks and Grace Paley before getting her first short works published. She labored long and hard in the trenches of Seventeen magazine (where her talents went largely unrecognized), before striking gold with her ambitious first novel, The Patron Saint of Liars, which was named a New York Times Notable Book of 1992 and subsequently made into a major motion picture.

Since her auspicious debut, Patchett has crafted a handful of elegant novels, garnering several accolades and awards along the way. But her real breakthrough occurred with 2001's Bel Canto, a taut, psychological thriller set in the claustrophobic confines of an embassy under siege in South America. Winning both the PEN/Faulkner Award and the Orange Prize, Bel Canto catapulted Patchett into the ranks of bestselling authors.

As if to prove her versatility, Patchett departed from fiction for 2004's Truth & Beauty, the heartbreaking account of her longstanding, difficult friendship with the late Lucy Grealy, a gifted writer whose disfigurement from cancer precipitated a tragic descent into addiction and death. This memoir won several literary awards and appeared on many end-of-year best books lists.

Success breeds success; and with each book, Patchett's reputation grows. Perhaps the secret to her popularity has been captured best by Patchett's friend, Pulitzer Prize winner Robert Olen Butler. "She is a genius of the human condition," he says. "I can't think of many other writers, ever, who get anywhere near her ability to comprehend the vastness and diversity of humanity, and to articulate our deepest heart." Visit www.annpatchett.com for more information about the author and her works.