Upcoming events.
Renegade Grief: A Guide to the Wild Ride of Life After Loss by Carla Fernandez
From grief quests to altar-making, to dinner parties to Dungeons & Dragons, Renegade Grief is an “offering to the struggle and art of being human” (Krista Tippett, New York Times bestselling author) and a profound, vulnerable exploration of care practices and rituals that empower grievers in a culture that expects us to simply “give it time.
HEATHER by Caitlin Mullen
Gear up for Halloween! Fear and Desolation in New Jersey Pine Barrens?! Check out Edgar Award-winning Caitlin Mullen’s new mystery/thriller HEATHER!
Her Own Voice: Eight Women Who Rewrote Life and Art by Anne E. Fernald
With Virginia Woolf as a guide, the stories of 8 radical 20th century women—wanderers, rebels, explorers, mentors—who made a life for themselves in spite of everything. Among the women featured are:
Margaret Wise Brown, groundbreaking author of Goodnight Moon
Jessie Redmon Fauset, prolific novelist of the Harlem Renaissance
Dorothy Arzner, the only woman director to make the transition from silent to sound film
The women in this book encompass a wide range of diverse identities: Black, white, Asian, lesbian, queer, straight, mothers, aunts, teachers; novelists; poets, filmmakers, musicians, producers. Altogether, they provide an inspirational reminder that the social and political upheaval of our time is nothing new; women have been working to overcome enormous barriers in the name of their art throughout history.
RAVENOUS by Sara Cooper
RAVENOUS is a satire of consumerism and capitalism, in which a pregnant momfluencer's livestreamed unboxings spiral into something much darker. It was a finalist for the 2025 Tucson Festival of Books Literary Awards, and it's got a kind of a fun cult following already on Bookstagram (ironically). Join us for some pre-Halloween hunger! and help us celebrate this timely debut novel, Ravenous!
The Reservoiristas! Celebrating this Mountain Valley that We Call Home
Nina Shengold, Gail Straub, and Kate McGloughlin make up the artistic supergroup called the Reservoiristas. All three of them live within a few miles of the Ashokan Reservoir and they walk there often. Each has written about the reservoir's haunted beauty and infinite variations, and Kate has painted magnificent renditions of this landscape. Their books are joined at the hip by Kate's gorgeous cover paintings for Gail's The Ashokan Way, Nina's Reservoir Year, and Kate and Gail's art-and-text collaboration Solace and Sanctuary: The Ashokan's Enduring Gifts. The trio will read a weaving of their works paying tribute to their love of the Ashokan Reservoir with its surrounding Catskill Mountain guardians. Join us for a magical evening celebrating the beauty of this mountain valley that we call home. Reading will be followed by lively conversation and book signing.
HIDDEN HISTORIES OF JAZZ AGE NEW YORK: From the Suppressed to the Strange by Jonathan Ezra Goldman
Hidden Histories of Jazz Age New York offers a fresh look at 1920s New York City, unearthing stories of everyday life and marginalized communities. Sweeping events such as the Harlem Renaissance, Prohibition, and immigration reform are seen through the individual experiences of librarians, cops, shopkeepers, sex workers, ragpickers, dogs, and antivaxxers that counter the era’s popular conceptions of ballooning wealth and uproarious celebration.
NEBRASKA by Monica Datta
Anna Chatterjee has just been released from prison. Her husband, Prabir, has arrived to take her home and found her already gone; their flighty and artistic grown children, Neal and Nina are left to navigate the fallout both from Anna’s disappearance and the trauma that splintered their lives years earlier. But as the story ricochets between past and present, the question looms: Where is Anna now?
This Dark Night: Emily Bronte, A Life by Deborah Lutz
Yes! and as promised, Deborah Lutz is back in High Falls with her new biography, the first comprehensive biography of Emily Brontë in over two decades, This Dark Night: Emily Bronte, a Life (2026). As her publisher writes, “Emily Jane Brontë was just 27 when she started writing the wayward and electric novel Wuthering Heights. Three years later, she was dead. Out of step with her own time and remembered as the strangest of the Brontë sisters, there's much that we don't know about her - most of her papers were destroyed after her death. But as Deborah Lutz explores in this, one of the first biographies of Emily in 20 years, the writing that has survived seethes with storm and strife and with the beautifully desolate landscape of Yorkshire.”
Join us! in celebrating this extraordinary book with the author who brings us the latest scholarship on Emily Bronte, the 19th century novel, and the Victorian Age.
Down to Earth by Julia Turshen
NYT Bestselling author and chef Julia Turshen is adding romance to the menu! Please join us to celebrate her debut romance novel Down to Earth, which, as Alison Roman writes, is a “steamy modern romance for anyone who finds sexual tension in the produce aisle”! Help us close out the summer with some literature, love, and some laughs!
Book Club: Blue Heron Books & Intuitively Wild
We're excited to partner with Intuitively Wild for a monthly spirituality-themed Book Club. We’re beginning with HomeSchooled by New York Times bestselling author (and fellow local) Stefan Merrill Block - a deeply moving memoir that explores family, belonging, and the homeschooling system through one unforgettable story.
How it works:
• Sign up for Book Club.
• Pick up your copy of HomeSchooled from either Intuitively Wild or Blue Heron Books (your ticket includes the book! and the author will be joining us!).
• Read along with us.
• Arrive on August 20th at 6:30 PM for our very first gathering. - Stefan, Rachel, and I will be present to facilitate the conversation.
Whether you're an avid reader or craving more moments of community, we'd love to have you.
Reserve your spot through this link at Intuitively Wild: https://book.squareup.com/classes/pazrojk7w5iuno/location/LE0R4RKAF7XY6/classDetails/clssch_brjt0chbvg58zv?dateStart=1787265000
Summer Salon: Join us for an evening of new work in Literature, Poetry, and Art
Summer Salon! Join us for an evening of new literature, poetry, and visual art with Stephanie Davies, whose new book Surviving a Patriarchy on Steroids helps us find “islands of sanity” in an insane world; poet and meditation guide Jacinta Lanz whose new book On Our Way/En Nuestro Camino is a bilingual work that lives at the intersections of language, body, and breath; Hudson Valley award-winning poet and writing mentor Janlori Goldman who’ll read from Bread from a Stranger’s Oven; and visual artist, Nancy Ostrovsky, a “pioneer of performance painting” who in addition to being an artist who has exhibited all over the world, designed the cover art for Stephanie’s new book Surviving a Patriarchy on Steroids.
Paradiso 17 by Hannah Lillith Assadi
JOIN US for a SPECIAL LITERARY EVENT to celebrate the publication of Hannah Lillith Assadi’s latest novel, to meet the author, and discuss this important new contribution to the conversations of exile, love, loss, and life.
Loving Arrangements: Stories About Modern Living and Loving
Please Join editor Nan Bauer-Maglin and contributors, Mindy Lewis, Ronald E. Hellman, and Vicki Breitbart, for an afternoon of candid and insightful conversations about their new book, Loving Arrangements: Stories About Modern Living and Loving (Rutgers UP, June 2026).
Kids Read to Kids
We are launching a new Sunday morning series celebrating small, joyful moments of connection and community Kids Read to Kids. Beginning this Sunday, July 12
Bad Words & The Worst Kind of Girl by Susan Rukeyser
Celebrate Pride with us! with a Double (Quadruple?) bill featuring Bad Words and The Worst Kind of Girl by Susan Rukeyser! in conversation with Hudson Valley authors and Feckless band of feministas, Nina Shengold, Tina Barry, and Jana Martin!
Ellen Hagan & David Flores Tell Me Every Lie
An afternoon discussion and writing workshop with the authors of YA novel Tell Me Every Lie
First Rule of Fire by Rebecca Gopoian
First Rule of Fire by Rebecca Gopoian explores how history can never truly be erased, no matter how hard we try to deny or forget. Told in interwoven narratives, the novel explores the lives of three characters as they seek safety, love, and belonging, beginning in Eastern Turkey 1914, at the start of the Armenian Genocide to 1980’s New Jersey.
Home Inside the Globe: Embracing Our Human Family with author Gail Straub and musician Steve Gorn
Gail Straub and Steve Gorn invite you to a special event at Blue Heron Books honoring our unity as a human family across cultures and time.
Perennial Cosmology by Catherine Arra, a Poetry Reading
In honor of the 30th Anniversary of National Poetry Month, please JOIN US for a reading by Hudson Valley poet Catherine Arra from her latest chapbook, PERENNIAL COSMOLOGY, exploring “the life-death cycle in nature and in everday living.”
Growing Up Golem: A Magical Realist Memoir by Donna Minkowitz
Reissued in March 2026, the book was a finalist for both a Lambda Literary Award and for the Publishing Triangle’s Judy Grahn Nonfiction Prize. Lilith called the book “fascinating, compulsively readable, delightful… and tills new and important ground.”
ORLANDO WEEKEND: Orlando, My Political Biography Film Screening
Experience a poetic and political celebration of identity with a screening of the award-winning documentary Orlando, My Political Biography, a modern love letter to Woolf’s iconic protagonist.
ORLANDO WEEKEND: Marathon Reading
Lend your voice to our marathon reading as we bring Virginia Woolf’s masterpiece Orlando to life, traveling through three centuries in a single day.
ORLANDO WEEKEND: Dr. Madelyn Detloff Talk
Join renowned Woolf scholar Dr. Madelyn Detloff for an illuminating conversation exploring Orlando through the lenses of queer history and trans-visibility.
The Big Breeze by Steven Fechter
An afternoon with Steven Fechter & C. B. Whitaker, discussing Steven’s novel The Big Breeze
Home Schooled by Stefan Merrill Block
An Evening with author Stefan Merrill Block discussing his book Homeschooled
‘Eros, Again, Now’: A Celebration of Erotic Poetry
An Evening of Erotic Poetry with Elana Bell, Tina Barry, Irena “Namyrah” Nayfeld, and Lisa St. John.
Emma Tourtelot
An Evening with Author Emma Tourtelot discussing her debut novel No One You Know
JANE AUSTEN's 250th Birthday Party
Join us for a 250-Year toast to truth, wit & Mr. Darcy. She may not be able to join us in person, but Jane will absolutely be with us in spirit :)
Jeremy Varon & L.A. Kauffman
An Evening with Author Jeremy Varon & L.A. Kauffman discussing Jeremy’s book Our Grief Is Not a Cry for War
MOBY DICK 2-Day Marathon Reading
Join us for a LIVE marathon reading of Herman Melville’s MOBY DICK. Sign-up to read on Saturday 11/29 or Sunday 11/30 9am-7pm
Benjamin H. Shepard & Jay Blotcher
An afternoon with Author Benjamin H. Shepard discussing his book Activism, Friendship, And Fighting with Jay Blotcher
Natasha Williams
An evening with Natasha Williams discussing her debut book, The Parts of Him I Kept.
José Sotolongo
An Evening with José Sotolongo discussing his second novel, The Optimistic Cuban
Elizabeth Cunningham in Conversation with Kristen Holt-Browning
Elizabeth Cunningham in conversation with Kristen Holt-Browning about their respective books: Over the Edge of the World and Ordinary Devotion.
Mark Hussey
An evening with Mark Hussey discussing Virginia Woolf and his new book, Mrs. Dalloway, Biography of a Novel.
