Books on the Lake

The Grosse Pointe Public Library has another unforgettable experience planned for the 2026 Books on the Lake author event. This year’s authors are Lily King and Virginia Evans.

“Heart the Lover, a 100 Notable Book of 2025 by the New York Times and The Correspondent, on the NY Times bestseller list for 15 weeks both deal with love and grief,” said Jessica Keyser, Library Director. “Everyone’s talking about both authors and their books.”

Books will be available to purchase at the event provided by The Book Beat.

Heart the Lover is King’s seventh novel. “Wonderful, witty, heartfelt,” said the Washington Post, “a funny novel about grief…it’s dangerously romantic.” This novel shares a narrative thread with her fifth novel, Writers and Lovers, a New York Times bestseller and winner of the New England Society Book Award for fiction.

King grew up in Massachusetts and received her BA in English from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and her MA in Creative Writing from Syracuse University. She has taught English and Creative Writing at universities and high schools in the US and abroad. She is the recipient of a MacDowell Fellowship and a Whiting Writer’s Award.

The Correspondent is Virginia Evans’s debut novel. It’s in an epistolary format, which means the novel is a series of letters. “Evans’s enchanting epistolary novel revolves around prickly septuagenarian Sybil Van Antwerp . . . [with] a dash of mystery that keeps the pages flying.” —The Washington Post.

Evans is from the East Coast. She attended James Madison University for her bachelor’s in English literature, as well as Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland, for her Master of Philosophy in creative writing. She lives in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, with her husband, two children and her Red Labrador, Brigid.

Presenting sponsors are:

Know what’s Happening Next — before everyone else does.

Get App

Host or Publisher Grosse Pointe Public Library