Brian Platzer presents THE OPTIMISTS, with Joanna Pearson
Schedule
Tue Mar 10 2026 at 05:30 pm to 07:00 pm
UTC-04:00Location
752 Martin Luther King Jr Blvd (Historic Airport Rd, Next to The Root Cellar), Chapel Hill, NC, United States, North Carolina 27514 | Chapel Hill, NC
A beloved schoolteacher chronicles the meteoric rise of his most dazzling student in this ambitious, big-hearted story of learning and legacy.Flyleaf will offer seating for up to 70 in-person guests, with priority access given to folks who purchase the book. Please indicate in the "Customer Comments" field (at checkout) if you’d like 1-2 seats held for you at the event!
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Mr. Keating is an extraordinary teacher: brilliant, dedicated, and possibly a few pages ahead in a book no one else is reading. He’s a magician, able to enchant fourteen-year-olds into a love of writing and literature. Yet no student has lived up to the promise of their potential more than Clara Hightower. Over the course of three decades, Clara goes from kindergarten thief to a high school genius, Silicon Valley celebrity, and, finally, animal rights activist turned terrorist.
But to tell Clara’s story, Mr. Keating must tell his own, including his courtship and marriage, his dreams of writing and comedy, his days in the classroom in lower Manhattan and his rivalry and friendship with his head of school, and his eventual stroke and the isolation that follows.
Brian Platzer was the education columnist for The Atlantic and has written frequently for the New York Times, The New Yorker, New York Magazine, and many other publications. He currently teaches and lives with his family in Brooklyn and Paris. The Optimists is his latest novel.
Joanna Pearson is the author of the novel Bright and Tender Dark, two short story collections, and a book of poetry. Her stories have appeared in The Best American Short Stories, The Best American Mystery and Suspense, and many other publications. She has won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize and been a finalist for the Shirley Jackson Awards, the Janet Heidinger Kafka Prize, and the Virginia Literary Awards. She lives in North Carolina, where she works as a psychiatrist.
Where is it happening?
752 Martin Luther King Jr Blvd (Historic Airport Rd, Next to The Root Cellar), Chapel Hill, NC, United States, North Carolina 27514
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