Wilton Library is pleased and honored to present this year’s ASML Author Series, featuring three high-profile authors whose work will encourage the library’s vision of a welcoming, engaged and diverse community. The library is excited to announce that the second year of the series will kick off with popular bestselling author Bonnie Garmus, followed by renowned teen author Ruta Sepetys, and Newbery Award-winning children’s author and illustrator Jerry Craft.
The ASML Author Series is sponsored by ASML. The author series is free and open to the public; advance registration is strongly recommended. Each author talk will be followed by a Q&A with audience members and an author signing of their books.
The ASML Author Series schedule is as follows:
Bonnie Garmus
Thursday, Oct. 22
7 p.m. at Wilton Library
Wilton Library is excited to present Bonnie Garmus, The New York Times bestselling author of Lessons in Chemistry, as the adult author in our second ASML Author Series. Garmus will be in conversation with author Debby Applegate about Lessons in Chemistry and her soon-to-be published second novel, Peck & Peck.
Fans of Lessons in Chemistry were drawn to protagonist Elizabeth Zott, “a gifted research chemist, absurdly self-assured and immune to social convention” (The Washington Post). In Peck & Peck, readers meet a similarly quixotic character in Batter Gray, a recent college graduate whose passion for poetry does not exactly set him up for success in 1980s New York City. But when he lands a job at the most prestigious, secretive and dysfunctional poetry journal on the planet — Peck & Peck — he finds 39 editors who, like Batter, believe poetry not only represents the power of humanity but holds the key to its survival.
Big-hearted, witty and laugh-out-loud funny, Peck & Peck is an ode to creativity and originality from an author who writes with “irresistible buoyancy, along with a deliberately sharp bite” (The New York Times) and is bold, smart, and often hilarious” (Real Simple).
Garmus is a coffee-dependent American novelist. Her debut novel, Lessons in Chemistry, was a “Good Morning America” Book Club pick, a Goodreads Choice Best Book of the Year, spent nearly two years on the New York Times bestseller list and was named by Times readers as one of the top 100 books of the 21st century. Translated into over 40 languages, Lessons in Chemistry was honored with 16 international literary awards and made into an Apple TV limited series. Peck & Peck is her second novel.
Applegate’s first book, The Most Famous Man in America: The Biography of Henry Ward Beecher, won the 2007 Pulitzer Prize for Biography. Her second book, Madam: The Biography of Polly Adler, Icon of the Jazz Age, was a New York Times Editor’s Choice for Best Books of 2021, and won an Earphones Award for best audiobooks of 2021.
There will be time for Q & A after the conversation.
Elm Street Books will be on site to sell additional copies of Peck & Peck and Lessons in Chemistry. The library receives a portion of the proceeds from these sales.
Registration is now open. Register online or call 203.762.6334.
Ruta Sepetys
Saturday, Nov. 14
3 p.m. at Wilton Library
Ruta Sepetys is an internationally acclaimed, #1 New York Times bestselling author of historical fiction published in over 60 countries and 40 languages. Sepetys is considered a “crossover” novelist, as her books are read by both teens and adults worldwide. Her novels Between Shades of Gray, Out of the Easy and Salt to the Sea have won or been shortlisted for more than 40 book prizes, and are included on more than 60 state award lists. Between Shades of Gray was adapted into the film Ashes in the Snow, and her other novels are currently in development for TV and film.
Winner of the Carnegie Medal, Sepetys is passionate about the power of history and literature to foster global awareness and connectivity. She has presented to NATO, to the European Parliament, in the U.S. Capitol and at embassies worldwide. Sepetys was born and raised in Michigan and now lives with her family in Nashville, TN.
Jerry Craft
Saturday, May 8, 2027
3 p.m. at Wilton Library
Jerry Craft is the New York Times bestselling author and illustrator of the graphic novels New Kid, Class Act and School Trip. New Kid is the first graphic novel in history to win the John Newbery Medal for the most outstanding contribution to children’s literature (2020), and it is the only book to ever win the Newbery Medal, the Kirkus Prize for Young Readers’ Literature (2019) and the Coretta Scott King Author Award for the most outstanding work by an African American writer (2020). In his latest book, Craft has teamed up with fellow Newbery winner Kwame Alexander to bring you J vs. K, the story of two fifth graders, one a talented artist and the other an amazing writer, who become bitter rivals when they enter their school’s annual storytelling contest.
Craft has worked as an advertising copywriter where he created print ads, radio and TV commercials, and as an assistant artist for Barbara Slate to produce a variety of comic books and graphic novels, including Sweet Sixteen (Marvel Comics) and New Kids on the Block (Harvey Comics). Craft is the executive producer of the upcoming New Kid movie based on his Newbery Medal-winning graphic novel of the same name. It will be produced in partnership with LeBron James’ SpringHill Company and Universal Studios.
Craft was born in Harlem and grew up in the Washington Heights section of New York City and now travels the world telling kids and their families about the importance of reading.
For more information about the ASML Author Series, please visit the Wilton Library website. Registration for Ruta Sepetys and Jerry Craft will open approximately one month before each event. Elm Street Books will be on site to sell books for all three author events.
About Wilton Library
For more than 131 years, Wilton Library has served as the cultural and intellectual center of Wilton with the mission to inform, enrich, connect, and inspire our community. Wilton Library is honored to be recognized with state and national awards. The library is located at 137 Old Ridgefield Rd. in the heart of Wilton Center. For more information, visit Wilton Library online or call 203.762.3950.
