Books, Beads and More features a book signing by children’s fantasy author, JoAnn Meaker
Are you looking for a great gift for your child? Consider giving the gift of reading. On Saturday, November 26 from 10 – 2 pm award-winning author, JoAnn Meaker, will be at Books, Beads and More (Bell Creek Road, Mechanicsville) to sign her children’s fantasy book, Nola’s Gift.
Meaker tapped into the imaginations of her three grandchildren, asking them for input when developing the characters and setting for the story. The book is a tale of a young girl named Nola who is sent on a mission find beads of the jewelfern. Lady Marika, the village healer, needs them to create a potion to heal her brothers and other children stricken by the strange illness that has swept their village. On her travels, Nola discovers the dangers of the forest and encounters children and animals with unusual abilities. Will she be able to gather the jewelfern in time to save her brothers?
Meaker is also the author of Images of America, Ontario, an Arcadia Publications book written to commemorate the bicentennial of the town of Ontario, New York. Two historical mysteries followed, My Dear Emma and Four Branches which are both partially set during the Civil War era. A Line of Shorts, a book of short stories, completes the list of books she’s written, but she’s also published a series of historic newspaper articles and her work has appeared in several anthologies.
A retired teacher, she and her husband Norm moved to the Richmond area from Ontario, in western New York State, where she volunteered for many years for the town’s Historical Society, was the organization’s President and archivist, and served as organizer of Civil War reenactments at the Society-owned museum. Since relocating to Richmond, Meaker has been very active in the Hanover Rotary Club, is the current president of the Hanover Writers Club and is on the board of the Virginia Writers Club.