Kathi Scrizzi Driscoll
\n\u00a0|\u00a0 Special to Cape Cod Times<\/p>\n
Three authors with multiple best-sellers, and a writer whose debut novel was the September pick for actress Reese Witherspoon\u2019s book club, will explore a \u201cLove & Joy\u201d theme over two weekends for the\u00a0Cape Cod Book Festival<\/a>.<\/p>\n Founder\u00a0Lois Cahall<\/a>\u00a0calls the second annual event \u201csmall but mighty\u201d because while there are fewer 2025 authors \u2014 due to arts funding cuts and constraints from Cahall’s tour for her third novel, \u201cThe Many Lives & Loves of Hazel Lavery\u201d \u2014 the four participants are heavy-hitters. The headliner is \u201cAn Evening With\u00a0Mitch Albom<\/a>,\u201d at 6:30 p.m. Oct. 24, with Cahall interviewing the author of \u201cTuesdays With Morrie\u201d and \u201cThe Stranger in the Lifeboat\u201d about his new book, \u201cTwice.\u201d<\/p>\n The event takes place at the 900-seat Sandwich High School auditorium because of Albom\u2019s longtime popularity. \u201cTwice,\u201d his website says, is a \u201clove story about magical second chances that dares to explore how our unchecked desires might mean losing what we\u2019ve had all along.\u201d<\/p>\n Cahall previously interviewed Albom for the Palm Beach Book Festival she ran in Florida for 10 years before relocating to the Cape. \u201cWe\u2019ve gotten the audience crying, then laughing,\u201d she says of their interviews, and notes how well the author\u2019s work fits with this year\u2019s festival theme. \u201cIn music, songs fall into three categories \u2014 looking for love, being in love and losing love \u2014 and I think the same could be said about every iconic Mitch Albom book.\u201d<\/p>\n A Cape connection this year is\u00a0Joseph Finder<\/a>, the Boston-based\u00a0bestselling writer of 17 suspense novels (\u201cHouse on Fire,\u201d \u201cParanoia\u201d) and\u00a0a part-time Truro resident who says by email that he loves early fall on the Cape \u201cbecause it\u2019s so beautiful then, and you can actually turn left on Route 6.\u201d He\u2019s particularly honored to be the only thriller author so far in the festival.<\/p>\n Cahall will interview Finder at 2:45 p.m. Oct. 25 at\u00a0Cotuit Center for the Arts<\/a>, discussing the January-published \u201cThe Oligarch\u2019s Daughter.\u201d The story follows a rising Wall Street star whose romance with a photographer sends him on the run from Russian operatives until he can solve a decades-old conspiracy. It\u2019s his first time writing about Russia since his debut, \u201cThe Moscow Club.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI remember reading about Russia’s new oligarchs, those billionaires who were sort of merchant princes, a kind of royalty in Russia, and I wondered what their relationship to Putin might be like,\u201d Finder says. \u201cSince I’m a novelist, I began to wonder what it would be like to marry into an oligarch’s family. And since I write thrillers, I knew it had to be a fraught, tense relationship, ultimately frightening.\u201d<\/p>\n The first half of the festival\u2019s Oct. 25 \u201cdouble-header,\u201d with a discounted ticket for both events, will be\u00a0Eliana Ramage<\/a>\u00a0interviewed at 1:30 p.m. about her just-out debut novel, \u201cTo the Moon and Back,\u201d by Lizz Schumer, People magazine\u2019s senior books editor. The story is about a\u00a0young woman\u2019s quest to become the first Cherokee astronaut, a push that will alter the fates of people she loves. Ramage is a citizen of the Cherokee Nation.<\/p>\n Cahall says she reached out to the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe about Ramage\u2019s event, and tribal elders plan to attend. \u201cThere\u2019s something about this book, beyond the diversity factor, that won me over,\u201d she says. \u201cIt just feels good, and (the subject) fits under our banner of love and joy.\u201d<\/p>\n The festival opens Oct. 18, with an 11 a.m. talk by\u00a0Susan Orlean\u00a0<\/a>(\u201cThe Orchid Thief,\u201d \u201cThe Library Book\u201d) at the Cotuit center just days after her memoir ,\u201cJoyride,\u201d is published. Leigh Haber, former Oprah Winfrey Book Club editor, will interview Orleans about her life from journalist to her books becoming movies, plus romances and family life.<\/p>\n \u201cSusan finds stories in places where no one would find stories, like orchid thieves or bullfighters, and comes up with a subject she can write a whole book about,\u201d Cahall says. \u201cThis one is a fun Cinderella story \u2014 from hoping she\u2019d be a staff writer at The New Yorker to walking the red carpet at the Oscars.\u201d<\/p>\n Cahall began her own career writing at Cape newspapers and raised her daughters on Cape Cod, then returned regularly after moving elsewhere to write for magazines, work for mega-selling author James Patterson, and other jobs. Unexpected encounters with book-lovers while writing at a Yarmouth inn encouraged Cahall to start the book festival last year before moving back earlier this year.\u00a0<\/p>\n Festival tickets will be made available to many students \u201cto honor our mission in keeping literacy alive,\u201d she says. Books will be available for purchase, and only books bought there will be signed. More information:\u00a0www.capecodbookfestival.com<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n