Author Talk With Gail Black April 9th at 6:30pm.

Gail L. Black will speak about her first book, “Asses and Angels: A Journey from Abuse to Achievement.” Signed copies of the book will be available for $10 at the presentation.

Gail Black is living proof that success and failure in life are interwoven like the tangled brambles in a thicket of wild berries. Asses and Angels shares the moving story of her personal path through life as it wove through tangled fields of good and evil. She learned to hope and survive on her journey from abuse to achievement.

Born just as World War II intensified, Gail grew into a spirited little girl and then into a woman who never forgot that each day was a new opportunity with the possibility of success and happiness. Family health challenges compelled her to mature early. Religious control, physical abuse, and financial manipulation caused her to experience divorce, widowhood, and annulment. Learn how she prevailed in male-dominated business ventures and environmental battles as she farmed her land. Her grit, sense of humor, work ethic, and love for her farm helped insure her entrepreneurial success in the business of making fruit syrups with her grandmother’s recipe.

Teen Author of Vampire Series to Visit the Library on Tuesday

The Olean Public Library is proud to welcome Florence Wilson, author of the Teenage Vampire Series, to speak about her book, her experience with writing and publishing, and to autograph books. No sign up is required to attend this free event on Tuesday, August 14 at 7:00pm in the library’s Art Gallery.

What happens when you combine a love for literature with the imagination to create worlds? You get new breakout writer Florence Wilson, creator of the new Teenage Vampire series. Florence Wilson is a teenage resident of north-central Pennsylvania. She has written a series of five Teenage Vampire novels, the fifth of which will be released this month. She wrote her first novel at age fourteen, and has met the challenge to complete one new novel in the series each year. Florence recently finished adapting the first in the series into a screenplay by the same title. Florence a recent graduate of PAVCS, a public charter school, has been writing ever since the “picture stories” she wrote at age 4. In addition, Florence has participated in competitive power lifting since she was eight. She currently holds thirty-seven AAU (Amateur Athletic Union) national and world records.

For more information please call the Olean Public Library, 716-372-0200. This program is sponsored by the Olean Public Library and is free to the public.

“Mikado’s Secret: Path to the Purple Moon” Author to Visit Library on Tuesday

The Olean Public Library is proud to welcome Sacynda S.D. Shields, author of “Mikado’s Secret:  Path to the Purple Moon”, to speak about her book, her experience with writing and publishing, and to autograph books.  No sign up is required to attend this free event on Tuesday, August 7 at 7:00pm in the library’s Art Gallery.

S.D. Shields is an energetic 16 year old high school sophomore.  She has a vast imagination and creative art ability.  The book is entirely hers from the words on the page to the illustrations and cover art.  She deals with dyslexia and ADD, but never let that stop her from pursuing her dream of publishing.  “I’d like to encourage other kids not to let anything stand in their way either,”  she says.  “Follow your dreams.  You have to believe in yourself.”  She loves animals and loves to ride horses, especially dressage.  She wrote her book when she was 15 years old and lives with her mom, 3 dogs, and 2 cats in Randolph, New York.  She has a second book in the works and hopes to send it to the publisher soon.

For more information please call the Olean Public Library, 716-372-0200.  This program is sponsored by the Olean Public Library and is free to the public.

May 2012 Calendar of Events

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Author Ann McCauley to Visit Library May 5th.

The Olean Public Library is pleased to announce local author Ann McCauley will speak on Saturday, May 5, 2012 at 2:00 pm in the Art Gallery. Ms. McCauley is the author of Runaway Grandma, Mother Love and a contributing author to the recently released Women Writing On Family: Tips On Writing, Teaching, and Publishing. The latter is a start to finish resource written for women who are just starting their writing careers by “their sisters” who understand the balancing act of writing honest prose between loads of laundry and during naptime.

According to Marilyn L. Taylor, Ph.D., Wisconsin Poet Laureate, 2009-2010; Going Wrong (Parallel Press, 2009), Women Writing On Family is an “extraordinary collection of insightful, well-written essays will serve splendidly as both guidebook and motivator for any woman who is writing seriously and living her life fully. Matters as diverse as family dynamics, realistic time-management, marketing strategies—even ways of writing more effectively—are covered here with great sensitivity and common sense.”

Mother Love was published in November 2004 and received the Reviewers Choice Award in 2005. A revised edition of Mother Love and e-book will be released in May 2012.

Runaway Grandma was released in November 2007. It was listed as one of the Top 100 Choices of Book Clubs in the country by Bookmovement.com in May 2008. Runaway Grandma was nominated for Book of the Year in Women’s Issues in 2008. Both books are available online at Amazon.com & B&N.com or may be ordered at any bookstore.

Ms. McCauley grew up on a small farm in Pennsylvania, the oldest of seven children. As a child she wrote many dramatic stories to and about her siblings, letters to the editor, and even letters to the PA state governor. She remembers her father saying, after reading one of her tales, “I’ll be damned if you are not a writer!” Ms. McCauley states from that day forward she believed she was a writer, crediting her father’s influence. She states that there were detours before she actually started to write. “I did freelance writing for local newspapers and nursing journals for ten years before I stopped working as a nurse in 2003. Since then I have been writing, marketing, and learning the ropes of the publishing world.”

Writing and reading as well as involvement with her family and friends give Ms. McCauley joy and life satisfaction. She and her husband also like to travel. Copies of her books will be available for purchase after the program.

This Program is free and open to the public; it is sponsored by the Olean Public Library. The library is located at 134 N. 2nd St., Olean, NY 14760.