Thursday September 10 – 5:00-6:30 PM EDT
Price: Free
Registration: Seating is limited; please call to reserve your spot: 843-379-7025.
Venue: Pat Conroy Literary Center | 601 Bladen St., Beaufort
ABOUT THE BOOK:
Her latest novel, No Way Out but Through, scheduled for August 2026, continues her exploration of Southern life and human connection. Two women of different generations—one scarred by an abusive teen marriage and the other by an alcoholic husband—come together to grapple with their inner demons and confront their untold stories.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS:
Susan Beckham Zurenda- taught English for 33 years on the college level and at the high school level to AP students. Her debut novel, Bells for Eli (Mercer University Press, March 2020; paperback edition March 2021), was selected the first place winner for Best First Book—Fiction in the 2021 IPPY (Independent Publisher Book Awards), a Foreword Indie Book Award finalist, a Winter 2020 Okra Pick by the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance, a 2020 Notable Indie on Shelf Unbound, a 2020 finalist for American Book Fest Best Book Awards, and was nominated for a Pushcart Prize for 2021. Susan has won numerous awards for her short fiction, including winning the South Carolina Fiction Prize twice. Her second novel, The Girl From the Red Rose Motel (Mercer University Press, September 2023), was the recipient of the 2024 Patricia Winn Award in Southern Fiction, Gold Medal winner in the 2024 IPPY Awards for Southeast Fiction, a 2024 Pushcart Prize nominee, a Shelf Unbound 2023 Notable 100 books, and a finalist in the American Book Fest Awards. The author lives in Spartanburg, SC.
CASSANDRA KING- is the award-winning author of two books of non-fiction and five novels, Making Waves, The Sunday Wife, The Same Sweet Girls, Queen of Broken Hearts, and Moonrise, as well as numerous short stories and articles.
The Sunday Wife was a Book Sense Pick and a People magazine Page Turner of the Week; on release, The Same Sweet Girls was the number one Book Sense selection nationwide. Queen of Broken Hearts, was a Book of the Month Club and Literary Guild selection. Her latest book, Tell Me a Story, was named SIBA’s non-fiction Book of the Year. In 2025, Cassandra was the recipient of the Harper Lee Prize, a lifetime achievement award presented by the Harper Lee Foundation. A native of L. A. (Lower Alabama), Cassandra resides in Beaufort, South Carolina, where she is honorary chair of the Pat Conroy Literary Center.
