Marc Brown, creator of the popular Arthur series for young readers, will be the third author in 2012 edition of Out Loud! The Metro Library Network Author Series. Brown will appear in the Linn-Mar High School auditorium on Thursday, May 3, at 7:00 p.m.
The event is free and open to the public, and no tickets are required. The Out Loud! Author Series is a program of the Cedar Rapids, Marion, and Hiawatha Public Libraries.
The Arthur series—which features an adventuresome aardvark, his quirky group of friends, and his precocious little sister D.W.—has been delighting young people since the publication of Arthur’s Nose in 1976. The books are the basis for the PBS television series Arthur.
Following his evening presentation, Brown will take questions from the audience and then sign books. The Cedar Rapids Barnes & Noble will be on hand with copies of Brown’s work available for purchase.
Adult attendees can enter to win one of three $50 Barnes & Noble gift cards that will be given away at the event. There will be additional gift card giveaways for the children in attendance. Additionally, adult attendees can enter to win one of two Nook Color e-readers that will be given away at the end of the Out Loud! season.
During his visit to the area, Brown will give two presentations to second graders from the Linn-Mar, Marion Independent, and Cedar Rapids Community School Districts. Both of those presentations, which are free for attending schools and will also be held in the Linn-Mar High School auditorium, will have full houses of well over 800 children apiece.
The Out Loud! Author Series will present five additional authors in 2012 including Linn Area Reads author Nicolette Hahn Niman (May 11), comics creator and scholar A. David Lewis (June 8), paranormal teen romance writer Wendy Delsol (June 21), bestselling thriller writer James Rollins (July 1), and science writer Sam Kean (July 13).
More information about the Out Loud! Author Series is available at www.metrolibrarynetwork.org/outloud.
Out Loud! The Metro Library Network Author Series is supported by the Giacoletto Foundation with media support from The Gazette and event book sales provided by Barnes & Noble Booksellers.
Kevin Brockmeier will be featured during the second event of the 2012 edition of Out Loud! The Metro Library Network Author Series. Brockmeier will appear at the 
He is also the author of two additional novels for adults (The Truth about Celia and A Brief History of the Dead), two books for younger readers (City of Names and Grooves: A Kind of Mystery), and two short story collections (Things That Fall from the Sky and The View from the Seventh Layer). He has won the O. Henry, Nelson Algren, and Italo Calvino Short Fiction awards and was named one of the Best Young American Novelists by Granta in 2007.
This year’s edition of Out Loud! The Metro Library Network Author Series gets underway on Saturday, April 21 at 1 p.m. with Robin Hemley, a writer of both fiction and non-fiction and the director of the University of Iowa’s Nonfiction Writing Program.
Reply All, Hemley’s third short story collection will be released in June, while his new nonfiction title, A Field Guide for Immersion Writing: Memoir, Journalism, and Travel, is available now.