On Sunday, May 27, Pulitzer Prize winning author Richard Russo and his daughter, Kate, will give a reading at the Bunch of Grapes Bookstore in Vineyard Haven. This will be the first event to take place in the bookstore’s new space, across Main street in the old Bowl and Board building.

What a way to start a new era.

In a 1967 Life magazine story, the late William Stryon was quoted as saying: “Writing is a cruel and wracking pursuit. I hope none of my children follow in my path.”

Alexandra Styron has done just that, and in her book — Reading My Father — she has found a lifeline away from the scar tissue of her upbringing to a deep and compelling portrait of a complex person — father and writer.

In 1995, Sarah Ban Breathnach wrote a bestselling book called Simple Abundance: A Daybook of Comfort and Joy. The book features 366 essays about how to live life with simplicity and grace, but most of all gratitude. Oprah Winfrey called it her “favorite book,” of the year.

The book sold seven million copies and counting.

Alexandra Styron, the daughter of William Styron, will be featured at the next Speakeasy series held at State Road Restaurant in West Tisbury on Wednesday, May 16 at 5:30 p.m.

Ms. Styron’s recent book is Reading My Father, a memoir about growing up with the legendary author of Sophie’s Choice, The Confessions of Nat Turner and Darkness Visible: A Memoir of Madness.

The New York Times called Ms. Styron’s book, “Ardent, sophisticated and entirely winning.”

Today is the deadline for Island students, grades one through eight, to enter the Mom of the Year essay writing contest. The contest, in conjunction with the Edgartown Board of Trade and Pink and Green Weekend, will award three winning prizes—one each in grades one to three, four to six and seven to eight. The winning essays will be recognized and read at the Harbor View Hotel’s Mother’s Day brunch on Sunday, May 13, at 11 a.m.

“April is the cruellest month, breeding lilacs out of the dead land, mixing memory and desire, stirring dull roots with spring rain.”

So said T.S. Elliot at the beginning of his epic poem The Waste Land.

Here on the Vineyard, though, April is poetry month, nothing cruel about that, and to celebrate, the West Tisbury Library’s is holding its annual community poetry night on Sunday, April 22 from 3:30 to 4:30 p.m.

State Road Restaurant’s Speakeasy Series returns next week with more unrivaled chances to mingle and speak with respected authors. This Tuesday, April 18, author John Hough Jr. will discuss Seen the Glory, a novel about the Battle of Gettysburg and two young brothers who volunteer to serve their country. Future participating authors include Alexandra Styron, who will speak about her book, Reading My Father, on May 16. On June 20 novelist Richard North Patterson will discuss his 20th novel, Fall from Grace, a family drama set on Martha’s Vineyard.

By SYDNEY BENDER

Children’s books are magical. Just ask Island author Kate Feiffer, who debuts her latest children’s book, Signed by Zelda, on Thursday, April 5, at the Bunch of Grapes Bookstore in downtown Vineyard Haven.

Her last book, No Go Sleep, arrived in book stores just last month.

Herbal Tea Talk

Some think green beer for St. Patrick’s day. Others go for a spot of tea.

If you’re in the latter camp, head to the Bunch of Grapes Bookstore on Main street in Vineyard Haven to sip tea with Island herbalist Holly Bellebuono, who will be discussing her new book The Essential Herbal for Natural Health: How to Transform Easy-To-Find Herbs Into Healing Remedies for the Whole Family.

Afterwards, perhaps you can use the herbs to help an ailing St. Patrick’s Day reveler.

Fall from Grace, by Richard North Patterson, Scribner, a Division of Simon & Schuster, Inc., New York, NY, March 2012, 278 pages (hardcover, $26.00).

Chilmark is home base in Richard North Patterson’s newest novel, Fall from Grace. “I’ve long wanted to write a novel set on Martha’s Vineyard, my summer home for almost two decades now,” Mr. North Patterson writes in the book’s afterword.