On Saturday, February 7th, several staff members and I attended the Enoch Pratt Booklovers’ Breakfast to see both James McBride and Nikki Giovanni speak before a crowd of more than 650 people!

Giovanni was warm, irreverent, smart, and her reading from her new collection of poetry just wonderful.

McBride’s remarks were interesting and entertaining, funny and fiery. He read beautifully from his newest novel—the One Maryland One Book 2009 selection–Song Yet Sung and spoke compellingly about both Baltimore and the Eastern Shore as historical sites of the Underground Railroad (or “Gospel Train” as it was known in Maryland).

McBride finished his remarks by saying that the book had been chosen as the One Maryland One Book selection, which brought applause from the audience.

After the authors’ remarks, I had the opportunity to address the crowd to formally announce our selection of Song Yet Sung as our 2009 One Maryland One Book selection. After the event, many participants shared with me how happy they were at this year’s book selection and how much they were looking forward to us bringing McBride back to Maryland.

You can read more about the event and the selection of Song Yet Sung at the Baltimore Sun website.

Let us know what you think of our selection by commenting below.

Phoebe Stein Davis is Executive Director of the Maryland Humanities Council.

Tags: James McBride, One Maryland One Book

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