Sunday with Friends hosts Mark Powell, author of “Small Treasons.”

Please note: This event is held at the Community Center of Abingdon NOT at the main library. The event was moved because of the renovations at the library.

About the book:

Powell brings his acclaimed eye to an American marriage on the verge of rupture, spinning an all-too-current tale of the world we live in and the world we fear—and how we may not be able to tell the two apart.

Tess Maynard is coming apart. At home with her three young children in her husband’s Georgia hometown, people keep asking if she’s depressed, if she and John are okay.

Secretly, she’s becoming obsessed with the war on terror—an ISIS beheading video in particular. Something about the victim’s captivity on the computer screen resonates with her. Something inside of her demands endless prayers for a world gone mad.

The carefully constructed life of her husband is likewise beginning to unravel. Now a college counselor, John’s former life bears persistently into the present. Once a contractor at a CIA black site that interrogated suspected terrorists—and one innocent civilian—he is given a choice by the Justice Department: either help with a problem in the homeland, or they investigate.

Forced by an old colleague to spy on a new one, John’s experiences abroad come home to roost in Georgia. For his wife, for his family, he goes along with the game. But just as he and Tess work to salvage their life together, the world comes between them in the form of a young man slowly being radicalized by the professor John is reporting on.

In a moment Tess imagined and never wanted to see, the intersection of their three lives is as devastating as the bomber’s explosion of hate and metal, and as inevitable as the battle between powers great and personal.

About the author:

Powell’s work includes “Prodigals,” “Blood Kin,” “The Dark Corner,” “The Sheltering” and “Small Treasons.”

He has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, Breadloaf Writers’ Conference, Sewanee Writers’ Conference and in 2014 was a Fulbright Fellow to Slovakia.

In 2009, he received the Chaffin Award for contributions to Appalachian literature. He holds degrees from Yale Divinity School, the University of South Carolina and the Citadel. He teaches creative writing and contemporary fiction at Appalachian State University, Boone, North Carolina.

Family story time features stories, songs, rhymes and fun for children of all ages and their parents or caregivers.

Free and open to the public. Story times are held at the main library at 11 a.m. on Mondays, 10 a.m. on Tuesdays and 11 a.m. on Wednesdays.

No registration is required.

Family story time features stories, songs, rhymes and fun for children of all ages and their parents or caregivers.

Free and open to the public. Story times are held at the main library at 11 a.m. on Mondays, 10 a.m. on Tuesdays and 11 a.m. on Wednesdays.

No registration is required.

Join us to create DIY Spa Treatments.

We get together and make or learn about herbal remedies and personal hygiene care. We talk and listen to soothing music and let the cares of the world just slip away. Come join us in the fun.

The Passawatami Book Club meets at the Glade Spring branch library the last Tuesday of the month at 6 p.m. Everyone is welcome to join in the discussion.

Family story time features stories, songs, rhymes and fun for children of all ages and their parents or caregivers.

Free and open to the public. Story times are held at the main library at 11 a.m. on Mondays, 10 a.m. on Tuesdays and 11 a.m. on Wednesdays.

No registration is required.