In honor of Christmas, New Year's, Kwanzaa and the Winter Solstice, this is the last issue of Shelf Awareness Pro for the year. See you again on Thursday, January 2, 2014!
Author Shops Indies: 'Great to See that ALL Were Packed'
"In the last month, I have shopped at four northern Vermont bookstores and two in Manhattan, and it was great to see that ALL were packed. Reports of the death of the bookstore have indeed been exaggerated. Color me VERY happy."
Crawley told the paper that Shipley "has been like my big sister for about 30 years" and that he spent many hours in the store when growing up. "This was my place, this was like my playground. I would read whole books while in the store, and that's the way it was for me as a child many years ago."
He said that when he moved back to the area a year ago, he had been interested in the store (Shipley put it up for sale in early 2012), but she was in negotiations with Hill. He met Hill and has worked with him and helped stage an event earlier this year in honor of Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday.
With Harrison, he eventually approached Hill and said they were interested "in buying the shop if he ever wanted to sell," the paper wrote. "As luck would have it, Hill was looking to sell and negotiations began. Although relatively brief, negotiations were earnest, according to Crawley, and always in the spirit of the bookstore being the most important thing."
Crawley added: "We believed that that legacy was something that was valuable, not just to us, but to Blytheville and to Mississippi County and to the state of Arkansas and actually, to the nation."
Crawley and Harrison are now operating the bookstore and plan to hold a grand re-opening sometime in January.
Marcus Books and Friends Launch Fundraising Campaign
Marcus Books and supporters yesterday launched a campaign to raise the last $1 million needed so that the San Francisco bookstore's building can be purchased and the landmark store remain in business, the San Francisco Examiner reported. The total acquisition price is $2.6 million; Westside Community Services is lending $1.65 million.
photo: aalbc.com
Loans and donations can be made at supportmarcusbooks.com. With help from the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment and others, the San Francisco Community Land Trust is organizing this part of the fundraising and using Fundrise.com. The deadline for the proposed purchase is February 28.
The first traditional fundraiser, part of a series of book readings, concerts and house parties, was held last night. According to the Examiner, co-owner Karen Johnson called the fundraiser, which included an auction, "a beautiful place to start."
Marcus Books' troubles began when Blanche Richardson, daughter of Marcus Books founders Julian and Raye Richardson and manager of the Marcus Books in Oakland, filed for personal bankruptcy. (The family had taken out a $950,000 loan on the building in 2006, and monthly payments rose to about $10,000 a month by 2009.) A co-owner of the San Francisco building, she could have been bought out by her sister, Karen Johnson, and Karen's husband, Greg Johnson, who operate Marcus Books in San Francisco. But the Johnsons were not able to do so, and the building was sold to Nishan and Suhaila Sweis.
After buying the building, the Sweises tried to have the Johnsons and the bookstore evicted and, at one point, wanted at least $3.2 million for the building.
Zac Colandrea and Mike Dregalla have bought Twice Told Tales, Crystal Lake, Ill., and renamed it--in an apparent nod to one of the big trends in indie bookselling--Buy Local Books, according to the Northwest Herald. They have hired Sarah Carzoli to manage the store. The store's inventory is mostly used books, although it does sell some new books.
Colandrea considers the bookstore, the paper wrote, "a physical platform for their other business, Forward Motion, which he and Dregalla operate with a third partner, Michael Campell." Colandrea described Forward Motion as an educational consulting firm that develops literacy products.
At the same time, Colandrea plans to create a new layout for the store, open on Sundays, have longer hours during the week, partner with schools and libraries and host workshops, author readings and readings for children.
Tracy, Calif., "is going to start looking for a bookstore to replace the Barnes & Noble closing December 31 at the West Valley Mall," the Tracy Press reported. City manager Leon Churchill announced last week that adding a bookstore to the list of economic development goals for Tracy came in response to comments his office had received from citizens and an online petition to keep the B&N.
"You clearly have a demand," he said. "If you look at the sheer numbers, people are interested and want that venue.... You probably have to have private booksellers, because chains don't really exist anymore." Churchill cautioned, however, that many booksellers already have ties to their own communities and finding someone willing to move to Tracy might be a challenge: "It's a difficult search. If we had a bookseller in the community, they would already be here."
The Books-A-Million bookstore in Monroe, La., was damaged Monday by a storm that brought strong winds and small tornadoes to the northern part of the state. The Shreveport Times reported that "high winds ripped the front facade off" the building and the "area in front of the store was full of storm debris."
Co-manager Renee Martin told the Monroe News Star she was at the front of the store when the winds picked up: "There were moms shushing their babies, telling them everything is going to be all right."
Customers Kierstin Curtis and David Hanks were also inside the bookstore when the skies darkened and the wind began swirling outside. "We joked that it was tornado weather, then the winds got really fast really quick," said Curtis. "We all started running to the back and heard stuff being ripped off the building and we heard some glass break, then an explosion and then it was all over."
We are deeply saddened by the death of YA author and New Yorker writer Ned Vizzini, at the age of 32. Vizzini lost his longtime struggle with depression and committed suicide on Friday, December 20, according to the AP.
"I was devastated to learn of Ned Vizzini’s death," said Alessandra Balzer, co-publisher of Balzer + Bray, who worked with Vizzini on his novels since his debut, Be More Chill, which he wrote when he was still in college. "He created characters who were outsiders trying to find their way, and he did it with such humor and empathy. Ned's books will be read and beloved for generations to come." Balzer said that at Vizzini's signings, streams of teens would approach him to say that he had changed their lives.
On the final Saturday before Christmas, Kevin Ryan, co-owner of Green Apple Books and Music, San Francisco, Calif., "kept his pedometer during his shift this afternoon, proving that we walk miles in the name of bookselling," the bookshop's Facebook page noted, while posting the visual evidence of his retail pilgrimage among the stacks.
Other booksellers posted happy holiday thoughts, too:
From Michele Filgate (@readandbreathe): We are so incredibly busy at @CommunityBkstr today. Brooklynites love to support indie bookstores! Yay!!!
Red Balloon Bookshop (@RedBalloonBooks): Numerous toddlers today, wandering behind the counter, determined to become booksellers.
Suzanna Hermans (@oblongirl): Music to my ears after helping a customer find perfect books for her family: "Wow, this is so much better than Amazon!" #grateful
Porter Square Books (@PorterSqBooks): The store tonight: books books books books customer in a kilt and sporran books.
Through acquisitions and expansion, eBay has grown substantially beyond its original business of online auction house. Owner of PayPal, among other tech companies, eBay is a partner with many large retailers and can help with "the back end of websites, create interactive storefronts in real-world locations, streamline the electronic-payment process or help monitor inventory in real time." It's rolling out an app that allows consumers to buy from local sellers and have the products delivered within an hour.
Most interesting is eBay's "digital wallet" concept, whereby apps customers "check in" when they enter a bricks-and-mortar store, and then engage in a way that is familiar online--with the store "remembering" preferences and previous transactions, offering appropriate specials and more.
So far, most book retailers have been left out of this world. The Times quoted Healey Cypher, the head of retail innovation at eBay, who said to a bookseller convinced that online commerce would kill his business: "How do you know when someone's in your store? You don't, unless they bought something, and then only after the purchase. What if you had a platform for the first time ever that said, 'This person is in your store, they like these things, they bought these things on your web store, and here's an offer you should give them based on their purchases?' You don't have to take it, but you've never had that opportunity before."
Wendy Welch, co-owner of Tales of the Lonesome Pine bookshop, Big Stone Gap, Va., shared "a list of our favorite customer sayings compiled from Christmases past and present (hee hee, get it, present? Oh, never mind)." Some of our favorites:
A woman asks: "Do you have any books about how to be a good husband? Maybe two or three."
After child rips page out of a picture book while mother browses nearby: "I'm not going to pay for that. You shouldn't have the children's books lying about where children can reach them."
"Do y'all sell Christmas presents here?"
Christmas Eve Day, 5 p.m.: "I need a gift for my mother-in-law. I don't care what it is. Just make sure it's big and heavy. And wrap it for me."
Christmas Eve Day, 5:50 p.m.: "Excuse me, do you know a lot about books? O.K., pick me out something a 14-year-old will like. Quick, I'm in a hurry."
Summit released a new clip from the movie adaptation of Veronica Roth's novel Divergent, directed by Neil Burger, Deadline.com reported. The cast includes Shailene Woodley, Kate Winslet, Maggie Q, Miles Teller, Tony Goldwyn, Ashley Judd, Zoe Kravitz, Jai Courtney and Theo James. It hits theaters March 21.
Today on a repeat of the View: Rick Warren, co-author of The Daniel Plan: 40 Days to a Healthier Life (Zondervan, $24.99, 9780310344292).
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Tonight on a repeat on the Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson: Mitch Albom, author of The First Phone Call from Heaven (Harper, $24.99, 9780062294371).
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Tomorrow on a repeat of NPR's Diane Rehm Show:
Neil MacGregor, author of A History of the World in 100 Objects (Viking, $45, 9780670022700) Bill Bryson, author of One Summer: America, 1927 (Doubleday, $28.95, 9780767919401).
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Tomorrow on a Fox Christmas Special: Sarah Palin, author of Good Tidings and Great Joy: Protecting the Heart of Christmas (Broadside, $22.99, 9780062292889).
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Wednesday on a repeat of NPR's Diane Rehm Show:
Fannie Flagg, author of The All-Girl Filling Station's Last Reunion (Random House, $27, 9781400065943) Billy Collins, author of Aimless Love: New and Selected Poems (Random House, $26, 9780679644057).
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Wednesday on NPR's Tell Me More: David Menasche, author of The Priority List: A Teacher's Final Quest to Discover Life's Greatest Lessons (Touchstone, $24, 9781476743448).
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Thursday on a repeat of KCRW's Bookworm: Junot Díaz, author of This Is How You Lose Her (Riverhead, $16, 9781594631771). As the show put it: "Our master of seductive street-slang discusses seduction and its relation to fiction. Can a writer seduce you? Does Junot Díaz feel guilt about his persuasive and tempting approach? Find out, as he describes what he calls 'the shock of representation.' "
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Thursday on Dr. Phil: Larry Winget, author of Grow a Pair: How to Stop Being a Victim and Take Back Your Life, Your Business, and Your Sanity (Gotham, $17.50, 9781592408467).
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Thursday on a repeat of NPR's Diane Rehm Show:
Martin Cruz Smith, author of Tatiana (Simon & Schuster, $25.99, 9781439140215) Shirley Jones, author of Shirley Jones: A Memoir (Gallery, $27, 9781476725956).
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Friday on the John Batchelor Show: James Tobin, author of The Man He Became: How FDR Defied Polio to Win the Presidency (Simon & Schuster, $30, 9780743265157).
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Friday on a repeat of NPR's Diane Rehm Show: Pat Conroy, author of The Death of Santini: The Story of a Father and His Son (Nan A. Talese, $28.95, 9780385530903).
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Friday on a repeat of the View: Bill O'Reilly, co-author of Killing Jesus (Holt, $28, 9780805098549).
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Friday on a repeat of Tavis Smiley: James McBride, author of The Good Lord Bird (Riverhead, $27.95, 9781594486340).
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Saturday on CBS Saturday Morning: Daniel Boulud, co-author of Daniel: My French Cuisine (Grand Central, $60, 9781455513925).
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Saturday on NPR's Weekend Edition: Richard Betts, author of The Essential Scratch and Sniff Guide to Becoming a Wine Expert (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $19.99, 9780544005037).
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Next Monday morning on the Today Show: Esther Blum, author of Cavewomen Don't Get Fat: The Paleo Chic Diet for Rapid Results (Gallery, $24.99, 9781476707693).
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Next Monday morning on Good Morning America: Justin Klosky, author of Organize & Create Discipline: An A-to-Z Guide to an Organized Existence (Avery, $26, 9781583335291).
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Next Monday on a repeat of NPR's Diane Rehm Show: Katy Butler, author of Knocking on Heaven's Door: The Path to a Better Way of Death (Scribner, $25, 9781451641998).
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Next Monday on a repeat of the Late Show with David Letterman: Billy Crystal, author of Still Foolin' 'Em: Where I've Been, Where I'm Going, and Where the Hell Are My Keys? (Holt, $28, 9780805098204).
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Tuesday, December 31, on a repeat on NPR's Diane Rehm Show: John Grisham, author of Sycamore Row (Doubleday, $28.95, 9780385537131).
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New Year's Day on a repeat of NPR's Diane Rehm Show:
Richard Blanco, author of For All of Us, One Today: An Inaugural Poet's Journey (Beacon, $15, 9780807033807) Wally Lamb, author of We Are Water (Harper, $29.99, 9780061941023).
From last week's Indie bestseller lists, available at IndieBound.org, here are the recommended titles, which are also Indie Next Great Reads:
Hardcovers A Reader's Book of Days: True Tales From the Lives and Works of Writers for Every Day of the Year by Tom Nissley, illustrated by Joanna Neborsky (Norton, $24.95, 9780393239621). "This book goes everywhere with me. I read it aloud at the front counter of our store. I read it silently to myself. Filled with fascinating and interesting stories and excerpts from literature, the pages of this beautiful book overflow with rich nuggets of information. A wonderful gift for readers, teachers, lovers--and yourself!" --Tracy Taylor, the Elliott Bay Book Company, Seattle, Wash.
My Mistake: A Memoir by Daniel Menaker (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $24, 9780547794235). "Being a longtime reader of the New Yorker, I found Menaker's behind-the-scenes account of his career there absolutely riveting. The literary life is gutted and splayed for all to see. Menaker's professional story is interspersed with his personal life, and both fed his writing career. His years at Random House and HarperCollins are also included, with fascinating details about contemporary authors and how a book is created. This is a must-read for booksellers and serious readers." --Ellen Jarrett, Porter Square Books, Cambridge, Mass.
Paperback This Is Between Us: A Novel by Kevin Sampsell (Tin House Books, $15.95, 9781935639701). "Sampsell's This Is Between Us is a tangible, breathtaking work of writing. This is a love letter laced with hope, pain, doubt, intoxication, apprehension, and a veritable ocean of feeling, navigated with impeccable skill and grace. Wonderful!" --Jim Brimble, Third Place Books, Lake Forest Park, Wash.
For Ages 4 to 8 Elephant's Story by Tracey Campbell Pearson (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, $17.99, 9780374399139). "Whoops! After Elephant accidentally sneezes out letters from Gracie's missing picture book, the perplexed pachyderm seeks assistance in putting the words back together again. His friends have their own ideas of how the story should go. Will the book ever be fixed and returned to its rightful owner? Cleverly and joyfully illustrated, Elephant's Story is a celebration of both wordplay and friendship." --Beth Wagner, Phoenix Books, Essex, Vt.
Selected new titles appearing next Tuesday, December 31:
Weeknight Wonders: Delicious, Healthy Dinners in 30 Minutes or Less by Ellie Krieger (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $29.99, 9781118409497) is a cookbook of fast, healthy meals.
The Body Book: The Law of Hunger, the Science of Strength, and Other Ways to Love Your Amazing Body by Cameron Diaz (HarperWave, $25.99, 9780062252746) gives health advice.
The Deepest Secret by Carla Buckley
(Bantam, $26 hardcover, 9780345535245, February 4, 2014)
The daring premise of Carla Buckley's The Deepest Secret tests the limits to which a mother will go to protect her child. Driving to the airport one rainy night, Eve looks down at a text message and hits what she initially thinks is a deer. When she stops, she discovers she's killed Amy, the 11-year-old daughter of her next door neighbor and best friend. With no witnesses, Eve has a difficult choice. She can tell the truth and go to jail, or live free with the guilt.
Eve's family is already strained to the breaking point. For years, her life has centered on protecting her now 14-year-old son, Tyler, whose affliction with the fatal light sensitivity condition xeroderma pigmentosum (XP) makes a normal childhood impossible. Tyler's older sister, 16-year-old Melissa, is metamorphosing from perfect daughter to stereotypical sullen teen. And since her husband, David, started work at a law firm in Washington, D.C., Eve and the kids see him only when he flies home on weekends.
Unbeknownst to Eve, though, David feels disconnected from her and has grown closer with a young female coworker. Behind her sudden sulking, Melissa is acting out dangerously, knowing her mother's total focus on Tyler will leave her free from parental intervention. Only Tyler knows about his sister's behavior--and Tyler has secrets of his own. Forced by his disease to remain in his light-proofed room during daylight hours and attend school via Skype, Tyler knows he'll never learn to drive, never meet a girl; according to the statistics, he probably won't even live to 20. Restless, Tyler sneaks out and roams the neighborhood at night, discovering that every household has a hidden pain or secret infraction.
Buckley takes readers into the grayest area imaginable. Although Eve's crime is tremendous, Buckley convincingly portrays a mother whose need to protect her child overrides moral and societal obligations, at least in her own mind. Tyler makes for an even more compelling character, with a sensitivity cultivated by living in death's shadow that contrasts sharply with his naiveté and vulnerability. Though often heart-wrenching, the extensive emotional development Buckley packs into a world of everyday life overlaid by nightmare will leave readers wondering how far they might go for their loved ones, and the additional moral conundrums faced by each member of Eve's family will provide hearty book club discussion fodder. As winding and treacherous as a slick road, this masterful thriller will leave readers clutching their chests even through the graceful ending, grateful to be safely back in their own lives. --Jaclyn Fulwood
Shelf Talker: In this suburban thriller, a mother covers up a terrible crime to protect her family--including a teenage son who suffers from a fatal light sensitivity disorder.
Earlier this month at the Society of Illustrators in New York City, Cecilia Yung, art director and v-p at Penguin Books for Young Readers, welcomed an audience of teachers, librarians and other children's book enthusiasts to a presentation by three of the artists honored in annual exhibit of called "The Original Art." This year, the show honored 125 books. Yung organized the program with Brooklyn Public Library's Judy Zuckerman, and Anelle Miller, director of the Society of Illustrators.
"Picture books allow children to experience artwork even if they're far from major museums," Yung said, adding that it's often their first exposure to art. Jerry Pinkney, Jeanette Winter and Peter Brown provided insight into their creative process.
Jerry Pinkney, Jeanette Winter and Peter Brown, three of the artists featured in the "Original Art 2013" exhibit at the Society of Illustrators.
"Most of the work happens on my drawing table," Jerry Pinkney explained. Like his Caldecott Medal–winning The Lion and the Mouse, Pinkney thought his most recent book, The Tortoise and the Hare, would be wordless, but he wanted the process to be organic. As he considered the moral of the story, he thought, "Wouldn't it be interesting if the moral unfolded on the spreads with the tortoise?" He started working out the dummy and, using the moral as a cumulative text, discovered that it corresponded perfectly with the spreads featuring the tortoise. The artist uses marker to draw on vellum, then places the drawing on a light box, and watercolor paper over that. This way, he can keep developing the drawing (in pencil), tracing over the marker, and use watercolors on the final drawing. Pinkney passed around his childhood copy of Aesop's Fables, illustrated by Arthur Rackham, which has inspired several of his most beloved picture books. Other inspiration comes from his personal collection of more than 3000 books on nature and African American culture.
Jeanette Winter also emphasized her materials. As a child, she said, "Nothing made me happier than a new box of Crayolas with their pristine points." She learned to draw with charcoal, pencil, pen-and-ink and Cray-Pas (oil pastels) in high school. She illustrated her first book, The Christmas Visitors, with etchings, then used watercolors for Follow the Drinking Gourd. "My natural way of seeing and thinking is small in scale," she said. Her original art for her most recent book, Henri's Scissors, is smaller than it appears in the book. Winter credits David Hockney with her most recent medium: pictures created on an iPad. She saw work Hockney had done on the iPad and was inspired to try it for herself. Her forthcoming book, Mr. Cornell's Dream Boxes (Beach Lane Books, July 2014) will feature art created using this new tool. "Each drawing can be like an animated film," she explained. "Children were his favorite audience," she said of artist Joseph Cornell, who once held an opening at the Cooper Hewitt for children only, with the boxes all hung at a child's height, and brownies and cherry coke as refreshments.
"As a kid, I wanted to be an old man making art," Peter Brown admitted. His grandfather was an amateur artist, and Brown has a theory that "children don't see artists as grown-ups making art." He struggled in school, yet made his first book at age six. He joined the Philadelphia Museum at 16 and took a foundation studies class. "I was on a quest to find a visual voice for myself," Brown said. When he sees a piece of art that resonates with him, he asks himself, "Why do I love that painting? Is it the color? The composition? The naïveté? The pattern? The use of light and shadow?" He called Babar an inspiration for his latest work, Mr. Tiger Goes Wild. "Babar goes from being naked on four legs to having clothes and standing on two legs with the turn of a page," Brown observed. "I decided to make a book that's the inverse of that." (Mr. Tiger sheds his clothes.) He wanted to strip down images to their essentials (forgive the pun). "How simply can I show a tree and have it read like a tree?" he wondered. He used a similar approach with the transition from Mr. Tiger going from an upright standing position to walking on four legs. Brown draws with black ink or watercolor on paper, then scans the work and uses Photoshop to create hundreds of layers on each picture.
Perhaps Jerry Pinkney summed up the afternoon's discussion best: no matter what the process in the creation of the art, "We bring pieces of ourselves to the work on the wall." The show closed on Saturday, but a selection of 40 works from it will tour colleges throughout the country, a tradition going back nearly 30 years. --Jennifer M. Brown
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"In the last month, I have shopped at four northern Vermont bookstores and two in Manhattan, and it was great to see that ALL were packed. Reports of the death of the bookstore have indeed been exaggerated. Color me VERY happy."
That Bookstore in Blytheville, Ark., has new new owners.
Zac Colandrea and Mike Dregalla have bought Twice Told Tales, Crystal Lake, Ill., and renamed it--in an apparent nod to one of the big trends in indie bookselling--Buy Local Books, according to the Northwest Herald. They have hired Sarah Carzoli to manage the store. The store's inventory is mostly used books, although it does sell some new books.
Tracy, Calif., "is going to start looking for a bookstore to replace the Barnes & Noble closing December 31 at the West Valley Mall," the Tracy Press reported. City manager Leon Churchill announced last week that adding a bookstore to the list of economic development goals for Tracy came in response to comments his office had received from citizens and an online petition to keep the B&N. 
Yesterday's New York Times Magazine profiled eBay's conception of how bricks-and-mortar stores can compete with Amazon. As eBay's CEO John Donahoe described the approach: "Not online, not offline: both."
Wendy Welch, co-owner of Tales of the Lonesome Pine bookshop, Big Stone Gap, Va., shared "a list of our favorite customer sayings compiled from Christmases past and present (hee hee, get it, present? Oh, never mind)." Some of our favorites:
Summit released a new clip from the movie adaptation of Veronica Roth's novel Divergent, directed by Neil Burger, Deadline.com reported. The cast includes Shailene Woodley, Kate Winslet, Maggie Q, Miles Teller, Tony Goldwyn, Ashley Judd, Zoe Kravitz, Jai Courtney and Theo James. It hits theaters March 21.
The daring premise of Carla Buckley's The Deepest Secret tests the limits to which a mother will go to protect her child. Driving to the airport one rainy night, Eve looks down at a text message and hits what she initially thinks is a deer. When she stops, she discovers she's killed Amy, the 11-year-old daughter of her next door neighbor and best friend. With no witnesses, Eve has a difficult choice. She can tell the truth and go to jail, or live free with the guilt.
