Develop a 2021 vision
When the Newport Public Library announced the summer reading program for this year, it had a vision for events all summer long on the theme “Reading Colors Your World.”
And a three-part author series beginning on Tuesday, June 15, is the perfect partner to help that vision along.
Tod Davies, author of “The History of Arcadia” visionary fiction series and the “Jam Today” cookbook/memoir series, will present a series on visionary fiction on the third Tuesday of June, July and August. Participants will have an opportunity to win a free copy of one of her (yes, her) books.
What is visionary fiction? Davies explains, with illustrations from The History of Arcadia, that “these books tell the story of a world literally formed by story, by one person discovering and claiming who she really is . . . and of the subsequent events that lead first to a deceptively happy world, then to an inevitably tragic outcome and finally to a slow rebuilding of the world on foundations more deeply and thoughtfully laid.”
The first three novels in the series are “Snotty Saves the Day,” “Lily the Silent” and “The Lizard Princess.” The fourth, told by arch villain Aspern Grayling, is “Report to Megalopolis” or “The Post-modern Prometheus.”
“The History of Arcadia” series prompted critics and booksellers to ask readers to “imagine Lewis Carroll with footnotes by Jonathan Swift.” The author herself credits Ursula K. LeGuin, Mary Shelley, Octavia Butler and J.R.R. Tolkien as noble ancestors of the world of Arcadia. With their strong and loving female protagonists, accessible storylines, fantastical settings, sophisticated illustrations and powerful messages, each novel in “The History of Arcadia” series is truly visionary.
On Tuesday, July 20, Davies will present “Looking Back to Look Forward” focusing on the second and third of “The History of Arcadia” series, the YA/Arthurian love story “Lily the Silent” and the literary fiction of “The Lizard Princess.”
“When Sophia the Lizard Princess plunges into the world of symbol made visible, discovering who she is and what her world needs, the reader, too, can experience these wonders with her,” Davies said. “And, as in all visionary fiction, wonder if these transfer to our world as well.”
The series concludes on Tuesday, Aug. 17, with “Visionary Fiction's Ancestry and Report to Megalopolis” focusing on the fourth book in “The History of Arcadia” series.
Readers won’t need to have read any of the other books in the series to become engrossed in the drama of Aspern Grayling, whose obsession with creating a new life form — in the person of ruthless adventurer Pavo Vale — could destroy his whole world. A compelling descendant of Mary Shelley’s “Frankenstein,” this is a tale of a man bent on conquest, and of an adversary that might yet defeat him: the ghost of the Arcadian Devindra Vale, the only woman he has ever loved.
Each presentation will begin at 6 pm on Zoom.
For more information, go to www.newportlibrary.org or call 541-265-2153.