Novelist/musician performs at Shelton library

Hoodsport author Rebecca Holbrook will read from her novels "Omie's Well" and "The Deer Stone" from 4 to 5:45 p.m. Jan. 16 at the Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder St.

Admission is free. Holbrook is also a singer and banjo player and will perform music references in her novels.

Holbrook grew up in the American South, where her maternal line went back to some of the earliest settlers around Savannah, Georgia. Stories from her ancestors, passed down through the generations, inspired the novel. Though she grew up in Florida and lived much of her life in Tennessee, those family tales are loosely draped around her own story.

In "Omie's Well," Omie Silar and her mamma Kate are descended from a line of women possessing the Sight - a knowing of things to come, of secrets hidden beneath life's surface. Midwives and healers, they used their gifts to lessen the suffering of those living and those hovering between. Had Omie been able to read the portents at the bottom of her own teacup, she might have borne less suffering herself. Perhaps when she saw, as her mother predicted, the face of the man she was to marry, she only sensed the sweetness that overlaid the sorrows to come.

The book is available on Kindle. The sequel, "The Deer Stone," will be published this year.

Holbrook lives in Hoodsport with her husband Gary. She has also played the banjo and written songs for most of her life.

Holbrook has also been a carpenter, horticulturist and poet. She offers courses on empowering women through carpentry. She founded the Healing Arts Center & Massage School in Huntsville, Alabama.

IF YOU GO

WHO: Author/singer/musician Rebecca Holbrook

WHAT: Reads from her two novels

WHEN: 4-5:45 p.m. Jan. 16

WHERE: Shelton Timberland Library, 710 W. Alder St.