LANCASTER, PA (July 20, 2015) – The Junior League of Lancaster proudly welcomes New York Times Best Selling Author Christina Baker Kline for their 2015 Author’s Luncheon!   Guests will enjoy food and fellowship, while enjoying a presentation from Christina Baker Kline about her best-selling novel Orphan Train.

Date: December 4, 2015

Location: Lancaster Marriott at Penn Square. 25 S Queen St, Lancaster, PA 17603

Time: Doors open at 11am

Silent Auction and Raffle!

Christina Baker Kline, a novelist, nonfiction writer, and editor, brings a little-known chapter in American history to light in her recent New York Times best-selling novel, Orphan Train.  Between 1854 and 1929, so-called orphan trains ran regularly from cities on the East Coast to the farmlands of the Midwest, carrying thousands of abandoned children whose fates would be determined by luck or chance. As a young Irish immigrant, Vivian Daly was one such child, sent by rail from New York City to an uncertain future a world away. Returning to the east coast later in life, Vivian strikes up an unlikely friendship with Molly Ayer, an eighteen-year-old on the verge of leaving the child welfare system. As the two grow closer, they begin to find answers to mysteries that have haunted both of them their entire lives – answers that will ultimately free them both.

Kline is the author of four other novels and is the recipient of numerous honors, including a Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation Fellowship, a Writer-in-Residence Fellowship at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and a Fordham Faculty Research Grant. Her first novel, Desire Lines, follows the disappearance of a teenage girl in Maine and the delayed investigation that takes place a decade later. Her second book, The Way Life Should Be, (follows a 33-year-old woman who thinks she is risking everything by moving from Manhattan to Maine, only to discover love in the most unlikely place. In Bird in Hand, published in 2009, Kline follows four adults, two marriages, one life-long friendship, and the choices that tear everything they have apart.

Kline is co-editor, with Anne Burt, of a collection of personal essays called About Face: Women Write About What They See When They Look in the Mirror. She also commissioned and edited two widely praised collections of original essays on the first year of parenthood and raising young children, Child of Mine and Room to Grow. With her mother, Christina Looper Baker, Kline co-authored The Conversation Begins, a book on feminist mothers and daughters. She is an editor and writing coach for the social networking site SheWrites.com and her essays, articles, and reviews have appeared in the New York Times Book Review, The Yale Review, Southern Living, Ms., Parents, and Family Life, among other places.one book one community

Orphan Train is the 2015 “One Book, One Community:  Our Region Reads” selection for Berks, Dauphin, Lancaster, Lebanon, Perry, and York Counties! 

What is the One Book, One Community: Our Region Reads! Campaign? Community-wide reading, or “One Book,” programs are designed to promote the value of reading by recommending a compelling book that links the community in a common conversation. One Book programs encourage dialogue about a particular book, but also foster lifelong learning and the development of a strong community identity.

Launched in Seattle in 1998 with great success, the “One Book” concept has swept the nation, including such cities as Chicago, New York, Detroit, Philadelphia, and Houston. Learn more at http://www.oboc.org/what-is-one-book.html

Inspired by the Orphan Train story; donations will be collected before and during the luncheon event for the Junior League’s “Apartment in a Suitcase – Fostering Strength” Project.

There are approximately 600 children in foster care roughly 45% are teens. Every year, a number of them turn 18 and graduate from high school while in the foster care system. These teens often lack the support and resources that young adults need to live independently.

The Junior League of Lancaster will be collecting and filling suitcases for these teens aging out of the foster care system, with items necessary to live independently. The suitcase helps them to minimize the financial burdens of getting set up in their own place. Many of these teen go through financial hardships where it can be hard to even afford the necessities such as buying groceries, and affording personal care items.   Items needed include: Suitcases,  Gift Cards, Bedding, Pots and Pans, Dishes, Kitchen Utensils, Laundry Care Items, Cleaning Supplies, Towels and Wash Cloths, and Personal Care items.

This project is also in line with the Junior League of Lancaster’s “Issue-Based Community Impact” plan for the 2015-2016 League Year, which aims to bring awareness to and benefit the issue of children aging out of foster care. 

Authors Luncheon REGISTRATION INFORMATION:

GENERAL:  8/2/15-11/20/15

$60 general/$35 student

LATE REGISTRATION:  11/21/15-12/1

$70 general/$40 student

Paperback books available for $15, Hardcover for $25.

For additional information about the Luncheon:

Visit:  www.jllancaster.org/authors-luncheon 

“Like”: our facebook page Junior League of Lancaster Author’s Luncheon to stay current on event details, contests, and raffle/silent auction items!”

Email: authorsluncheon@jllancaster.org

Phone: (717) 392-2415

Past Authors include:

2014 – Jennifer Weiner, author of All Fall Down

2013 – Therese Anne Fowler, author of Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald

2012 – Kelly Corrigan, author of The Middle Place

2011 – Laura Ling, author of Somewhere Inside