Where's Lynne?

As I head out on a road trip book tour, I'd love to see you along the way...

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The other day, my mother texted me asking how the air quality was “up there.” I had been in northern Michigan leading a writers retreat the week prior, but I returned home some days before winds sent smoke from Canadian wildfires through Michigan, turning the skies cloudy and suffocating.

“I’m home,” I said to my mom.

“I can’t keep track,” she laughed.

I’m not wearing a striped turtleneck, spectacles and hat, like Waldo, but I am definitely on the move this summer! First Africa, then Mackinac Island, and now I am heading out in my car with boxes of books (the trunk is FULL—I hope to sell them all) for 4 events in New England and upstate New York.

So where will I be over the next two weeks? In case you want to connect, share a hug and a coffee or conversation about writing and book publishing?

Stop 1: RomantiConn! July 24th

I start by driving east, visiting my stepdaughter Grace in Ohio, then spending a night with my college roommate Laura in Yonkers. From there, I’ll meet a writing friend on Long Island for lunch, then spend two nights with a cousin I lived with when I was a new college grad with an unpaid internship in New York City.

me in my 20s with my dad

(Yes, I moved my life to the Big Apple at 22 without a guaranteed paycheck—crazy to consider now, but it turned into a full-time journalism job after 6 weeks!)

After I leave my cousins, I head to Connecticut. This is the first time I’ll be a signing author at RomantiConn, a two-day romance book festival in Trumbull. Founder Kitty Berry plans a whirlwind schedule, and I am excited to be signing & selling books Friday evening and also participating in the Snippet Read Friday.

That’s when a snippet from one of my books (Cave of Secrets, my award-winning Scotland novel) is read by narrators on the big stage. Purchase tickets to attend here.

I’ll be staying with my oldest friend, Melissa, who is also a writer, and visiting my writing friend April, too.

Melissa and me circa 1970s (on the right, Melissa is on the left, and I'm in the middle, both of us rocking pigtails)

Stop 2: Boston, July 27-28

After a weekend in New London with my writing friend Susan, I’ll drive north to Boston, and spend two nights with my friend Tcheilly. (I can’t wait to share the story of how Tcheilly and I met, in another Substack!)

In Boston, I am speaking at Congregation B’nai Shalom in Westborough, invited by Hadassah Greater Boroughs Book Club. Register for this event here.

Then the next day, July 28, at 1 pm, I’m speaking to residents of Opus Newton, also about Cave of Secrets.

Stop 3: the Finger Lakes, July 30th

I leave Boston and head for the Berkshires, where I will have 36 hours to myself to explore the little towns in those gorgeous mountains. A couple years ago, I drove home from a writing sabbatical in Nova Scotia—took the ferry to Maine, then drove straight back to Michigan, stopping overnight in the Berkshires. There was a horrible downpour, so I didn’t get to see anything. I’m glad to have a chance to go back.

And then, it’s on to the Finger Lakes, another breathtaking landscape, in upstate New York.

On July 30th, I’m speaking at a library in Elmira about my essay collection, Forest Walk on a Friday. I’ll also be leading a writing workshop and having dinner with writer-friend Beth.

Register for this event here.

So…if you want to connect over books and writing, find me anywhere on this journey over the next two weeks. I can’t wait to meet you!!

Wish me luck! I’m driving across the US on the open road, something I love to do. I love the promise of driving until I feel like stopping, turning off at an exit because of some compelling roadside attraction. Taking backroads. Wandering with no deadlines.

I’ll have time to think and listen to audiobooks—(I’m currently listening to Andre Agassi’s autobiography, Open. I just finished reading Carrie Soto Is Back by Taylor Jenkins Reid, a great tennis novel. Yes, I’m reading all the tennis stories I can as I work through revisions of my fifth novel, a tennis-hockey 1980s romance.)

In a future Substack, I’ll share how this road trip book tour came to be. It’s been months in the planning, and I’m super excited to see people, speak to audiences of readers, see old (and new) friends, and take to the open road. Who knows what stories will come from this?

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