Four San Miguel writers, who call themselves "The Quad," have met weekly for the past two years, usually in one of their homes or, when away from San Miguel, via Zoom. "All four of us are working on memoirs," reports Quad member Philip Gambone. "Each one of us has a different take on what that genre is all about."

Miss Tanya Goes to Yale by Leslie Acoca begins when a photographer snaps a photo of a teen girl as she emerges from the sea off Miami Beach. That photo, published in newspapers worldwide, leads Acoca to become Coppertone's Miss Tanya, and pays her way through Yale. From there, she travels on foot through India to meet the Dalai Lama, and fall in love with both her Yale professor and her work with troubled kids. "Leslie's writing is sensual and humorous," Gambone says, "bringing readers along on a wild ride that is simultaneously unique and universal." Acoca's previous work has been featured on NPR, the Los Angeles Times, and The New York Times.

Sound Woman: Dispatches from a Documentary Life, written by writer and photographer Rosemary Davis, contains both a vivid first-hand description of the mechanics of media over 25 years, and dramatic and real stories about place – from the Mississippi Delta to a small English village; people – an Olympic athlete to the King of Yemen; and culture – in an Appalachian mountaintop coal town, to a Russian/American Peace Cruise. Davis is the author of the San Francisco memoir, Before They Left Us, which was named 2019 AIDS Awareness Book of the Year by the Human Relations Book Awards.

The Hook & I, by Janet Rodgers, captures her tumultuous years in the 1960s and early 1970s as she navigates the twists and turns of her often-dangerous journey toward becoming an adult. This action-packed story of her adventures with The Hook, her charismatic dare-devil, pot-dealing husband, whose dramatic exit from her life (after one year, one month and thirteen days of marriage) brings her face to face with painful but life changing truths, and toward a path of creative joy and true love she never could have imagined. A Professor Emerita of Theatre from Virginia Commonwealth University, Rodgers has published The Complete Voice and Speech Workout and Acting & Singing with Archetypes.

Philip Gambone's Considerable Women: An Italian American Matriarchy is the biography of four talented and accomplished women in his family. "Women who each, in different ways, went way beyond the expectations of their time," Gambone says. "Women who embraced life with dauntless gusto, even in the face of heartbreaking circumstances. Women of complex and often contradictory humanity. Women who could be a delight one minute and drive you crazy the next." Gambone is the author of seven books, both fiction and nonfiction, and over a dozen personal essays in major anthologies. His memoir, As Far as I Can Tell: Finding My Father in World War II, was named one of the Best Books of 2020 by the Boston Globe.

The reading is free and open to the public. A question-and-answer session will follow. The event should run a little over an hour.

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