Book Talk Cafe

The Friends of the Ponte Vedra Library’s Book Talk Café program features humor writer Harrison Scott Key and his heartwarming memoir, The World’s Largest Man. In his book, Key writes of growing up with a Bunyanesque father in Mississippi, a tale that Kirkus Reviews said was, “Consistently seasoned with laughs …” and “An uncommonly entertaining story …”

Key’s memoir begins with his childhood, when his father moved them from the comfort of Memphis to Mississippi—which seemed to Key a land of werewolves, racism, and tooth decay. When it became clear that he was not able to make his father happy—and really, did he want to embrace that life anyway?—he left it all behind to become everything his father was not: an actor, a Presbyterian, a doctor of philosophy, with nary a gun or a knife to show for himself. But when it was time to settle down and marry, Key found himself returning to Mississippi. With a wife and children, he suddenly saw his father from a fresh vantage point, and realized—for better and for worse—how much of his old man he’d absorbed.

Harrison Scott Key writes a humor column for The Oxford American. His nonfiction and humor have also appeared in The New York Times, Outside, The Best American Travel Writing, Southern Living, Salon, Reader’s Digest, and elsewhere. He teaches humor, memoir, and other writing courses at the Savannah College of Art and Design in Savannah, Georgia, where he lives with his wife and three children.

All Book Talk Café programs begin at 6:30 p.m. and are free and open to the public. The author’s books will be available for sale, and light refreshments served.