Author Shannon Gibney Meet & Greet, Book Sales & Signing

Townie Books welcomes educator and prolific author Shannon Gibney for a meet and greet, with book sales and signing, to the patio next Thursday, July 27 from 4 – 6 pm. Shannon has published THREE books in the past year!

Part memoir, part speculative fiction, The Girl I Am, Was, and Never Will Be, the latest book by this award-winning author, explores the often surreal experience of growing up as a mixed-Black transracial adoptee, and is based on Shannon’s true story.

At its core, the novel is a tale of two girls on two different timelines occasionally bridged by a mysterious portal and their shared search for a complete picture of their origins. Gibney surrounds that story with reproductions of her own adoption documents, letters, family photographs, interviews, medical records, and brief essays on the surreal absurdities of the adoptee experience.

The end result is a remarkable portrait of an American experience rarely depicted in any form.

Shannon also has two stunning picture books out in the last year: Sam and the Incredible African and American Food Fight as well as Where We Come From. In Sam, six-year-old Sam, with his Liberian dad and African American mom, finds a way to bring everyone in his cross-cultural family together at the dinner table. Rice and okra soup: Sam’s auntie from Liberia made it, and it’s Dad’s favorite. Mom, homegrown in Minnesota, made spaghetti and meatballs. And Sam? He’s just hungry, but no matter what he chooses to eat, someone will be disappointed. Caught in the middle of his family’s African and American food fight, Sam gets a little help from his grumbling stomach—and readers of this seriously funny book get a peek at cultures colliding in a family kitchen that work out in a very delicious way. Charly Palmer’s vibrant and captivating illustrations make this gentle lesson in getting along a bright and colorful visual feast as well.

In Where We Come From, Shannon teams up with other authors to lyrically explore where they each come from—literally and metaphorically—as well as what unites all of us as humans.

All three books will be available for purchase and personalization by Shannon. Come meet this award-winning author and take a peek at her work!
Shannon Gibney is a writer, educator, activist, and author of See No Color and Dream Country, young adult novels that won Minnesota Book Awards. She teaches writing in the English department at Minneapolis College, and lives with her two Liberian-American children in Minneapolis, Minnesota.