Powderly Library Hosts Author Talk With Kwame Mbalia on Monday, September 20

What: Powderly Branch Library Presents Conversations with an Author Kwame Mbalia 

When: 9:30 a.m. on Monday, September 20.

Where: Virtual. Registration is required at this link https://forms.gle/K6DsevhQVpPkfSR27 

Details: The Birmingham Public Library’s Powderly Branch is hosting a virtual interview with New York Times best-selling author Kwame Mbalia. For more information, contact  Powderly Branch Manager Candice Hardy at (205) 925-6176. 

Birmingham, Ala. - The Birmingham Public Library’s Powderly Branch invites you to join in for a powerful conversation with New York Times best-selling author Kwame Mbalia, best known for his Tristan Strong series.

 The author talk will take place virtually on Monday, September 20, beginning at 9:30 a.m. Registration is required by clicking here https://forms.gle/K6DsevhQVpPkfSR27 

Once you are registered, you will receive a Zoom link on how to view the author event.   

Kwame Mbalia is a husband, father, writer, a New York Times best-selling author. He is a former pharmaceutical metrologist.

 Mbalia’s debut middle-grade novel, Tristan Strong Punches a Hole in the Sky, (October 2019) was awarded a 2020 Coretta Scott King Book Award, presented annually to African-American authors and illustrators of books for children and young adults that demonstrate an appreciation of African American culture and universal human values.   

The book is about a 12-year-old Black boy, Tristan Strong, while dealing with grief over the death of his best friend, is transported to a world where West African folktales exist and are in conflict with African gods.

 Mbalia has also published two other books in the Tristan Strong trilogy – Tristan Strong Destroys the World (October 6, 2020) and the upcoming concluding book, Tristan Strong Keeps Punching, being released October 5, 2021.

The first two books in the series - Tristan Strong Punches a Hole in the Sky and Tristan Strong Destroys the World  - are available at Jefferson County Library Cooperative members, including the Birmingham Public Library. 

The concluding book, Tristan Strong Keeps Punching, is available for purchase on Amazon.com.

 In the newest book, Tristan Strong faces his arch-enemy, King Cotton, in a dramatic conclusion of the trilogy. The series is published by Rick Riordan Presents/Disney-Hyperion. 

Mbalia is also the co-author of Last Gate of the Emperor with Prince Joel Makonnen (Scholastic Books). He is the editor of Black Boy Joy: 17 Stories Celebrating Black Boyhood, released last month (August 3, 2021). 

A Howard University graduate who now lives with his family in North Carolina, Mbnalia says he survives on Dad jokes and Cheezits. 

You can find several books by Mbalia on Amazon through searching his name or by clicking on his website,  www.kwamembalia.com. 

To learn more about Mbalia, check out this video of another interview he did virtually last year with the Wake County Public Library in Wake County, North Carolina.