Authors coming to sign books in Williamsburg

Mark your calendar: David Baldacci will be signing books in Williamsburg on Dec. 8.

But first, so will a couple other authors of note:

Bob Drury, author with Tom Clavin of “Valley Forge,” a history of the events and major players, at1 p.m. Saturday. The two previously wrote “The

Heart of Everything That

Is.”

Lt. Joe Kenda, on Grand Illumination day, Dec. 2. You may know him from the show “Homicide Hunter,” which draws on his years as a homicide detective. His book is “I Will Find You” (2017), and he’ll be signing it at 2 p.m.

Then it’s Baldacci, at 2 p.m. Dec. 8, signing his latest, “Long Road to Mercy.” While he’s there, the bookstore will collect new and gently used books for the Feeding Body and Mind Initiative, which will send them to a community food bank. The initiative, which addresses the relationship of literacy, poverty and hunger, was established by Feeding America and David and Michelle Baldacci’s Wish You Well Foundation.

Details: William and

Mary Bookstore, Merchants Square, 345 Duke of Gloucester St. 757-221-1658.

Christina Dalcher of Norfolk, author of “Vox” (the novel about women in the U.S. being allotted100 spoken words a day), has a Q&A in the latest Writer’s Digest. She talks about the repercussions of having no language at all; the speed with which she wrote

“Vox”; her naivete when she started writing; the impact of her science training on her writing process (she’s a linguist); and more.

The American Booksellers Association protested Virginia’s and New York’s financial support for Amazon’s second headquarters. In letters to the two governors, the indie booksellers group protested “providing massive subsidies of public funds and tax incentives” to one of the world’s largest corporations. (Bookweb.org)

You Saw It Coming Department: Yet another

David Lagercrantz/Stieg Larsson title, this one due in August: “The Girl Who Lived Twice.” (Publishers Lunch)

Obituary notes: Donald McCaig: “He trained Marines to shoot, taught philosophy to college students and worked as a producer for Murray the K, the influential rock radio DJ. But after settling into a lucrative copywriting position at a Madison Avenue ad agency, Donald McCaig grew restless — and decided to reinvent himself as a farmer and writer. So in1971, as the back-to-the-land movement pulled his friends toward communes in the countryside, he and his girlfriend acquired a 280-acre farm in the Allegheny Mountains of western Virginia. Their 19th-century cabin was unheated, unfenced and plumbing-free. By the end of their third lambing season, nearly half their sheep had died.” So writes Harrison Smith in The Washington Post, going on to recount how McCaig and girlfriend Anne struggled back, married; he wrote, and wrote, and his books included Michael Shaara Award winners “Jacob’s Ladder” and “Canaan,” as well as “Rhett Butler’s People.” Donald McCaig was 78. ... And William Goldman, the Oscar-winning screenwriter of “Butch Cassidy” and “All the President’s Men,” was 87.

New and recent

“Ruth Bader Ginsburg: A Life” by Jane Sherron De Hart (Knopf, 752 pp.). “This hefty biography of the Supreme Court justice by De Hart, a scholar of women’s history, aims to explain Ginsburg’s transformation from brilliant law student and expert on civil procedure to leading advocate for women’s rights,” but it doesn’t reduce the explanation to simple “don’t get mad, get even.” (NYT)

“Why Religion? A Personal Story,” by Elaine Pagels (Ecco, 256 pp.). A well-regarded Princeton scholar of religion relates her life story. Raised in a nonreligious household but riveted by a Billy Graham crusade she attended, Pagels was struck by tragedy early in life: Both her young son and her husband died in rapid succession. She asks: How does religion help us to deal with loss? (Newsday)

“Jeeves and the King of Clubs” by Ben Schott. (Little, Brown; 320 pp.). Billed as a “novel in homage to P.G. Wodehouse,” this new book by the author of “Schott’s Miscellany” and “Schott’s Almanac” revives idle young English gentleman Bertie Wooster and his unflappable valet, Jeeves. This time they’re enlisted by the British government to thwart an upper-class spy; high jinks ensue. (Newsday)

“Nine Perfect Strangers” by Liane Moriarty (Flatiron, 464 pp.). While you’re waiting for Season 2 of “Big Little Lies” to return to HBO, pick up the latest from this bestselling Australian author. At a health resort called Tranquillum House, a romance novelist and assorted other guests gather for a retreat and find that not everything about the place is as it seems. (Newsday) —Erica J. Smith, books@dailypress.com