Authors! Authors! opens season Sept. 16

Jack Hanna, the Columbus Zoo's emeritus director, will open the 2010-11 Authors! Authors! speaker's series Sept. 16 with some live animal pals.

Hanna became such a popular TV guest after his animal-accompanied appearances on "Good Morning America" and "The Late Show with David Letterman" in the 1980s that he left the zoo directorship to become one of the country's premier ambassadors to the animal kingdom.

His humorous autobiography is "Jungle Jack: My Wild Life" (2008). He's also penned "Jungle Jack's Wackiest, Wildest, and Weirdest Animals in the World" and other books.

On Oct. 21, the prolific Alexander McCall Smith, creator of "The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency" series set in Botswana, will take the stage. Born in Zimbabwe and educated in Scotland, McCall Smith returned to Africa as an adult to work as a law professor in Botswana. He's also written a light-hearted series based on a Scottish ethicist named Isabel Dalhousie.

Geraldine Brooks, a former Wall Street Journal reporter born in Australia, will speak Nov. 8. Her first novel, "Year of Wonders," published in 2001, was inspired by the true story of Eyam, Derbyshire, where villagers voluntarily quarantined themselves when a plague struck in 1665.

Her next novel, "March," a retelling of Louisa May Alcott's "Little Women" from the point of view of Mr. March, the absent father, won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 2006. Her most recent novel, "People of the Book," was a New York Times bestseller.

It's the 17th year for the series, sponsored by The Blade and the Toledo-Lucas County Public Library. Hanna and McCall Smith will speak at 7 p.m. in the Stranahan Theater, 4645 Heatherdowns Blvd. Brooks will speak in the McMaster Center in the Main Library, 325 North Michigan St.

Talks last about an hour, followed by a question and answer period and a book signing. Tickets will go on sale the first week of August and are $10; $8 for students. They may be purchased in advance at any library branch and at the door.

Contact Tahree Lane at:

tlane@theblade.com

or 419-724-6075.