Leverage meets Parasite meets Six of Crows in multi-award winning author Fran Wilde’s thrilling, high-tech adventure heist wrapped in a gaslamp fantasy where thieves are entertainment for the wealthy.
The Canarviers are the premier performance thieves in New Washington, blending astonishing acrobatics, clever misdirection, and daring escapes to entertain their rich patrons. As King Canarvier has always told his children, their work is art. Who else could titillate audiences with illicit history lessons and tease them through the gaps in their much-prized security?
Now that they’re adults, King’s children feel their divisions more than their bonds. Roosa attends an exclusive finishing university, blending in so well she’s unsure where she belongs. Her brother Dax craves a chance to prove himself, stifling under his father’s caution.
Then King disappears.
With only days to buy mercy before their father is lost forever, Roo and Dax must compete in a high-stakes Grand Heist, pushing down their resentments to work together. Against a technocrat wagering more than he can lose, a security chief with a taste for pain, and a society beauty with secrets of her own, any misstep promises catastrophic ruin.
But Canarviers are artists. And they perform best when the pressure is on . . .
Fran Wilde will be joined in conversation by Baltimore City Comptroller Bill Henry.
About the Author:
Fran Wilde is a Compton Crook Award and two-time Nebula Award-winning author whose novels and short stories have been finalists for six Nebula Awards, a World Fantasy Award, four Hugo Awards, three Locus Awards, and a Lodestar. She teaches for the Genre Fiction MFA concentration at Western Colorado University and the Writing for Children and Young Adults MFA at Vermont College of Fine Arts. She also writes nonfiction for publications including The Washington Post, The New York Times, and Tor.com. She lives outside Washington DC and can be found online at franwilde.net.
About the Moderator:
Baltimore City Comptroller Bill Henry has published no novels, poetry or short stories of his own, but has long been an avid consumer of other peoples’ work. Since his first exposure to the Chronicles of Narnia in elementary school, Bill has been looking for other worlds of fantasy and science fiction in wardrobes, libraries and under bedcovers for over fifty years.
Before being first elected to his current post in 2020, Bill served three terms representing the north-central part of the City on the Baltimore City Council. He previously worked in community development and as staff for the City Council, the Maryland legislature, and the US House of Representatives. A lifelong City resident, Bill is a graduate of Johns Hopkins University and Loyola University Maryland.
About the Program:
- Doors will open to registered attendees at 6 pm.
- A local bookseller will be on-site and have books available for purchase.
- Free parking vouchers are available to program attendees who park at the Franklin Street Garage (15 W. Franklin Street) after 4pm. Ask Pratt event staff for your parking voucher prior to or after the program.
- This free event will be presented in-person and virtually.
