Author Bryan Mealer’s latest, The Kings of Big Spring, follows his family legacy back through four generations of Texans trying to survive and thrive despite tremendous odds. To coincide with the book’s release, the author will read from this family memoir, discuss his writing and research process, answer audience questions, and sign copies of the new release, which will be available for purchase thanks to BookPeople.

ABOUT THE KINGS OF BIG SPRING: Five years ago, writer Bryan Mealer set out to tell the story of his father and his father’s childhood friend, Grady Cunningham, who, during the early eighties, started a small oil company and began drilling wells together. As a child, Mealer watched the excess his father’s career had brought them: Rolexes, Rolls Royces, and charter planes to the Caribbean were just some of the luxuries they enjoyed. Just as quickly, he saw it all disappear. Digging deeper into his family history, Mealer discovered that this personal story was just the tip of the iceberg for the Mealers. Through historical records and interviews with long lost family members, Mealer has created THE KINGS OF BIG SPRING: God, Oil and One Family’s Search for the American Dream, as much the unforgettable account of four generations of one big Texan family—their redemption, salvation, triumphs, and loss—as it is the telling of the American experience.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Bryan Mealer is the author of Muck City: Winning and Losing in Football’s Forgotten Town, and the New York Times bestseller The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind, which he wrote with William Kamkwamba. He is also the author of All Things Must Fight to Live, which chronicled his years covering the war in the Democratic Republic of Congo as a reporter for the Associated Press and Harper’s. His work has appeared in the anthology Best American Travel Writing and was chosen for an Overseas Press Club Award Citation. He and his family live in Austin.

ABOUT At CENTRAL: At CENTRAL is The Library Foundation’s new cultural series featuring author events, musical performances, film screenings, cooking demonstrations, and gallery exhibitions at the Austin Central Library.