Nancy McCabe's Fires Burning Underground - Launch Party

Apr 8, 2025 7:30pm-8:30pm

Mukaiyama University Room, Frame-Westerberg Commons

Nancy McCabe's middle-grade novel Fires Burning Underground will be released on April 8. Join us for a launch party in the University Room at 7:30, co-sponsored by Spectrum and BAPL. There will be refreshments, a brief talk on writing for different audiences, a dramatic reading by a small cast of performers, a Q&A, and a book signing, with books available for purchase.

In Fires Burning Underground, it's Anny's first day of middle school and, after years of being homeschooled, her first day of public school ever. In art, Larissa asks what kind of ESP is her favorite: telepathy, clairvoyance, precognition, or telekinesis. Tracy asks how she identifies: gay, straight, bi, asexual, pan, trans, or confused? And thus kicks off a school year for Anny in which she’ll navigate a path between childhood and adolescence, imagination and identity. In a year of turmoil and transition, with a new awareness of loss after the death of a friend, Anny struggles to find meaning in tragedy, to come to terms with her questions about her sexuality, and to figure out how to negotiate her own ever-shifting new friendships. And when her oldest friend's life is in danger, she must summon up her wits, imagination, and the ghosts that haunt her to save them both.

Susan Campell Bartoletti, author of The Boy Who Dared and Hitler Youth: Growing Up in Hitler’s Shadow, calls Fires Burning Underground “compelling.” “A sensitively drawn and beautifully written portrait of a girl coming into her own,” adds Kathleen Wilford, author of Cabby Potts, Duchess of Dirt. The Independent Book Review writes, "Spirits prowl at the corners, but tender vulnerability and small rebellions make the haunting, beating heart of Nancy McCabe's middle-grade novel."