2026 Friends Gala Event
Friends of Gaston County Public Library are excited to announce the date for our 2026 Friends Gala Event to be held on Wednesday, May 6, 2026, at the Gaston Country Club. This year’s event will host three North Carolina authors, Joy Callaway, Meagan Church, and Kelly Mustian. As part of the ticket price, you get the pleasure of selecting one of the amazing titles from one of these fantastic authors. At the event, all of these titles and additional works from all three authors will available for purchase.
Joy Callaway: Sing Me Home to Carolina (9798892421119) published by Penguin Random House
About the book: A small-town girl turned big city businesswoman returns home to help her parents, only to find her heart being tugged between her old flame and the town’s mysterious new guy. This witty and effervescent novel is perfect for readers of Viola Shipman and fans of Sweet Magnolias and Hart of Dixie.
Event planner Hattie Norwood only came back home to Mountain View, South Carolina to support her parents as they receive word that the family peanut farm is infertile. This news doesn’t come as a surprise to Hattie, and she plans to return to Charlotte at the weekend’s end.
But then the town councilwoman begs Hattie to use her event-planning prowess to help Mountain View put on a musical benefit to stop the construction of the new Carolina Panthers stadium—a project Hattie is actually in favor of, much to the dismay of the locals—and she finds herself agreeing to stay until the town’s Founder’s Day celebration a week later, just as her old flame, former MLB standout Lee Lockhardt, materializes in town after a career-ending injury.
When the hunky and mysterious new owner of Fox’s Hardware, Fox Ryan, suggests the Founder’s Day celebration be moved to the Norwoods’ barn in an attempt to reinvent the failing farm as a music and event venue, Hattie agrees, unaware this move will thrust the town, her love life, and the brewing tension over the stadium into a very public spotlight.
Fans of small-town romance and quirky casts of characters will be rooting for Team Lee or Team Fox as Hattie decides if love, like most music, is meant to fade or last forever.
Meagan Church: The Mad Wife (9781464236747) published by Sourcebooks
About the book: From bestselling author Meagan Church comes a haunting exploration of identity, motherhood, and the suffocating grip of societal expectations that will leave you questioning the lives we build—and the lies we live.
They called it hysteria. She called it survival.
Lulu Mayfield has spent the last five years molding herself into the perfect 1950s housewife. Despite the tragic memories that haunt her and the weight of exhausting expectations, she keeps her husband happy, her household running, and her gelatin salads the talk of the neighborhood. But after she gives birth to her second child, Lulu’s carefully crafted life begins to unravel.
When a new neighbor, Bitsy, moves in, Lulu suspects that something darker lurks behind the woman’s constant smile. As her fixation on Bitsy deepens, Lulu is drawn into a web of unsettling truths that threaten to expose the cracks in her own life. The more about Bitsy she uncovers, the more she questions everything she thought she knew—and soon, others begin questioning her sanity. But is Lulu truly losing her mind? Or is she on the verge of discovering a reality too terrifying to accept?
In the vein of The Bell Jar and The Hours, The Mad Wife weaves domestic drama with psychological suspense, so poignant and immersive; you won’t want to put it down.
Kelly Mustian: The River Knows Your Name (9781464230370) published by Sourcebooks.
About the Book: From the acclaimed author of The Girls in the Stilt House comes a long-awaited novel both atmospheric and lyrical, a haunting Southern story about memory, family secrets, and fierce and fragile love.
For nearly thirty years, Nell has kept a childhood promise to never reveal what she and Evie found tucked inside a copy of Jane Eyre in their mother’s bookcase—a record of Evie’s birth naming a stranger as her mother. But lately, Nell has been haunted by hazy memories of their early life in Mississippi; years their reclusive mother, Hazel, has kept shrouded in secrecy. Evie recalls nothing before their house on Clay Mountain in North Carolina, but Nell remembers abrupt moves, odd accommodations, and the rainy night a man in a dark coat and a hat pulled low climbed their porch steps with a very little girl—Evie—then left without her.
In dual storylines, Nell, forty-two in 1971, reaches into the past to uncover dangerous, long-buried secrets, and Becca, a young mother in the early 1930s, presses ahead, each moving toward 1934, the catastrophic year that would forever link them.
Our 2026 Friends of the Gaston Public Library gala event was a wonderful night! We had the opportunity to hear from three local authors, Joy Callaway, Megan Church, and Kelly Mustian, in a round-table discussion featuring their latest books. Check out these photos from the night!
I dare say that there is no greater advocacy group to the public library than the Friends of the Library. The Friends of the Gaston County Public Library is no exception. With a rich history dating back to 1955, the Friends continue to be an integral part of the Gaston County Public Library. Today the Friends are not only known for their advocacy efforts, but also for their fundraising and dedication to quality, cultural programming at no-cost to the residents of Gaston County.
As early as 1955, there was discussion about a Friends of the Library organization. In November 1955, Public Affairs Committee Chair, Mrs. W. B. Boney (Maude), called on members of the Altrusa Club of Gastonia to attend a planning meeting on December 8, 1955. Mrs. Boney not only requested the member’s attendance but requested two representatives from their respective groups. The goal was to “work toward the aim of bringing Gaston County’s library rank up from 61st in library income to nearer its proper position as one of the six largest and wealthiest counties in North Carolina.” While little information was kept beyond their second meeting on January 19, 1956, it is safe to say that their work did not stop. In 1957, Gaston County voters passed a 5-cent tax levy to support branch library operations in seven communities and earmarked $250,000 in capital funds for building construction.
Fast forward almost 30 years to 1983 where once again, a Friends group stepped up to help the Gaston County library. Despite having moved into a 66,000 sq ft facility on Garrison Blvd roughly five years earlier, library staff recognized the need to deaccession materials due to poor condition and inaccurate information. In an attempt to be fiscally responsible, library staff held an annual book sale to raise funds for the Library. With a reduction in library staff and the increased demand this created for other library staff, those book sales ceased until a new group stepped into the limelight to form the Friends of the Gaston County Public Library. With bylaws approved on September 20, 1983, the Friends of the Gaston County Public Library were on their way. In April 1985, the Friends of the GCPL held their first book sale which has continued annually until 2020. Following this first book sale, the Friends of the GCPL received their 501(c)3 designation from the Internal Revenue Service on September 9, 1986.
The rest is as they say, history.
