Join First Light Books for an evening with Annie Hartnett, whose new novel packs a lottery winner, two orphaned kids, an aimless adult daughter, and a cat who can predict death into a borrowed red Volvo and sends them on a cross-country road trip to Arizona.

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The Road to Tender Hearts is the kind of book that makes you laugh on one page and cry on the next. Come for the conversation, stay for the surprises.

She'll be joined in conversation by Corrie MacLaggan, executive editor of KUT News and The Texas Newsroom, a lifelong Austinite, and a member of the same Austin book club for more than 15 years.​

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A reception with the author will take place from 6:00 to 6:30 PM, followed by the conversation at 6:30 PM and a signing to close the evening. Tickets include a copy of the book and a reserved seat. Unreserved seats are available on a first come, first served basis. Free RSVPs are also encouraged.

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About the book

National Bestseller. Winner of the 2025 New England Book Award for Fiction. An NPR and LitHub Best Book of the Year.

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At sixty-three years old, million-dollar lottery winner PJ Halliday would be the luckiest man in Pondville, Massachusetts, if it weren't for the tragedies of his life: the sudden death of his eldest daughter and the way his marriage fell apart after that. Since then, PJ spends both his money and his time at the bar, and he probably doesn't have much time left. He's had three heart attacks already. But when PJ reads the obituary of his old romantic rival, he realizes his high school sweetheart, Michelle Cobb, is finally single again. Filled with a new enthusiasm for life, PJ decides he's going to drive across the country to the Tender Hearts Retirement Community in Arizona to win Michelle back.

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This could be the second chance PJ has long hoped for, a fresh shot at love and parenting, but does he have the strength to do both those things again? It's very possible his heart can't take it.

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The Road to Tender Hearts has been called "a feel-good, feel-sad, warm, dark, and funny road-trip story, in the grand tradition of Little Miss Sunshine" by Catherine Newman, New York Times bestselling author of Sandwich. Rufi Thorpe, author of Margo's Got Money Troubles, wrote that PJ Halliday is "like 'The Dude' in The Big Lebowski, one of those iconic characters you just can't help falling in love with." The New York Times called the novel "absurdly over-the-top in plot, yet warms like a heated seat." And Shelby Van Pelt, New York Times bestselling author of Remarkably Bright Creatures, said simply: "I loved every page of this wild, weird, bighearted book."

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About the author

Annie Hartnett is the award-winning author of three novels: Rabbit Cake, Unlikely Animals, and the national bestseller The Road to Tender Hearts, which won the 2025 New England Book Award for Fiction and was named a best book of 2025 by NPR, LitHub, and Southern Living. Unlikely Animals was listed as one of the best books of 2022 by the Washington Post and was longlisted for the Joyce Carol Oates Prize. Rabbit Cake was listed as one of Kirkus Reviews' Best Books of 2017, was a finalist for the New England Book Award, and was longlisted for the Center for Fiction's First Novel Prize.

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Annie has been awarded fellowships and residencies from MacDowell, Sewanee Writers' Conference, and the Associates of the Boston Public Library. Along with the writer Tessa Fontaine, she co-runs Accountability Workshops for writers, helping writers commit to routines and embrace the long, slow, joyful, terrible process of doing the work. She lives in Massachusetts with her pretty good husband, perfect daughter, and two flawless rescue dogs, Willie Nelson and Minnie Mouse.

About the conversation partner

Corrie MacLaggan is the executive editor of KUT News, Austin's NPR station, and The Texas Newsroom, the collaboration among public radio stations across the state. Previously, she was managing editor of The Texas Tribune, an Austin-based national correspondent for Reuters, and a state Capitol reporter for the Austin American-Statesman.

She has also worked as a reporter in El Paso and Mexico City. Corrie grew up in Austin, serves on the board of Carolina Alumni at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and has been a member of the same Austin book club for more than 15 years.​