We’re always looking for fun and exciting new ways to do book events, so when Ann Humphreys approached us about a hula hoop workshop - well, how could we resist??

Ann’s memoir, The Tao of Hoop, is a philosophical memoir about how the humble hula-hoop transformed her life. Having endured a life-altering loss as a teenager, Ann had learned to handle grief and pain through the time-honored Southern traditions of denial and repression. The hula-hoop broke those old patterns, allowing her to meet a new wave of challenges with a clear mind and an open heart.

Part story, part treatise, part inquiry, part self-help guide--The Tao of Hoop is a raw, poetic, and captivating read you will have a hard time putting down.

For the first half of this event, we will gather inside the shop for a reading from Ann’s memoir. Once we have gotten a bit of inspiration in our hearts and minds, we will take the party outdoors for a bit of real live HOOPING! Bring your comfy shoes! Ann will have large beginner hoops on hand and it will be easy...YES YOU CAN hula-hoop! You just need the right size!

Ann Humphreys grew up in North Carolina and attended Barnard College, graduating with high honors. In 2000, after several years working as a reader for The Sun Magazine, Ann graduated from the acclaimed MFA Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College in Swannanoa, NC, where she studied the special sonic calculus that is poetry.

One day when she was 35 years old, fresh from a breakup and very depressed, Ann happened to catch sight of a cute guy doing what seemed to be a sacred dance with what appeared to be a large black hula-hoop. A few days later she was introduced to the hot hoop guy by her dear friend, the Cree artist Kimowan Metchewais, and her life changed forever.

Ann has worked as a waitress, editor, yoga teacher, mitigation investigator in death-penalty appeals cases, and most recently as a world-renowned instructor of flow-based hoopdance. The Tao of Hoop is her first book.