About this Event
Bookmarks is thrilled to host #1 New York Times bestselling author Colson Whitehead for a talk on his latest book, Cool Machine!
Cool Machine is the final entry in the Harlem Trilogy, though readers can easily jump in at any point. This series of thrillers recreates New York City across the 1960s (Harlem Shuffle), the 1970s (Crook Manifesto), and concludes with the 1980s in Cool Machine.
Attendees can expect to hear from Colson Whitehead in a solo talk, followed by a Q&A. If you have a question for the author, please include it in your event registration.
Ticket options are as follows:
- Ticket for One: $35 (plus taxes & fees) includes one pre-signed copy of Cool Machine and event admission for one person.
- Ticket for Two: $45 (plus taxes & fees) includes one pre-signed copy of Cool Machine and event admission for two people.
Please note there is no book signing, photo line, or opportunity to meet the author at this event.
Have any questions? Check out our Event FAQs page and email [email protected] for further inquiries.
Thank you to the for sponsoring this event!
About the Author
COLSON WHITEHEAD is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of twelve works of fiction and nonfiction, and is a two-time winner of the Pulitzer Prize, for The Nickel Boys and The Underground Railroad, which also won the National Book Award. A recipient of MacArthur and Guggenheim fellowships, he lives in New York City.
About the Book
From #1 New York Times bestselling author and two-time Pulitzer winner Colson Whitehead, an exuberantly entertaining novel that brings to life 1980s New York in the magnificent final volume of his Harlem Trilogy.
1981. New York City is beginning to emerge from financial ruin and decline, energized by rampant real estate development and a Wall Street unchained by Reagan-era predatory capitalism. Up in Harlem, successful business owner/master fence Ray Carney has just been named Sterling Furniture’s Dealer of the Month. When the banks won’t give his beloved wife Elizabeth a loan for her new travel agency, however, Carney gambles on one last heist, and finds himself entangled with a legendary criminal mastermind.
1983. To some, Carney’s friend and partner in crime, Pepper, is a stone-cold sociopath. To others, a top thief with questionable people skills. Either way, he’s feeling his age in his troubled gut and his aching bones. When he takes on a bodyguard gig as a favor to Elizabeth, he’s plunged into the alien territory of the East Village art and club scene. Luckily for him, whether you’re uptown or down, everyone speaks the same language of violence—Pepper is a native speaker.
1986. Carney has always been haunted by his inability to save his cousin Freddie. Now, twenty years after Freddie’s death, he has a chance to rescue Freddie’s son from the violent forces of the city. But coming out of retirement and teaming up with Pepper again will mean risking the safety and security he’s spent decades building for his family, with only one shot to get it right.
With his usual pitch-perfect prose, Whitehead paints a portrait of a city in transition, where shimmering skyscrapers rise to the heavens as displaced people huddle in abandoned tunnels below. In a dazzling display of protean imagination, Cool Machine roves all over the city, from Windows on the World to the Meadowlands, to show that in New York, and in the lives of Whitehead’s vivid characters, it’s what’s below the surface that reveals the truth.
About the Venue
First Baptist on Fifth boasts a beautiful historic building in the heart of downtown Winston-Salem. Bookmarks has had the pleasure of working with First on Fifth for several large-scale events, hosting authors like Celeste Ng with Jason Mott, Anne Lamott, Stacey Abrams, Shelby Van Pelt with Etaf Rum, TJ Klune, and Kate Bowler with Virginia Evans.
Assistive listening is available via Listen Everywhere technology. Attendees can download ListenWiFi for free, connect to the church's WiFi, and receive audio directly to their phones. This will require attendees to use their own headphones.
Wheelchair accessible parking is located along Poplar St. NW and in the gravel lot behind the church (this lot is currently closed for construction as of April 2026). Designated pews are reserved for mobility device users and their companions. Accessible restrooms are available on the ground level. All restrooms at this venue are single stall/family restrooms.
Check-in is located at the church's front entrance. If you would like to avoid stairs, there is an accessibility ramp located on the left side of the building, where an additional check-in point will be located.
Parking locations nearest the venue include the following:
- Gravel lot behind the church building (closed April 2026)
- Street parking where indicated by signage
- Spruce Street Visitor Lot (formerly the Winston-Salem Journal lot)
- Sixth-Cherry Trade Parking Deck - 527 N. Cherry St.
- Fourth Street Parking Deck - 601 W 4th St.
- Cherry-Marshall Parking Deck - 402 N. Cherry St.
Event Venue & Nearby Stays
First Baptist Church, 501 West 5th Street, Winston-Salem, United States
USD 6.68 to USD 51.62
