Name: Mary Ann Lindley w/ Fragments: Then & Now
Start: 2025-10-04T16:30:00-04:00
End: 2025-10-04T17:30:00-04:00
Location: Midtown Reader & the Piebrary

$Mary Ann Lindley w\/ Fragments: Then & Now$

You are invited to Midtown Reader to experience a book that creates an original sense of lived history one that is easily accessible designed as a coffee-table format with airy pages light illustrations a cover with an original painting and with an overall respect for the beauty and necessity of language that invites reflection and engagement. "Fragments: Then & Now" a cultural memoir by Mary Ann Lindley is written in a then-and-now format borrowing fragments from the vast portfolio of newspaper columns written throughout 40 years by a literary journalist in Florida.
About the Book
Datelined fragments selected by the author sum up particles of Florida history and broader American culture. These are followed by "And now" fragments reflecting the author's current perspective and experiences. Eight overall chapters provide an umbrella for these topics: Florida: Its sun its clouds its politics; Notes from my younger self; Technology: If we knew then what we know now; Home family and seasons; The more things change the more they stay the same; The news biz; This place these people; The nature of things: This is who we are.
About the Author
Mary Ann Lindley was a newspaper columnist for nearly 40 years primarily for the Tallahassee Democrat. Her commentaries on Florida politics community issues and most frequently trends and curiosities throughout American culture received state and national awards. Ms. Lindley started working in a small weekly newsroom in her native Northwest Missouri at the age of 16. She was immediately captivated by journalism and went on to become a Curator’s Scholar at the University of Missouri School of Journalism where she earned her bachelor’s degree. During her career she managed the capital bureau of the New York Times’ Florida news group writing about state government and the courts in the 1970s. She was a state-news editor at The Miami Herald and beginning in 1979 as a columnist and later as editorial board chairman of the Tallahassee Democrat. She left journalism in 2011 to run for and win a seat on the Leon County Commission which she held from 2012 until 2020 stepping down to return to her writing career. She’s a community volunteer in Tallahassee Florida where she lives with her husband Charlie.