RHONDA MCKNIGHT is the author of the 2025 Christy Award winner Bitter and Sweet and the 2024 Christy Award finalist and Emma Award winner The Thing About Home, as well as several other bestselling, award-winning novels. She writes book club fiction and romance featuring complex characters, her stories inspire and uplift women, offering heartfelt journeys of love, redemption, and resilience. She lives in South Carolina.
From award-winning author Rhonda McKnight comes a new story of faith, history, and the power of legacy that merges the romance of The Bookshop Sisterhood with the rich Lowcountry setting of Mary Alice Monroe.
Alexandra Chambers is a writer who has run out of words. Struggling with writer's block and the pressure to secure a new book deal, she wins a week in a writer-friendly cabin through a drawing held at a Lowcountry literacy center. What she finds is far more than she expected--a vibrant community brimming with inspiration, a past steeped in history and culture, and a man who both intrigues and unsettles her.
Gabe Scott, a bestselling author and the former writer-in-residence, is everything Alex feels she's not--acclaimed, award-winning, and unshakably confident. When their paths cross at the center, his literary brilliance and dedication to helping struggling Gullah students stir feelings Alex isn't ready to confront. Though undeniably attracted to him, Alex wrestles with the fear that her books pale beside his celebrated work…
ALEXIA JONES HELSLEY is an author, historian and an archivist. She loves to study and write about South Carolina’s long and unique history. She grew up in Beaufort and developed a lifelong love affair with the Lowcountry. Currently, she teaches history at the University of South Carolina–Aiken and serves as the university archivist. Among her publications are; South Carolinians in the War for American Independence, Beaufort, South Carolina: A History, Wicked Edisto: The Dark Side of Eden , Wicked Columbia, and A Girl, a Boy, and a Train in Our Prince of Scribes: Authors Remember Pat Conroy.
A vivid portrait of power, privilege, and peril in 1700’s Charleston.
Eighteenth-century Charleston was a city built on water, wealth, and whispers―where the harbor brimmed with merchant ships and war vessels and status was measured in wharves, wine cellars, imported porcelain, and family names that could open every door. This is colonial Charleston at its peak: a thriving Atlantic port fueled by rice and indigo, shaped by transatlantic trade, and held together by tightly woven kinship networks that blurred the line between commerce and political power.
At the center is Rebecca Brewton Motte―born into privilege, married into influence, and forced by fire, disease, and revolution to become far more than a genteel figure in a drawing room. Through the interconnected worlds of the Brewtons, Mottes, Pinckneys, and their allies, the story reveals how South Carolina’s elite built fortunes, constructed iconic townhouses, navigated epidemics and natural disasters, and managed sprawling plantations with enslaved labor powering every “luxury” detail.
Date: Friday, September 25th 2026
Location: Tide to Table- 1 Norris Drive, Pawleys Island SC 29585. (inside of the Litchfield Inn)
*This location is upstairs. There is an elevator, but requires walking some distance.
Time: 10:45AM-1:00PM
Your Ticket Includes:
Guaranteed seating via our curated seating chart (no rushing for a spot).
An intimate talk and Q&A with Rhonda McKnight and Rebecca Brewton Motte.
A multi-course lunch, dessert, and beverages provided by Tide to Table.
A dedicated window for personalized book signing and a brief meet-and-greet with the authors.
The Opportunity to purchase signed copies of both Writer in Residence & Rebecca Brewton Motte and the American Revolution in South Carolina.
Refund Policy- Thank you for signing up for an event at Litchfield Books! Cards will be charged upon time of ticket purchase. We will refund your ticket, excluding our merchant banker convenience fee and credit card reversal fee. Cancellations are accepted up until seven days prior to the event date. If the cancellation is past the seven days you will not be offered a refund but you will be offered the signed copy of the event book.