This Week’s Temperature-Controlled Literary Events

After, lo, these many months, I am finally getting my act together to post upcoming readings, signings, and various related bookish events for those with an interest in such things. Assuming Michael (our brave and noble editor, long may he reign, huzzah!) approves, I will post every Monday. (Perhaps a bit of flattery will ease the way.)

This week starts off with the long-awaited opening of ticket sales for Hugo House’s 2010-2011 literary series, and closes out with beers, steers, and queers at Elliott Bay Books. Okay, I lied about two out of three of that last. I think. “Who knows?” she said whimsically, and then proceeded to spend the rest of the evening referring to herself in third-person.

Monday, August 16th

12 a.m. Hugo House
Hugo House Literary Series
Tickets for the fourth season go on sale today. Get ‘em while they’re hot! Featured authors include Nancy Rawles, Stacey Levine, Laura Love, and many others that I shall not list here. The season starts with Under the Influence on October 15, 2010, followed by Mother Knows Best on November 19, 2010. The series continues on February 18, 2011 with Brief Encounters, i.e. Hugo House: The Musical, and concludes with Born in the U.S.A. on March 18, 2011. Season ticket buyers will save $5/event: what a deal!

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1 p.m. Seattle Mystery Bookshop
Carl Hiaasen
Star Island
Hiaasen’s books populate U.S. airport and hotel news stands like triffids. It must stop. 

7 p.m. Cafe Racer
Gillian Gaar
Return of the King: Elvis Presley’s Great Comeback
Gaar joins Cafe Racer in a “death day” luau in honor of The Pelvis. Rather morbid, if you ask me, not that anyone did.

7 p.m. The Red Door
Charles Bukowski’s Birthday Party
Obviously the writer will not be present, unless something very unusual happens before 7 p.m.

7 p.m. University Bookstore, U-District
Carl Hiaasen
Star Island
Fans will be pleased to know that Hiaasen will sign up to six books per person.

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Tuesday, August 17th

7 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Julie Sheehan & Linda Bierds
Bar Book / Flight
Poetry reading, wherein poets read poems, as poets sometimes do.

7 p.m. University Bookstore, U-District
Neal Pollack
Stretch: The Unlikely Making of a Yoga Dude
Seattle writer and performer Suzanne Morrison will warm up the crowd with a few minutes from her show Yoga Bitch, then the yoga dude will talk.

8 p.m. Theatre Off Jackson
Salon of Shame
Wherein one may go to read one’s execrable adolescent poetry to an appreciative audience (assuming that one did not burn it all in a fit of sanity upon turning 22). Alternatively, one may attend to either mock or commiserate with those less inclined towards metrical arson.

Wednesday, August 18th

7 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Howard Norman
What is Left the Daughter
“The epistolary form of this novel is a cri de coeur from an author faithful to the printed word in a time of promiscuous texting, friending, and tweeting …” says Valerie Miner of The Los Angeles Times. Comments like that are why I did not become a professional critic.

7 p.m. Hugo House
Marilyn Stablein
Splitting Hard Ground
Poetry reading.

7 p.m. Pilot Books
Leon Baham & Sarah Galvin
Poetry reading.

7 p.m. UW Kane Hall, Room 210
Mary Roach
Packing for Mars
The very popular author of the very entertaining and informative pop-science titles Stiff, Spook, and Bonk returns to Seattle. I’m so excited, I could pee.

Thursday, August 19th

7 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Caleb Barber
Beasts and Violins
Barber reads from his debut collection, which has received very kind reviews.

7 p.m. Temple de Hirsh Sanai
Eric Volz
Gringo Nightmare
Have you ever been jailed in a foreign country for a crime that you (allegedly) did not commit? Well, Volz has. “In conversation with Eric Volz will be Roslyn Solomon, co-founder of the Implementation Project and former director of the U.S. program Uplift International, a Seattle-based health and human rights organization.”-EBBC

7 p.m. University Bookstore, U-District
Alexa Stevenson
Half Baked: The Story of My Nerves, My Newborn, and How We Both Learned to Breathe
Not even I can make fun of a memoir about having a premature baby, and dealing with Newborn ICU. That just sucks.

Friday, August 20th

7 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Stacey Levine
Frances Johnson
Local poets Rebecca Hoggs and Johnny Horton, cellist Leri Goldston, and assorted unnamed “others,” gather to celebrate the new edition of Levine’s novel.

Saturday, August 21st

12 p.m. Seattle Mystery Bookshop
Susan Wingate
Easy as Pie at Bobby’s Diner
Second in a series by a local-ish (San Juan Islands) author.

4 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Laurie Frankel
The Atlas of Love
The local writer and teacher debuts her novel, shockingly set in Seattle, about a baby named Atlas, who is (one assumes) loved.

7 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Peter Jabin, et al.
Gay City, Volume 3: Re-Pulped
GC deputy director Jabin and a bunch of contributors to GC3 get together to do their thing. Join them if it’s your thing, what you want to do. I can’t tell you who to sock it to.