Things Literary in Nature for the Week of September 27, 2010

This week’s big events include visits from Arianna Huffington, founder of The Huffington Post; Markos Moulitsas, founder of The Daily Kos; and Ken Follett, big time writer-guy. Not to forget Ms. Nancy Pearl, America’s most famous librarian, of course.

09/27/10 6 p.m. Town Hall Seattle
Sebastian Mallaby
More Money Than God: Hedge Funds and the Making of a New Elite
Mallaby will explain why we shouldn’t light our torches and sharpen our pitchforks, but instead join the hedge fun.

09/27/10 7 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Daniel Kehlmann
Fame: A Novel in Nine Episodes
“Who would have thought contemporary Central European literature could be so fun and so funny? Daniel Kehlmann is who. The young Austrian prodigy, famous everywhere but in the United States, has given us a real beauty of a book, farcical, satiric, melancholic, and humane. Modern fame may have been invented in America, but nobody has dramatized its paradoxes and heartbreaks more entertainingly than the European Kehlmann does here.” –Jonathan Franzen

09/27/10 7 p.m. UW Bookstore
Ken Scholes
Antiphon:The Psalms of Isaak
Book three in a five book series that combines epic fantasy and post-apocalyptic SF. From niche-errific TOR books, of course, who else?

09/27/10 7 p.m. Seattle Public Library
Sara Gruen
Ape House
The author of Water for Elephants promotes her new book about bonobos and reality television. Frankly, I’m surprised this story is fiction.

09/27/10 7:30 p.m. Town Hall Seattle
Deborah Fallows
Dreaming in Chinese
The single greatest disappointment in my life is my complete and utter failure to master a single foreign language. Do you think if I ate her brain, I could speak Mandarin Chinese?

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09/28/10 6:30 p.m. Borders
Marla Martenson
Diary of a Beverly Hills Matchmaker
What she said.

09/28/10 6:30 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Stages: Drama Book Group
Cider House Rules
Stages will be discussing the Parnell’s stage adaptation of The Cider House Rules, one of John Irving’s earlier, and better, novels. I’ve never read or seen this adaptation, but the book was very good. I miss John Irving. He used to be a writer.

09/28/10 7 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Annabel Lyon
The Golden Mean: A Novel of Aristotle and Alexander the Great
The award-winning Vancouver writer promotes her debut novel. Historical fiction, natch.

09/28/10 7 p.m. Barnes & Noble U-Village
Ethan Stowell
Ethan Stowell’s New Italian Kitchen
Author reading and signing.

09/28/10 7 p.m. UW Bookstore
Heather Krasna
Jobs That Matter: Find A Stable, Fulfilling Career In Public Service
Name that movie: “I want a job, I want a job, I want a good job, I want a job, one that satisfies my artistic needs.”

09/28/10 7 p.m. Pilot Books
Last of the Living Spankstra
I have no clue and the website doesn’t help. I suggest calling for more information.

09/28/10 7 p.m. Secret Garden Books
Lindsay Craig
Dancing Feet
The children’s book author will read.

09/28/10 7:30 p.m. Town Hall Seattle
Nancy Pearl
Book Lust to Go
The celebrity librarian recommends books to read before you travel. Sorry, I have to repeat that: Celebrity Librarian. How cool is that?

09/28/10 7:30 p.m. Richard Hugo House
Scribes Book Launch
This summer’s young writers series alums will celebrate their work.

09/29/10 11 a.m. Borders
Gary Friedly
Bridge Over the Valley
A young man finds himself on a train.

09/29/10 7 p.m. Town Hall Seattle
Ayaan Hirsi Ali
Infidel and the New Nomad
One of TIME magazine’s 100 Most Influential People, the activist will discuss her efforts to defend the rights of women against militant Islam.

09/29/10 7 p.m. UW Bookstore
Bob Goldstein
Riding With Reindeer: A Bicycle Odyssey Through Finland, Lapland, and Arctic Norway
A great travel memoir. Goldstein won the 2006 Ben Franklin Award for travel writing.

09/29/10 7 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Emma Donoghue
Room
EBBC wraps up their trio of foreign writers with the Irish-Canadian novelist and her creepy, creepy book.

09/29/10 7 p.m. All Pilgrim’s Church
Michael Meade
Facing Fate, Finding a Destiny
An evening of myth and storytelling.

09/29/10 7:30 p.m. Richard Hugo House
Judith Skillman
The Never
Poetry reading about endangered species.

09/29/10 7:30 p.m. Town Hall Seattle
Mary Catherine Bateson
Composing a Further Life
I don’t understand books about “staying young while getting old.” Also, dubbing aging “Adulthood II” is inane. Boomer panic alert: Gravity works! Entropy is a law! Oh, noes!

09/30/10 1 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Laura Numeroff
Otis & Sydney and the Best Birthday Ever
The popular children’s author will sign books purchased at the event, +1, so don’t bring her entire oeuvre to EBBC.

09/30/10 11 a.m. Borders
John Andrews
Rude Buay… The Unstoppable
A DEA agent goes after a drug cartel. Because that what DEA agents do when they aren’t sniffing your knitting at the border. You’d think those people had never seen an alpaca/silk blend before.

09/30/10 5 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Ethan Stowell
Ethan Stowell’s New Italian Kitchen
Jill Lightner, editor of Edible Seattle, will be interviewing the restauranteur onstage.

09/30/10 5:30 p.m. Century Ballroom
Arianna Huffington
Third World America: How Our Politicians Are Abandoning the Middle Class and Betraying the American Dream
Yes, you read that right: the founder of the Huffington Post is in town to talk about her new book, and to raise $$$ for Planned Parenthood Votes. Tickets start at $125.

09/30/10 6 p.m. Barnes & Noble Downtown
Gary Friedly
Bridge Over the Valley
Author reading and signing.

09/30/10 6:30 p.m. UW Bookstore
Dan Wells
Mr. Monster
The follow-up to I Am Not a Serial Killer. Or vice versa. Whichever came first– same author, same town, same characters.

09/30/10 7 p.m. Richard Hugo House
Cheap Beer and Prose
Ladies Night
Hugo House spins off a prose edition of “Cheap Wine & Poetry.”

09/30/10 7 p.m. Barnes & Noble U-Village
John Andrews
Rude Buay… The Unstoppable
Author reading and signing.

09/30/10 7 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Mona Simpson
My Hollywood
“Simpson’s massive gifts—for unflinching precision, for artful indirection, and for the deft unfurling of imagery—are on vivid display in My Hollywood, a book that carries us down deep, into the darkness of two distinct worlds, and lights them up, finding all the comedy in the ways they are the same world, and all the tragedy in the unbridgeable distance between them.” –Michael Chabon

09/30/10 7:30 p.m. Open Books Poem Emporium
David Young
Field of Light and Shadow: Selected and New Poems
A very serious poetry reading.

09/30/10 7:30 p.m. Town Hall Seattle
Peter Miller
Smart Swarms
Miller claims we can learn from the behavior of bees, ants, and birds. No doubt he is correct, but it’s still very, very creepy.

09/30/10 7:30 p.m. Town Hall Seattle
Seattle Speaks: Income Tax in Washington State?
No! No, no, no, no, no. But not for the reason you are thinking. Do you know why there are so many state appointees to Federal positions? Because we don’t have an income tax to bog down the confirmation process. Okay, so it’s not the only reason, but if you want Washington state priorities strongly represented in Washington D.C., then represent at Town Hall on Thursday. Also, vote. It’s Initiative 1098, and while I applaud the spirit, the flesh reeks.

10/01/10 6:30 p.m. Queen Anne Books
Nancy Medwell
Eternal Moments
A reception to celebrate the Seattle photographer’s new book.

10/01/10 7 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Kurt B. Reigley
United States of Americana: Backyard Chickens, Burlesque Beauties, & Handmade Bitters: A Field Guide to the New American Roots Movement
An interesting title from the Seattle DJ and writer.

10/01/10 7 p.m. Secret Garden Books
Laura Numeroff
Otis & Sydney and the Best Birthday Ever
There will be cake! CAKE!!!

10/01/10 7 p.m. Fremont Place Book Company
Tina Schumman & Deborah Woodard
As If/The Dragonfly
Poetry reading.

10/01/10 7:30 p.m. Town Hall Seattle
Ken Follett
Fall of Giants
Book one of Follett’s epic new historical trilogy. The books will examine the 20th century through the lives of five families.

10/02/10 11 a.m. Barnes & Noble U-Village
Kelly Pulley
Ten Unusual Features of Lulu McDunn
Author reading and signing.

10/02/10 12 p.m. Seattle Mystery Bookshop
Dana Haynes
Crashers
Crashing planes for fun and profit?

10/02/10 2 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Bev Battaglia
Changing Lanes: Couples Redefining Retirement
Dr. Bev talks about retiring, a concept that she herself seems to have trouble grasping, considering she wrote a book.

10/02/10 4 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Colin Cheney
Here Be Monsters
Poetry reading.

10/02/10 4 p.m. Green Lake Branch Library
PoetsWest
Open mic.

10/02/10 6 p.m. UW Bookstore
Creepy Tales!
Every Saturday in October, UW Bookstore staff will read classic tales of terror. And yes, of course Shirley Jackson is on the list. Sheesh.

10/02/10 7 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Darin Strauss
Half a Life
A memoir about killing someone from one of the McSweeney’s stable of authors.

10/02/10 7:30 p.m. Town Hall Seattle
Fatima Bhutto
Songs of Blood and Sword: A Daughter’s Memoir
The poet, journalist, and niece of Benazir Bhutto, will read from her memoir.

10/02/10 9:30 a.m. SAAM
Firoozeh Papan-Matin
Mystic Shrines as the Gateway to Memory and Anticipation
The UW Associate Professor of Near Eastern Languages and Literature (and translator of the major, twentieth-century poet Ahmad Shamlu) will speak to those awake at 9:30 on a Saturday morning.

10/03/10 2 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Scott Simon
Baby We Were Meant for Each Other: In Praise of Adoption
The host of NPR’s Weekend Edition is here with his not-at-all-cringe-worthy memoir of adoptourism.

10/03/10 5 p.m. Elliott Bay Book Company
Scott Peterson
Let the Swords Encircle Me: Iran—A Journey Behind the Headlines
“Incisive, humane, and full of vivid reportage … Perhaps the best account we have of Iran’s complex, embattled reality.” - Publishers Weekly

10/03/10 7:30 p.m. Town Hall Seattle
Markos Moulitsas
American Taliban: How War, Sex, Sin, and Power Bind Jihadists and the Radical Right
The founder of the Daily Kos is in town to discuss the American Radical Right’s war on, well, me, everyone who looks like me, and the horse I rode in on. I’m so there.