Archive
Friends,
below are some great events coming up at the Book Smith at 1644 Haight St. between Clayton & Cole (863-8688)
The Booksmith Goes to the Cole Valley Fair!
Sunday ~ September 21st, 2008 ~ 10am to 5pm
Cole Street between Carl and Grattan ( map )
N Judah stop: Carl and Cole. Bus: 43, 6, 66, 7, 71Stop by The Booksmith's booth at the Cole Valley Fair to receive personalized recommendations from local writers and editors, watch a children's puppet show and participate in crafts, and receive 20% off all special orders placed in the booth.
The Cole Valley Fair is a free community event with booths showcasing local artists and businesses. The Fair features fine arts and crafts, food from neighborhood restaurants, live music, a display of historic Cole Valley photographs, a full block of vintage automobiles owned by neighborhood residents, events for children, and much more! Below are the highlights of Booksmith's participation at the Fair this year:
12-1pm: Discuss Literary Fiction with Michelle Richmond (No One You Know and
The Year of Fog, michellerichmond.com) and Andrew Altschul
(Lady Lazarus, http://www.andrewfosteraltschul.com/)1-2pm: Discuss Mysteries with Louise Ure (The Fault Tree, http://www.louiseure.com/) and Michelle Gagnon (Boneyard, http://www.michellegagnon.com/)
2-3pm: Discuss Local Interest Books with Paul Madonna
(All Over Coffee, http://www.paulmadonna.com/)
and Kemble Scott (SoMa, http://www.kemblescott.com/)3-4pm: Discuss Bay Area Literary Journals with Derek Powazek
(Fray, http://www.fray.com/) and Gravity Goldberg
(Instant City: A Literary Exploration of San Francisco, http://www.instantcity.org/)Bring the Kids - 1pm: Puppet Show
Our kids section has been buzzing with help from Miss Martha and Miss Janine. Our children's booth will showcase a select number of titles we are excited about this year. There will also be a puppet show at 1pm and other crafts and activities throughout the day. Stop by to learn more about our new weekly storytime and other upcoming children's events.
Fair Specials
Meet the not-so-new-anymore owners of the Booksmith (Christin Evans and Praveen Madan) and find out how they are planning to create a neighborhood bookstore which is 'even more'? browser-friendly, experience-rich, community-oriented, and truly independent-minded.
Hope to see you there!
RICK WARTZMAN
talk & booksigning for Obscene in the Extreme
Tuesday, September 23 at 7:30 pmFew books have caused as big a stir as John Steinbeck's classic 1939 novel, The Grapes of Wrath. Just a month after publication, it was the nation's number one bestseller; but in Kern County, California - the Joads' newfound home - the book was burned publicly and banned from library shelves. Obscene in the Extreme, by California journalist and historian Rick Wartzman, tells the remarkable story behind this fit of censorship.
Rick Wartzman is director of the Drucker Institute at Claremont Graduate University and an Irvine senior fellow at the New America Foundation. He spent two decades as a reporter and editor at the Wall Street Journal and the Los Angeles Times. He is co-author, with Mark Arax, of the award-winning bestseller The King of California: J.G. Boswell and the Making of a Secret American Empire.
DAPHNE BEAL
talk & booksigning for In the Land of No Right Angles
Wednesday, September 24 at 7:30 pmSuspenseful, haunting and spare, In the Land of No Right Angles marks the arrival of a talented and intuitive new writer. In this, her first novel, Daphne Beal tells the story of a twenty-year-old American spending a year in Nepal who befriends a local only to be drawn into an uncertain world where the desire to save a friend is more harmful than doing nothing at all.
Daphne Beal was on the editorial staff of The New Yorker, and her writing has appeared in Vogue, McSweeney's, Open City, and The London Review of Books. Her work has been anthologized in The Believer Book of Writers Talking to Writers, The KGB Reader, and most recently in State by State: A Panoramic Portrait of America.
SEAN WILSEY
talk, screening & booksigning for State by State
Saturday, September 27 at 7:30 pmInspired by the WPA guides of the Thirties and Forties, 50 contemporary writers have produced original pieces of reportage and memoir that capture the 50 states in our time. State by State: A Panoramic Portrait of America is an American road trip in book form featuring original writing on all 50 states by 50 of our finest novelists, journalists, and essayists. Join editor Sean Wilsey and other contributors as we celebrate the publication of this new book and screen a short film on its making.
Sean Wilsey is the author of the memoir, Oh the Glory of It All, and the co-editor of The Thinking Fan's Guide to the World Cup. His writing has appeared in The New Yorker, the London Review of Books, the Los Angeles Times, and McSweeney's quarterly, where he is the editor at large.
NEIL GAIMAN
reading for The Graveyard Book
Sunday, October 5 at 3:00 pmThe Graveyard Book is Neil Gaiman's first full-length novel for middle-grade readers since the internationally bestselling and universally acclaimed Coraline. And like Coraline, this book is sure to enchant and surprise young readers as well as Neil Gaiman's legion of adult fans. This exclusive San Francisco event - one of only a few around the country - will take place at the Sundance Kabuki Theater (1881 Post Street) in San Francisco. Tickets are $28.00 and are on sale at The Booksmith.
Neil Gaiman is the author of the New York Times bestselling children's book Coraline and of the picture books The Wolves in the Walls and The Day I Swapped My Dad for Two Goldfish. He wrote the script for the film MirrorMask and is also the author of critically acclaimed and award-winning novels and short stories for adults, as well as the Sandman series of graphic novels. Among his many awards are the World Fantasy Award, the Hugo Award, the Nebula Award, and the Bram Stoker Award. Originally from England, Gaiman now lives in the United States.
ALSO THIS MONTH: For the second year, The Booksmith is participating in the Cole Valley Street Fair. Scheduled for September 21, the neighborhood street fair promises to be a charming and well-attended event with booths showcasing local artists and businesses. The Booksmith has invited several local authors including Paul Madonna and Michelle Gagnon to share in the fun that day; new this year, we will be hosting a second children's booth with family-friendly activities. The street fair runs 10am to 6pm and additional details about our author line-up will be available in the bookstore and on our website.