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3/06/07
Wednesday, March 7th, Pulitzer-Prize winner Robert Olen
Butler will read at the WSU Fine Arts Auditorium at 7:30. Butler's most
recent book, SEVERANCE, is a series of short stories that chronicle
decapitations from 40,000 years BCE through his own projected demise in
2008. Each short is exactly 240 words, which Butler derived by combining the
concepts that an excited human can speak 160 words per minute and a
decapitated brain retains consciousness for a minute and a half. Ultimately,
the vignettes, although fundamentally macabre, celebrate life and the quiet
victories that make the mundane remarkable.
Thursday, March 8th, Jane Goodall will present highlights
from research at Gombe Stream. She will be in the Beasley Performing Arts
Coliseum. The presentation will be from 7:30-8:30, followed by a book
signing. Admission is FREE!
Saturday, March 10, Meghan Sayers, author of ANAHITA'S
WOVEN RIDDLE and WEAVING TAPESTRIES IN RURAL IRELAND, will be here at
BookPeople from 12:00-1:00 PM. Her last reading and discussion was a smash
success and lead to a lengthy post-reading discussion and Q & A. Don't miss!
The University of Idaho's Women Center will be
participating in International Women's Day March 8. They will be sponsoring
a fair in the U of I Commons in the Clearwater Room from 11am until 3pm.
This international event "is the global day connecting all women around the
world and inspiring them to achieve their full potential" (http://www.internationalwomensday.com/).
The establishment of gender equality is still underway, and the U of I
Women's Center is participating in its cause. Show your support.
The Art Car Parade and Spelling Bee are in the works. If
you are interested in participating in the Art Car Parade let us know so we
can anticipate your participation. A photographer has already committed
their skills. The Spelling Bee will be hosted out in the wonderful spring
air. It will be a dance of musical chairs, random incantations and corks!
Wednesday, March 21, Elizabeth Fernea, author of GUESTS
OF THE SHEIK, will contribute to WSU's Women's History Month Lectures with
"Iraqi Women, Then and Now." Her lecture will begin at 7:00 PM in CUE 203,
with book signing before and after.
An interesting conjunction of books and ideals: The
Newberry Medal was awarded to THE HIGHER POWER OF LUCKY by Susan Patron. The
book was banned almost immediately. On the first page, Lucky Trimble, the
ten-year-old protagonist, is eavesdropping when she hears another character
describe the day he hit rock-bottom: after drinking a half gallon of rum and
listening to Johnny Cash in his parked Cadillac, he "saw a rattlesnake on
the passenger seat biting his dog, Roy, on the scrotum." Critics and censors
saw through the alcohol abuse (the character was renouncing it, after all),
and Lucky's search for security and belonging after her mother's untimely
death, and latched onto the word "scrotum." See Julie Bosman's article in
the February 18th New York Times.)
Concurrently, INSECURE AT LAST: Losing it in our Security
Obsessed World, by Eve Ensler of "Vagina Monologue fame," is on the
hardcover shelf. INSECURE AT LAST combines memoir and social criticism in a
collection that explores Ensler's quest for security and belonging despite
the world's potential volatility. Ensler does, of course, center the
narrative around the mistreatment of women and laments that vagina is still
a censored word in much of the world (one chapter is titled "Vaginas--More
Terrifying than SCUD missiles"), she concludes with the need to accept the
impossibility of absolute security. We cannot insulate ourselves from the
ills of our world without removing ourselves from it. The more we try to
bolster our defenses, rather than accept our vulnerability, the more we
allow our defenses to be breached.
April 25th, Sherman Alexie will read from his new novel,
FLIGHT, which will be released later this month, in Spokane's Get Lit
Festival. FLIGHT, according to the publisher, is "the hilarious and tragic
portrait of an orphaned Indian boy who travels back and forth through time
in a violent search for his true identity," is Alexie's first novel in a
decade. Order a copy today!
--BookPeople
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