Charles Finn
Monday the 14th, 7:30PM
Powell's Books on Hawthorne
In 29 essays that border on prose poems, Charles Finn's Wild Delicate Seconds (Oregon State Univ. Press) captures chance encounters with the everyday fauna of North America. With profundity, humor, grace, and compassion, Finn pays homage to the creatures that share our world and, in doing so, touches on what it means to be human. Finn will be joined by Kim Stafford and Paulann Petersen.
All Woman and Springtime
Monday the 14th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Before she met Il-sun in an orphanage, Gi was a hollow husk of a girl, broken from growing up in one of North Korea's forced-labor camps. But Il-sun's pursuit of a better life imperils both girls when her suitor spirits them across the Demilitarized Zone and sells them as sex workers, first in South Korea and then in the United States. Brandon Jones's debut, All Woman and Springtime (Algonquin), depicts with chilling accuracy life behind North Korea's iron curtain. How Gi and Il-sun endure, how they find a path to healing, is what drives this absorbing novel to its perfectly imagined conclusion.
Meghan O'Rourke
Tuesday the 15th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
After her mother died of cancer at the age of 55, Meghan O'Rourke found that nothing had prepared her for the experience. In the first anguished days, she began a record of her grief, trying to capture its profound agony and microscopic intimacies. This endeavor ultimately became The Long Goodbye (Riverhead), a memoir that will touch any reader who has felt the deep and enduring bond of love.
Criminal Crafts
Wednesday the 16th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
Crafters and mischiefs alike will enjoy Criminal Crafts (Andrews McMeel), 30 projects revolving around notorious criminals and their activities. Author Shawn Gascoyne-Bowman focuses on original crafts and recipes themed in noir, murder, retro espionage, pulp fiction, mafia, and voodoo. From John Dillinger's soap gun to Bonnie Parker's gunshot poetry journal, the author brings together illicit behavior and artistic expression with dark humor.
Leni Zumas
Wednesday the 16th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Hypnotic and profoundly disquieting, Leni Zumas's novel The Listeners (Tin House) is the story of a woman whose life is shaped by tragedy. Quinn is thirtysomething, a survivor of a fractured and eccentric childhood marred by the death of her younger sister. Twenty years later, she is in the midst of a slide down the other side of punk-rock stardom after her successful music career was abruptly halted. Sassy and smart, tough but broken, she develops unique strategies for coping, but no matter what tactic Quinn conjures to keep her psyche intact, she can't keep the past away. The Listeners is about what lurks in the shadows and what happens when what's lurking insists on being seen.
Ann Packer
Thursday the 17th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
From Ann Packer, the author of Songs without Words and The Dive from Clausen's Pier, comes her most enticing work yet — a collection of burnished, impossible-to-put down narratives framed by two stunning linked novellas that express the transformation of a single family over the course of a lifetime. With Swim Back to Me (Vintage), Packer delivers shimmering psychological precision, unfailing intelligence, and page-turning drama.
The Man Who Quit Money
Thursday the 17th, 7:30PM
Powell's Books on Hawthorne
In 2000, Daniel Suelo left his life savings — all 30 dollars of it — in a phone booth. He has lived without money, and with a newfound sense of freedom and security, ever since. A Walden for the 21st century, Mark Sundeen's The Man Who Quit Money (Riverhead) is an account of how one man learned to live, sanely and happily, without earning, receiving, or spending a single cent.
Family Fang
Thursday the 17th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Annie and Buster Fang have spent most of their adult lives trying to distance themselves from their famous artist parents. But when a bad economy and a few bad personal decisions converge, the two siblings have nowhere to turn but their family home. Reunited under one roof for the first time in more than a decade, Buster and Annie are forced to confront not only their creatively ambitious parents, but the chaos and confusion of their childhood. Written with wit and honesty, Kevin Wilson's The Family Fang (Ecco) is "a comedy, a tragedy, and a tour de force....The best single-word description would be genius" (Ann Patchett).
The Secrets of Mary Bowser
Friday the 18th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Based on the remarkable true story of a freed African American slave who returned to Virginia to spy on the Confederates at the onset of the Civil War, Lois Leveen's The Secrets of Mary Bowser (William Morrow) combines fact and speculation to craft an enthralling historical novel that celebrates the courageous achievements of a little-known but truly inspirational American heroine.
Kids' Storytime
Saturday the 19th, 11:00AM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Join us every Saturday for kids' storytime. Today we're reading Chloe by Peter McCarty.
Cat Daddy
Monday the 21st, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
Cat behaviorist and star of Animal Planet's My Cat from Hell, Jackson Galaxy (aka "Cat Daddy") isn't what you might expect in a cat expert. Yet his ability to connect with even the most troubled felines — not to mention the stressed-out humans living in their wake — is awe-inspiring. In his new book, Cat Daddy (Tarcher), Galaxy tells the poignant story of his 13-year relationship with a petite cat named Benny and gives singular advice for living with, caring for, and loving the feline in your home. An inspiring account of two broken beings who fixed each other, Cat Daddy is filled with Galaxy's amazing advice for understanding what cats need most from us in order to live happier lives.
Augusten Burroughs
Monday the 21st, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
To say that Augusten Burroughs has lived an unusual life is an understatement. From having no formal education past third grade and being raised by his mother's psychiatrist in the '70s to enjoying a highly successful advertising career in the '80s to experiencing a spectacular downfall and rehab stint in the '90s to having a bestselling writing career in the new millennium, Burroughs has faced humiliation, transformation, and everything in between. This Is How is Burroughs's no-holds-barred book of advice, told with his unique voice and black humor; it's Running with Scissors — with recipes.
Anne Cherian
Monday the 21st, 7:30PM
Powell's Books on Hawthorne
Anne Cherian's moving novel The Invitation (WW Norton) redefines the meaning of family, friendship, and success among a group of first-generation Indian immigrants. The follow-up to A Good Indian Wife, Cherian's story resonates with the poignancy of real life colliding with unmet expectations.
Greg Rucka
Tuesday the 22nd, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
In Alpha (Mulholland), the latest thriller from Greg Rucka (author of the Queen and Country series), the visitors to Wilsonville, the largest theme park in the world, begin the day with a smile. By the end, they wonder if they'll be able to escape with their lives. Retired Delta Force operator, Master Sergeant Jonathan "Jad" Bell, is Wilsonville's lead undercover security officer. The threat begins with the announcement of a hidden dirty bomb, but quickly becomes something far, far worse. Jad scrambles to assess the situation and protect the visitors but soon comes face to face with a villain whose training matches his in every way — and presents a threat Jad may not be able to stop.
Justin Halpern
Wednesday the 23rd, 7:00PM
Powell's Books on Hawthorne
Fans of Sh*t My Dad Says will recognize the voice of Justin Halpern's dad as it crackles through the pages of Halpern's hysterical new book, I Suck at Girls (It Books). The story begins when Halpern announces to his dad that he's decided to propose to his girlfriend. His dad's advice: Take a day off and think back over everything he's learned in life about women, relationships, and himself before making the decision. I Suck at Girls is a pilgrim's progress through the landscape of sex and love — by one of the funniest writers of today.
Peter Carey
Wednesday the 23rd, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
From Peter Carey, two-time winner of the Man Booker Prize, comes The Chemistry of Tears (Knopf). An automaton, a man and a woman who can never meet, a secret love story, and the fate of the warming world are all brought to incandescent life in this hauntingly moving novel from one of the most admired writers of our time.
Please God Let It Be Herpes
Wednesday the 23rd, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Comedy Central regular Carlos Kotkin is lucky in love — if lucky in love means he's had enough horrible, pathetic, and downright bizarre dating experiences to write a book. In Please God Let It Be Herpes (NAL), Kotkin shares his ups and (mostly) downs of bachelorhood, including romantic conquests with a slew of childhood crushes, insane yogis, a Playboy vixen, an STD host, the flaky, the deaf, and the just plain dumb.
A Silence of Mockingbirds
Thursday the 24th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
Investigative journalist and author Karen Spears Zacharias never thought she would become involved in a high-profile murder case. But when she reconnects with a close family friend named Sarah, Karen discovers that Sarah's daughter, Karly, had been murdered in Corvallis. In A Silence of Mockingbirds: The Memoir of a Murder (MacAdam/Cage), Karen uses court documents and investigative interviews with friends, family, law enforcement officials, and key witnesses to piece together what happened to Karly.
Get Your Pitchfork On!
Thursday the 24th, 7:30PM
Powell's Books on Hawthorne
For office workers Kristy Athens and husband Michael, farming was a romantic dream. After purchasing farm land in the Columbia Gorge, the couple were surprised to learn that the realities of farming were challenging and unexpected. Practical and often hilarious, Get Your Pitchfork On! provides the nuts-and-bolts of rural living from city folk who were initially out of their depth. Athens gives urban professionals the tools they need to realize their dream, with basics of home, farm, and hearth. It also enters territory that other books avoid: straightforward advice about the social aspects of country living, from health care to schools to small-town politics.
Paul Dickson
Thursday the 24th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Paul Dickson's Bill Veeck: Baseball's Greatest Maverick (Walker & Co.) is a richly detailed portrait of an American original: baseball impresario and innovator, independent spirit and unflinching advocate of racial equality, Bill Veeck. Dickson brings fully to life a transformational, visionary figure who spent a lifetime challenging baseball's and society's well-entrenched status quo.
Matt Love
Friday the 25th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
In June 1970, the biggest movie star in the world traveled to the Oregon Coast to film an epic novel about a defiant family of loggers written by a home-grown counterculture hero. The star was Paul Newman. The author was Ken Kesey. The story was Sometimes a Great Notion. In Sometimes a Great Movie: Paul Newman, Ken Kesey and the Filming of the Great Oregon Novel (Nestucca Spit Press), Matt Love documents the legend of that magical summer.
Kids' Storytime
Saturday the 26th, 11:00AM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Join us every week for kids' storytime. Today's book: The Hueys: The New Sweater by Oliver Jeffers.
Off The Shelf Book Group
Tuesday the 29th, 6:30PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
This month we meet to discuss the graphic novel Fables Vol. 1: Legends in Exile by Bill Willingham.
Lisa Jackson, Cathy Lamb, & Rosalind Noonan
Tuesday the 29th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
What makes a perfect summer? Golden sand, pounding surf, a sense of endless possibility — and four unforgettable stories of love, friendship, and second chances. Meet three of the four authors featured in the new romance anthology Beach Season (Kensington) as they set the tone for the sweetest of summers — just in time for vacation.
Classics Book Group
Wednesday the 30th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
This month we meet to discuss Kristin Lavransdatter by Sigrid Undset. Join us!
The Art of Intelligence
Wednesday the 30th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
With The Art of Intelligence: Lessons from a Life in the CIA's Clandestine Service (Penguin Press), legendary CIA spy and counterterrorism expert Henry Crumpton tells the spellbinding story of his high-risk, action-packed career while illustrating the growing importance of America's intelligence officers and their secret missions. Drawing from the full arc of his exploits, Crumpton explains what America's spies do and why their service is more valuable than ever. Cosponsored by the World Affairs Council of Oregon.
Thai Jones
Wednesday the 30th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
In the year that saw the start of World War I, the U.S. was itself on the verge of revolution: industrial depression in the east, striking coal miners in Colorado, and increasingly tense relations with Mexico. With More Powerful Than Dynamite (Walker & Co) historian and journalist Thai Jones creates a portrait of New York on the edge of chaos and charts how anarchist anger, progressive idealism, and plutocratic paternalism converged in July of 1914.
No One Has to Die Alone
Thursday the 31st, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
Caring for a terminally ill loved one can be the single biggest challenge of your life. Drawing from her experience of sitting with over 500 people as they died and of caring for her own terminally ill father, Lani Leary guides caregivers, family, and friends through the difficult transitions of illness, death, and bereavement in her book No One Has to Die Alone (Beyond Words).
The Book of Obama
Thursday the 31st, 7:30PM
Powell's Books on Hawthorne
How did a charismatic young president, elected in an atmosphere of optimism and expectation, lead the United States to the brink of revolution? From a chance encounter in the early 1980s to the Democratic primaries of 2007-08, political cartoonist Ted Rall was one of the first to size up Barack Obama as conservative, risk-averse, and tone-deaf. In The Book of Obama (Seven Stories), Rall revisits the rise and fall of Obama — and the emergence of the Tea Party and Occupy movements — and draws a startling conclusion: We, the people, weren't lied to; we lied to ourselves, both about Obama and about the two-party system.
Kids' Storytime
Saturday the 2nd, 11:00AM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Join us every Saturday for kids' storytime. Today we're reading Jamberry by Bruce Degen.
Buzz Bissinger
Sunday the 3rd, 2:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
With Father's Day (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt), Buzz Bissinger, author of Friday Night Lights and Three Nights in August, journeys into the psyche of his son and traveling companion, where he finds not only the skills and debilities known as savantism but a host of qualities we should all emulate. As father and son journey from Philadelphia to Los Angeles, Buzz gains a new and uplifting wisdom, realizing that Zach's worldview has a sturdy logic of its own, a logic that deserves the greatest respect. And with the help of Zach's twin, Gerry, Buzz learns an even more vital lesson about Zach: character transcends intellect.
Molly Moon
Sunday the 3rd, 3:00PM
Pastaworks
When Molly Moon Neitzel opened the first of her five boutique ice cream shops in 2008, she was an instant hit with the folks of Seattle. Now you can make her delicious ice creams, sorbets, and toppings at home. Molly Moon's Homemade Ice Cream (Sasquatch) features recipes that focus on using local, fresh fruits and herbs in combinations that are both familiar and surprising. From childhood favorites to avant-garde fare, including the classic Vanilla Bean to the adventurous Balsamic Strawberry and comforting Maple Bacon (try it on oatmeal for a winter breakfast treat!), these ice creams and sorbets are both simple and fun to make. Please note: This free event takes place at Pastaworks on Hawthorne, 3735 SE Hawthorne Blvd.
Richard Ford
Sunday the 3rd, 4:00PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Richard Ford, the distinguished modern American master and Pulitzer Prize-winning author, returns with Canada (Ecco), a haunting and elemental novel about a young man forced by catastrophic circumstance to reconcile himself to a world that has been rendered unrecognizable. Fifteen-year-old Dell Parsons is spirited across the Canadian border by a family friend in hopes of delivering him to a better life. Instead, he is set on a collision course with an enigmatic and charismatic American whose cool reserve masks a dark and violent nature. A true masterwork of haunting and spectacular vision from one of our greatest writers, Canada is destined to become a classic.
Kim Barnes
Monday the 4th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
In the Kingdom of Men (Knopf) is the mesmerizing, richly imagined novel from award-winning author Kim Barnes. It's 1967 and Gin Mitchell knows a better life awaits her after she marries hometown hero Mason McPhee. When he takes a job with the Arabian American Oil company in Saudi Arabia, Gin steps into a luxurious world far from the two-room Oklahoma shack she grew up in. But when a young Bedouin woman is found dead, washed up on the shores of the Persian Gulf, Gin's world closes in around her, and the one person she trusts is nowhere to be found.
Darrin Drda
Monday the 4th, 7:30PM
Powell's Books on Hawthorne
In The Four Global Truths (Evolver Editions), Darrin Drda contends that as global temperatures rise and natural systems decline, humanity will be forced to confront the destructiveness of unfettered material progress and mechanistic thinking. Writing in a warm, open style recalling Eckhart Tolle, Drda integrates elements of Western philosophy, transpersonal psychology, deep ecology, modern cosmology, and quantum physics to get at the heart of worldwide ecological suffering and to encourage responsible participation in this critical moment in life.
Nell Freudenberger
Tuesday the 5th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
A surprising story about love, secrets, and betrayals, and the exhilarations and complications of getting and staying married, The Newlyweds (Knopf) takes the reader from the backyards of America to the back alleys of Bangladesh. What has always set Nell Freudenberger apart is the sly, gimlet eye she turns on collisions of all kinds, be they sexual, cultural, or familial. In the relationship between Amina Mazid and George Stillman, she has found her perfect foil. At once revelatory and affecting, The Newlyweds is a stunning achievement, a powerful, funny, richly observed tour de force by one of America's most acclaimed young writers.
Daniel Wilson
Tuesday the 5th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
As he did in his New York Times-bestselling Robopocalypse, Daniel Wilson masterfully envisions a frightening near-future world in his new thriller, Amped (Doubleday). People are implanted with a device that makes them capable of superhuman feats, but soon a set of laws is passed that restricts the rights of these "amplified" humans. On the day that the first law is passed, 29-year-old Owen Gray joins their ranks and is forced to flee, desperate to reach an outpost in Oklahoma where it is rumored a group of the most enhanced "amps" may be about to change the world
Jan Wallentin
Wednesday the 6th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
The Arctic, 1897: Nils Strindberg crashes his hydrogen balloon during an expedition to the North Pole. Germany, 1942: Gruesome and inexplicable experiments are performed on concentration-camp prisoners. Sweden, present day: Cave diver Erik Hall finds a dead body, wearing an ancient ankh, buried deep in an abandoned mine. A religious-symbol expert sets out to study the ankh but finds Erik dead and is soon being chased across Europe to escape a secret society that will do anything to obtain the ankh. In Strindberg's Star (Viking), Jan Wallentin weaves together each of these fascinating strands to create a mind-blowing cross-genre thriller.
Chris Guillebeau
Wednesday the 6th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Still in his early 30s, Chris Guillebeau has visited more than 175 nations, and yet he's never held a "real job" or earned a regular paycheck. There are many others like Chris, those who've found ways to opt out of traditional employment and create the time and income to pursue what they find meaningful. In The $100 Startup (Crown), Guillebeau shows how you, too, can lead a life of adventure, meaning, and purpose — and earn a good living — by turning ideas into income, often with only a modest investment.
First Thursday
Thursday the 7th, 6:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Portland has a long tradition of calligraphy. The Portland Society for Calligraphy was founded by Lloyd J. Reynolds and a group of his students in 1969. This month, members of the PSC will exhibit their artwork in the Basil Hallward Gallery. Please join us for the First Thursday reception.
Cinda & Linea Johnson
Thursday the 7th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
The Johnsons — mother, father, and two daughters — were a loving and close Seattle family. Then the younger daughter, Linea, started experiencing crippling bouts of suicidal depression. After multiple trips to the psych ward, she was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, and it took many trial runs of drugs and ultimately electroshock therapy to bring Linea back. Perfect Chaos (St. Martin's) is Linea and Cinda's story, the dual memoir of a mother and daughter and their journey through mental illness towards hope.
Eleanor Brown
Thursday the 7th, 7:30PM
Powell's Books on Hawthorne
Eleanor Brown's The Weird Sisters (Berkley) is the "delightful" (People) bestseller that's earned raves from Sarah Blake, Helen Simonson, and reviewers everywhere. It's the story of the three Andreas sisters as they return to their childhood home, where books are a passion and TV is something other people watch. Communicating with their parents and lovers is difficult, but communicating with one another is even harder. What can the shy homebody eldest sister, the fast-living middle child, and the bohemian youngest sibling have in common? Only that none has found life to be what she expected.
William Dietrich
Friday the 8th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
By 1803, swashbuckling, ribald, and irreverent hero Ethan Gage has outsmarted wily enemies and survived dangerous challenges across the globe. Now, the rakish hero finds himself on a desperate hunt to secure the lost treasure of Montezuma. Combining science, history, and mythology, William Dietrich has woven a larger-than-life tale that sees Ethan embroiled in the Napoleonic era's ideals, opportunism, and inventions. Filled with intrigue, voodoo, a hurricane, violent political unrest, and unexpected passion, The Emerald Storm (Harper) is Dietrich's most captivating novel to date.
Ron Paul's Revolution
Friday the 8th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
In Ron Paul's Revolution: The Man and the Movement He Inspired (Broadside Books), journalist Brian Doherty details Paul's career, traces the evolution of his ideas, and explores his significance in American politics. He explains Paul's appeal and identifies his constituents — a rising generation of cross-partisan activists concerned with government overreach.
Kids' Storytime
Saturday the 9th, 11:00AM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Join us every Saturday for kids' storytime. Today we're reading A Home for Bird by Philip C. Stead.
Rosecrans Baldwin
Sunday the 10th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
A self-described Francophile since childhood, Rosecrans Baldwin always dreamed of living in Paris. So, when an opportunity presented itself to work for an advertising agency there, he couldn't turn it down. An offbeat, up-to-date, surprising entry in the expat canon, Baldwin's Paris, I Love You But You're Bringing Me Down (Farrar Straus & Girous) is a memoir about a young man who witnesses his preconceptions replaced by the oddities of a vigorous, nervy city
Rhiannon Held
Monday the 11th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
In Rhiannon Held's Silver (Tor), Andrew Dare is a werewolf and the enforcer for the Roanoke pack. He's responsible for capturing or killing any Were intruders in Roanoke's territory. But the lone Were he's tracking doesn't smell or act like anyone he's ever encountered. And when he catches her, it doesn't get any better. She's beautiful, crazy, and someone has tortured her by injecting silver into her veins. She says her name is Silver and that she's lost her wild self and can't shift any more. The packs in North America have a live-and-let-live attitude, and try not to overlap with each other. But Silver represents a terrible threat to every Were on the continent.
Scott Jurek
Monday the 11th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Ultrarunner and star of Christopher McDougall's Born to Run, Scott Jurek delivers an inspiring memoir of a remarkable running career, fueled, surprisingly, by an entirely plant-based diet. Eat and Run (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt) will motivate everyone to go the distance, whether that means getting out for your first run, expanding your food horizons, or simply exploring the limits of your own potential. This event is cosponsored by Fit Right NW, who will host a fun run with Jurek, beginning at Fit Right (2258 NW Raleigh St.) at 6:30 and ending at Powell's for Jurek's reading at 7:30.
Anthony Swofford
Monday the 11th, 7:30PM
Powell's Books on Hawthorne
Following the success of his memoir, Jarhead, Anthony Swofford assumed he had exorcised his military demons. But in the searing, courageous pages of his new book, Hotels, Hospitals, and Jails (Twelve), he recounts his struggles to make sense of what his military service meant and to decide what his life can and should become, all while raising questions about masculinity, fathers and sons, and love.
Science Fiction Book Group
Tuesday the 12th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
This month we meet to discuss Natsume's Book of Friends, Vol. 1 by Yuki Midorikawa. Join us!
Lily Raff McCaulou
Tuesday the 12th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Lily Raff McCaulou had been raised as a gun-fearing environmentalist and an animal lover and, though a meat eater, had always abided by the principle that harming animals is wrong. But when she left New York for a reporting job in central Oregon, her perspective shifted. She began spending time fly-fishing and interviewing hunters for her articles, realizing that many of them were more thoughtful about animals and the environment than she was. Raff McCaulou's Call of the Mild (Grand Central) is a beautifully written and contrarian narrative that explores the tension between hunters and environmentalists and the new models of sustainable and ethical food procurement.
Laura Harrington
Wednesday the 13th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
Tomboy Alice Bliss is heartbroken when her father is deployed to Iraq. He'll miss seeing Alice blossom into a teenager: she'll learn to drive, join the track team, go to her first dance, and fall in love — all while trying to be strong for her mother and precocious little sister. At once universal and very personal, Laura Harrington's Alice Bliss (Penguin) is a profoundly moving novel about those who are left home during wartime.
Peter Zuckerman
Wednesday the 13th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
For as long as Westerners have been climbing the Himalaya, Sherpas have been the unsung heroes in the background. In August 2008, when 11 climbers lost their lives on K2, the world's most dangerous peak, two Sherpas survived. They had emerged from poverty and political turmoil to become two of the most skillfed mountaineers on earth. Based on unprecedented access and interviews, Buried in the Sky (W. W. Norton) reveals their astonishing story for the first time. This gripping, white-knuckled adventure from Peter Zuckerman and Amanda Padoan explores Sherpa customs and culture and recreates one of the most dramatic catastrophes in mountaineering history from a fascinating new perspective.
Wednesday the 13th, 7:30pm / Powell's City of Books
Joseph E. Stiglitz
Thursday the 14th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
The top one percent of Americans control 40 percent of the nation's wealth. As the Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz explains, while those at the top enjoy the benefits of their wealth, they fail to realize that "their fate is bound up with how the other 99 percent live." With The Price of Inequality (W. W. Norton), Stiglitz draws on his deep understanding of economics to show that growing inequality is not inevitable. But if left unchecked, it can result in a divided society that cannot tackle its most pressing problems.
Deadly Diversions Book Group
Thursday the 14th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
This month our mystery group meets to discuss Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan. Join us!
Samuel Popkin
Thursday the 14th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
There are two winners in every presidential election campaign: the inevitable winner when it begins and the inevitable victor after it ends. In The Candidate: What It Takes to Win — and Hold — the White House (Oxford Univ. Press), Samuel Popkin draws on a lifetime of presidential campaign experience and academic research and analyzes what it takes to win the next campaign.
The Great American Ale Trail
Thursday the 14th, 7:30PM
Powell's Books on Hawthorne
The Great American Ale Trail (Running Press) is the definitive guide to the best places to drink craft beer in America. Author Christian DeBenedetti has traveled across the country to find the worthiest beer destinations, from major breweries to tiny farmhouse startups. With hundreds of entries, including top-10 lists for "Best Dive Bars for Craft Beer Lovers," "Best Beer Festivals," and "Best Beer Cities," The Great American Ale Trail is sure to set anyone on their first beer pilgrimage.
Frank Deford
Friday the 15th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Over Time: My Life as a Sportswriter (Atlantic Monthly) is as unconventional and wide-ranging as Frank Deford's remarkable career, in which he has chronicled the heroes and the characters of just about every sport in nearly every medium. He's worked for Sports Illustrated, The National Sports Daily, written 10 novels, won an Emmy (not to mention being a fabled Lite Beer All-Star), and continues to delight sports fans with his commentary on NPR's Morning Edition. This is an inspired book — equal parts funny and touching — a real treasure, just like Frank Deford.
Kids' Storytime
Saturday the 16th, 11:00AM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Join us every Saturday for storytime. Today, we're reading Mama, Is It Summer Yet? by Nikki McClure.
Food in Jars
Saturday the 16th, 2:00PM
Pastaworks
With Food in Jars (Running Press), popular food blogger Marisa McClellan takes the reader through all manner of food in jars, storing away seasonal tastes for later. Basics like jams and jellies are accompanied by pickles, chutneys, conserves, whole fruit, tomato sauces, salsas, marmalades, nut butters, seasonings, and more. Small batches make them easy projects for a canning novice, and the surprising flavors will keep more experienced jammers coming back for more. Her home-canned food — learned from generations of the original "foodies" — is detailed in more than 100 recipes. Please note: This free event takes place at Pastaworks on Hawthorne, 3735 SE Hawthorne Blvd. Cosponsored by Edible Portland.
Charlotte Vivian Rodenberg
Saturday the 16th, 2:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
In Bronto and the Pterodactyl Eggs (Craigmore Creations), author and illustrator Charlotte Vivian Rodenberg presents a heartwarming picture book of one lone Apatosaurus who must protect a nest of tiny pterodactyls from the dangers of the Jurassic. Through breathtaking watercolor and ink paintings, we are carried to a world of unexpected joy as we discover Bronto, his heart as big and warm as the afternoon sun, and his four new dino-fledgling friends.
Jane Lynch
Saturday the 16th, 7:30PM
Newmark Theater
You might know actress Jane Lynch as the cheerleading coach everyone loves to hate on Glee, the intense lesbian dog-trainer in Best in Show, or the store manager offering to deflower Steve Carell in The 40-Year-Old Virgin. But before that, she was just a teenager in Dolton, Illinois, with a dream to be an actress, a journey that she details in her comic and inspirational new memoir, Happy Accidents (Hyperion). For this special event, Lynch will be joined by KOPB's Dave Miller for a "behind-the-scenes" conversation, sure to be funny, poignant, and brutally honest, just like the actress herself. Please note: This event, presented by Powell's Books and Third Rail Repertory Theatre, takes place at the Newmark Theatre, 1111 SW Broadway. Tickets are available at Ticketmaster.com, the PCPA box office, and by phone at 800-745-3000.
Rick Woodford
Monday the 18th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
Just as it can for humans, natural food can enable dogs to live longer, healthier lives, and with the meals, treats, and cookies in Rick Woodford's Feed Your Best Friend Better (Andrews McMeel) dogs will never miss commercial kibble. Using extensive research and veterinarian manuals as guides, Woodford makes the transition to homemade dog food easy with simple recipes and other helpful tips. This event is cosponsored by Animal Aid of Portland.
Andrew Blum
Monday the 18th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
When your Internet cable leaves your house, where does it go? Almost everything about our day-to-day lives — and the broader scheme of human culture — can be found on the Internet. In Tubes: A Journey to the Center of the Internet (Ecco), journalist Andrew Blum goes inside the physical infrastructure to reveal an utterly fresh look at the online world we think we know. Like Tracy Kidder's classic The Soul of a New Machine, Tubes combines on-the-ground reporting and lucid explanation into an engaging, mind-bending narrative to help the reader understand the physical world that underlies our digital lives.
Low-Carbon Living
Monday the 18th, 7:30PM
Powell's Books on Hawthorne
While the routine decisions that shape our days — what to have for dinner, where to shop, how to get to work — may seem small, collectively they have a big effect on global warming. Based on an in-depth, two-year study by experts at The Union of Concerned Scientists, Cooler Smarter: Practical Steps for Low-Carbon Living (Island Press) presented by contributor Jeff Deyette, shows how to cut your own carbon emissions by 20 percent or more. Including chapters on transportation, home energy, diet, and personal consumption, Cooler Smarter offers science-based strategies for low-carbon living, which can help you save money and live healthier but also will empower you to confront the planet's greatest threat.
Ernest Cline
Tuesday the 19th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
At once wildly original and stuffed with '80s nostalgia, Ernest Cline's Ready Player One (Broadway), now in paperback, is an ambitious and spectacularly genre-busting debut novel that's part quest, part love story, and part virtual space opera, set in a universe where spell-slinging mages battle giant robots, entire planets are inspired by Blade Runner, and flying DeLoreans achieve light speed.
Anna Keesey
Tuesday the 19th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Orphaned after the death of her mother, 18-year-old Esther Chambers heads west in search of her only living relative, a laconic cattle rancher named Ferris Pickett. In the lawless frontier town of Century, Oregon, Pick leads her to a tiny cabin where she'll begin her new life as a homesteader. If she can hold out for five years, the land will join Pick's already impressive spread. But Esther discovers that this town on the edge of civilization is in the midst of a range war filled with cutthroats and greed. Anna Keesey's Little Century (Farrar Straus Giroux) is a resonant and moving debut novel by a writer of confident gifts.
Craig Johnson
Wednesday the 20th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
Embarking on his eighth adventure, Wyoming Sheriff Walt Longmire has a more important matter on his mind than cowboys and criminals. His daughter, Cady, is getting married. Walt and old friend Henry Standing Bear are the de facto wedding planners and fear Cady's wrath when the location arrangements go up in smoke two weeks before the big event. The pair set out to find a new site on the Cheyenne Reservation, but their scouting expedition ends in horror as they witness a young Crow woman plummeting from Painted Warrior's majestic cliffs. With the growing popularity of Craig Johnson's Walt Longmire series, fans new and old will relish As the Crow Flies (Viking), the sheriff's latest quirky and complex investigation.
Wednesday the 20th, 7pm / Powell's at Cedar Hills Crossing
Terry Tempest Williams
Wednesday the 20th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Terry Tempest Williams's mother told her, "I am leaving you all my journals, but you must promise me you won't look at them until after I'm gone." It was a shock to Williams to discover that her mother had kept journals. But not as much of a shock as what she found when the time came to read them. In 54 chapters that unfold like a series of yoga poses, each with its own logic and beauty, Williams has created a lyrical and caring meditation on the mystery of her mother's journals. When Women Were Birds (Farrar Straus & Girous) is a kaleidoscope that keeps turning the question "What does it mean to have a voice?"
Francine Du Plessix Gray
Thursday the 21st, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
Historical fiction of the highest order, Francine Du Plessix Gray's The Queen's Lover (Penguin Press) reveals, in a fresh vision of the French Revolution and the French royal family, the untold love affair between the Swedish count Axel von Fersen and Marie Antoinette.
Matthew Batt
Thursday the 21st, 7:30PM
Powell's Books on Hawthorne
When a season of loss tests the mettle of their marriage, Matthew Batt and his wife decide not to call it quits. Instead, they set their sights on a dilapidated house in the Sugarhouse section of Salt Lake City. With no homesteading experience and a full-blown life crisis on their hands, these perpetual grad students decide to seek salvation through renovation and do all they can to turn a former crack house into a home. Batt's account of their adventure, Sugarhouse: Turning the Neighborhood Crack House into Our Home Sweet Home (Mariner), is heartfelt, joyous, and improbably funny.
Bonnie Jo
Thursday the 21st, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
In Once upon a River (W. W. Norton), Bonnie Jo Campbell has created an unforgettable heroine. Sixteen-year-old Margo Crane is a beauty whose unflinching gaze and uncanny ability with a rifle have not made her life any easier. After the violent death of her father, Margo takes to her boat and sets out on the Stark River in search of her vanished mother. But the river is a dangerous place for a young woman traveling alone, and she must be strong to survive, using her knowledge of the natural world and her ability to look unsparingly into the hearts of those around her.
Steven Raichlen
Friday the 22nd, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
From the celebrated author of the bestselling cookbooks Planet Barbecue and How to Grill comes a surprising first novel about love, loss, redemption — and really good food. Claire Doheney agrees to house-sit in an oceanfront mansion on Chappaquiddick island, hoping to find solace, strength, and sufficient calm to finish her biography of the iconoclastic psychotherapist Wilhelm Reich. The last thing she expects to find is love. Told with a keen eye for Chappaquiddick's natural beauty, Island Apart (Forge) has it all: romance, travel, crime, and cooking scenes so vivid they'll make your taste buds ache. Think The Bridges of Madison County with better food.
Alafair Burke
Friday the 22nd, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
In Never Tell (Harper), Alafair Burke's fourth Ellie Hatcher novel, Hatcher is forced to uncover the truth behind the apparent suicide of a teenage girl named Julie who has intriguing connections to New York's wealthiest, as well as to its most dispossessed. Hatcher is soon pulled into Julie's inner circle, an eclectic mix of overly precocious teenagers from Manhattan's most privileged families and street kids from Greenwich Village, and forced to acknowledge that Julia may have learned the hard way that some secrets should never be told.
Kids' Storytime
Saturday the 23rd, 11:00AM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Join us every Saturday for storytime. Today we're reading Dragons Love Tacos by Adam Rubin.
Ridley Pearson
Monday the 25th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
Rutherford Risk specializes in the recovery of hostages. After a Chinese National working for an American-owned construction company is grabbed off the streets of Shanghai in broad daylight, the security company recruits two outsiders to help located them. Grace Chu is a forensic accountant hired to follow the money; John Knox is a civilian with unparalleled training in both combat and culture. They begin by following the money, which leads to consequences neither anticipated. Rich with the atmosphere of Shanghai and crackling with tension-filled suspense, The Risk Agent (Putnam) introduces two compelling new characters — and heralds the start of a brilliant new series.
Sheila Heti
Monday the 25th, 7:30PM
Powell's Books on Hawthorne
A bawdy, genre-busting novel of friendship, sex, and love in the new millennium, Sheila Heti's How Should a Person Be (Henry Holt) is a portrait of the artist as a young woman and a delicious combination of pop and art. What begins as curiosity about how to live well becomes, in Heti's hands, an irresistible, torn-from-life novel exploring the eternal questions of why we connect, whom we desire, and how a person should be.
Joe Sacco & Chris Hedges
Monday the 25th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
In Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt (Nation Books), Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Chris Hedges and American Book Award-winning cartoonist Joe Sacco present a searing portrait of an American underclass in crisis. Reporting from the coal fields of West Virginia, from Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, from undocumented farm worker colonies in California, and from Camden, New Jersey, the poorest city in the nation, Hedges and Sacco warn of a bleak near future — where cities and states fall easily into bankruptcy, neofeudalism reigns, and the nation's working and middle classes are decimated. A shocking report from the frontlines of poverty in America, Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt is a clarion call for reform.
Natalie Serber
Tuesday the 26th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
In Natalie Serber's stories of resilient, flawed women, Shout Her Lovely Name (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt), Mothers and daughters ride the familial tide of joy, regret, loathing and love. In a battle between a teenage daughter and her mother, wheat bread and plain yogurt become weapons. An aimless college student, married to her much older professor, sneaks cigarettes while caring for their newborn son. And in a series of stories set in 1970s California, the reader follows capricious single mother Ruby and her steadfast daughter Nora through their tumultuous life of stray men, stray cats, and psychedelic drugs. Emotionally generous, achingly real, and beautifully written, these unforgettable stories lay bare the connection and conflict in families.
Classics Book Group
Wednesday the 27th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
This month we meet to discuss The Golden Ass by Apuleius. Join us!
Jess Walter
Wednesday the 27th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Jess Walter, the award-winning author of The Financial Lives of the Poets, returns with his funniest and most romantic novel yet. Beautiful Ruins (Harper) is the story of an almost love affair that begins on the Italian coast in 1962 and is rekindled in Hollywood 50 years later. Gloriously inventive, constantly surprising, Beautiful Ruins is full of flawed yet fascinating people, navigating the rocky shores of their lives while clinging to their improbable dreams.
Cindy Pawlcyn
Thursday the 28th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
Cindy Pawlcyn has been making her mark on the national food scene for decades, pioneering a farm-to-table philosophy and running some of Napa Valley's most beloved restaurants, including the legendary Mustards Grill. Her new cookbook, Cindy's Supper Club (Ten Speed Press), serves up more than 125 recipes from the world's greatest food destinations. From the familiar Italian to the adventurous Ethiopian, distinct fare from great food cities and countries gets a touch of Pawlcyn's easy sophistication and focus on freshness.
Translator Judson Rosengrant
Thursday the 28th, 7:30PM
Powell's Books on Hawthorne
Leo Tolstoy began his trilogy Childhood, Boyhood, Youth in his early 20s. Although in his old age he would famously dismiss it as an "awkward mixture of fact and fiction," generations of readers have disagreed, finding the novel to be a charming and insightful portrait of inner growth against the background of a world limned with extraordinary clarity, grace, and color. Judson Rosengrant has translated and edited a wide range of Russian literature, and presents his new translation of Tolstoy's autobiographical classic.
Glen Duncan
Thursday the 28th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
With Talulla Rising (Knopf), Glen Duncan gives readers a follow-up to last year's bestseller, The Last Werewolf, which has been hailed as "a brilliantly original thriller, a love story, a witty treatise on male (and female) urges, even an existential musing on what it is to be human" (James Medd, The Word). Talulla Rising pushes the werewolf myth further into new territory to give us a novel rich in action and ideas, delivering in the process the definitive 21st-century female of the species.
Kristen Iversen
Friday the 29th, 7:00PM
Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing
Full Body Burden (Crown) is a haunting work of nonfiction about the life of a young woman, author Kristen Iversen, who grew up in a small Colorado town close to Rocky Flats, the secret nuclear weapons plant once designated "the most contaminated site in America." It follows her through childhood and adolescence, at the height of the Cold War, living in a landscape at once startlingly beautiful and, unknown to those who lived there, tainted with invisible yet deadly particles of plutonium
Dorothy Wickenden
Friday the 29th, 7:30PM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
In the summer of 1916, Dorothy Woodruff and Rosamond Underwood, bored by society luncheons, charity work, and the effete men who courted them, left their families in Auburn, New York, to teach school in the wilds of northwestern Colorado. Nearly a hundred years later, Dorothy Wickenden, Woodruff's granddaughter, found the teachers' buoyant letters home, which captured the voices of the pioneer women, the children they taught, and other unforgettable people they got to know. With Nothing Daunted (Scribner), Wickenden has created an exhilarating saga about two intrepid women and the "settling up" of the West.
Kids' Storytime
Saturday the 30th, 11:00AM
Powell's City of Books on Burnside
Join us every Saturday for storytime. Today we're reading A Couple of Boys Have the Best Week Ever by Marla Frazee.
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