We think May Day gets short shrift round these parts. While it may not be a clearly defined holiday — it is, in fact, a catch-all name for an assortment of often unrelated holidays, among them International Workers' Day, the Spring Bank Holiday in the U.K., Hawaii's Lei Day, Northern Europe's Walpurgis Night (with its delicious echoes of Dracula), the Celtic Beltane, and more recently, EuroMayDay — we just think dancing around a Maypole for any reason is the best thing ever.

POWELLS.COM INTERVIEWS: JONATHAN SAFRAN FOER
Pick your favorite line from Everything Is Illuminated, a funny one, or magical, or perhaps something sad or profound. You might have a hard time choosing. "Comedy and pathos are braided together with extraordinary skill," one reviewer raved. The author's follow-up, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close (featuring one of the most captivating kids in recent fiction), tackles themes and structures every bit as ambitious. As the paperback edition arrived in stores, Foer spoke about writing, the Internet, family, and terrific failures. For a limited time, preorder a signed, trade paperback edition of Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close.

PREORDER SIGNED EDITIONS
Why wait for an author's appearance to scramble for a signed edition? Now you can preorder signed copies from authors who are visiting our stores, including This Book Will Save Your Life by A. M. Homes, The Messiah of Morris Avenue by Father Joe author Tony Hendra, Which Brings Me to You by Steve Almond and Julianna Baggott, Possible Side Effects by Augusten Burroughs... and more! Check out what is currently on offer here.

ORIGINAL ESSAY: DANIEL HANDLER
"What's love, again?" asks Daniel Handler. You might expect the author of Lemony Snicket's Series of Unfortunate Events to respond with something macabre and irreverent, but this is the grown-up Daniel Handler, whose new novel, Adverbs, should reclaim his literary name for older readers. In this original essay for Powells.com, Handler wonders, among other things, "Do the lyrics of love songs actually cut to the heart of the matter, or are they simply so vague that it feels like they do?" Read the rest of the essay and save 30% when you buy Adverbs.

ORIGINAL ESSAY: TIMOTHY NOAH
Last year, Washington Post writer Marjorie Williams died of liver cancer. Her husband, Slate senior writer Timothy Noah, assembled some of her best writing in The Woman at the Washington Zoo, a collection of pieces that reveal both the political and the personal in Williams's work. In this original essay for Powells.com, Noah remembers his late wife's gift for observation, as well as her unique perspective on marriage, Mother's Day, and family. Read the essay and save 30% when you buy The Woman at the Washington Zoo from Powells.com.

INK Q&A: ELINOR LIPMAN
Elinor Lipman describes her eighth book, My Latest Grievance, as a novel "narrated by Frederica Hatch, who was raised in a college dormitory....Things go a bit haywire when Laura Lee French — new housemother, homewrecker, and ex-wife of Frederica's dad — arrives on campus and wreaks some emotional havoc." In this INK Q&A, Lipman shares her favorite literary first line, describes the best breakfast she's ever had, confesses her guilty pleasure, and more. Read the Q&A and save 30% on My Latest Grievance.

In honor of Earth Day (April 22nd, if you didn't know), we'd like to suggest a few books that might make Mother Earth happy. Jill recommends Elizabeth Kolbert's Field Notes from a Catastrophe as "environmental science at its best." And Georgie likes The Weather Makers by Tim Flannery: "Flannery writes beautifully, clearly examining every angle of the debate surrounding our environment." Or, if you prefer the sunny side of things, Michael Crichton's fictional State of Fear posits that everything is A-OK and we've got nothing to worry about.

WORDSTOCK
Powells.com is proud to be a sponsor of the 2006 Wordstock Festival in Portland, April 21-23. Over 250 authors will read on eleven stages — including Dave Eggers, Colson Whitehead, Joyce Carol Oates, Ursula K. Le Guin, and many more! There will also be over 100 publishers, booksellers, and writing organizations at the Oregon Convention Center, a workshop for teachers and writers, and you can enter the Wordstock Writing Challenge! And don't miss an evening with radio host Ira Glass — tickets are on sale now. Click here for more details.

GUEST BLOGGERS: SUSAN STRAIGHT, MICHAEL CREWDSON, AND MARGARET MITTELBACH
Joining us this week on the Powell's blog is Susan Straight, author of A Million Nightingales, the tale of a nineteenth-century slave girl's journey — emotional and physical — from captivity to freedom, which the New York Times praised as "a powerful and moving story, written in language so beautiful you can almost believe the words themselves are capable of salving history's wounds." Next week's guest bloggers are Michael Crewdson and Margaret Mittelbach, authors of Carnivorous Nights: On the Trail of the Tasmanian Tiger, the tale of a quixotic quest that Jonathan Safran Foer calls "more than just endearing and engrossing, it's inspiring." Check out our blog and read what you're missing!

NEW IN STORES
New to our shelves: Irene Nemirovsky's Suite Francaise is an extraordinary novel of life in France under Nazi occupation — recently discovered and published 64 years after the author's death in Auschwitz. ("[M]agnificent....Everything about this transcendent novel is miraculous," praises Booklist in a starred review.) The Perfect Storm author Sebastian Junger returns with A Death in Belmont, the chronicle of a real-life murder that hit close to home for the writer. A. M. Homes's This Book Will Save Your Life was praised as one of the year's best books by Stephen King in Entertainment Weekly. Now you can pick up a copy and find out for yourself why this book "could become a generational touchstone."

DVDs
Now on DVD, HBO's acclaimed series Six Feet Under wraps up its groundbreaking run with its fifth — and arguably, best — season ("Instantly claims third place on the list of most memorable series finales," raves the New York Daily News). With extra features like cast commentary, a gag reel, and ten deleted scenes, 9 to 5: The Sexist, Egotistical, Lying Hypocritical Bigot Edition finds Dolly Parton, Jane Fonda, and Lily Tomlin fighting back against boorish boss Dabney Coleman. (And we dare you to get the theme song out of your head for the rest of the day.) As always, all DVDs ship for free from Powells.com!

eBOOKS
New in eBook: The unstoppable juggernaut that is The Da Vinci Code has a new and improved reduced price to match the just-released paperback edition. If you still haven't read it, you've officially run out of excuses. For a good laugh, pick up any book by Christopher Moore — they've all just come out on eBook. From longtime cult classics like Fluke and Lamb to new favorites The Stupidest Angel and A Dirty Job. And don't miss Micah, the new Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter, novel by Laurell K. Hamilton.

In our next edition:
An interview with Amy Hempel and signed first editions of The Collected Stories of Amy Hempel; an original essay from Laura Foster (Portland Hill Walks); and an INK Q&A from Paul Neilan (Apathy and Other Small Victories).

CALENDAR OF EVENTS
Jonathan Safran Foer, the bestselling author of Everything Is Illuminated, returns with Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, a second novel that boldly approaches history and tragedy with humor, tenderness, and awe. In My Life So Far, Jane Fonda tells the story of her remarkable life and reveals the woman behind the legend, with rich insights into the struggles of being human. Star of the Food Network's Everyday Italian, Giada De Laurentis returns with a new batch of simple, delicious recipes geared toward family meals — Italian style — in Giada's Family Dinners. In Saving the World, a novel-within-a-novel that is "intense and riveting" (Library Journal), Julia Alvarez pits ambition against altruism, and, in the process, tells the radiant stories of two courageous women. In response to the demonization of the "L-word" that has occurred over the past twenty years comes Proud to Be Liberal, a defiant celebration of the past, present, and future of Liberalism by an all-star collection of writers, activists, scholars, cartoonists, and bloggers. For those and other author events, check our calendar.

FUP. STORE CAT.
Fup gazes over the new cat's shoulder. The new cat gazes over Fup's. Both affect a pose of utter disinterest, as if the quiet park around them is more worthy of attention, as if nothing but chance brought them together on the path, sitting just a foot apart. As if they haven't been scoping each other out, converging, for the past fifteen minutes. Neither budges.

We watch from inside the window.

Fup says something, we can't hear what.

Ann remarks, "Imagine if people kept absolutely still while they talked. Try to do it. Move nothing but your mouth."

Steady as statues, staring now at each other, the cats appear to have reached some kind of impasse. We could be here for ages.

Clyde, craning over Ann's shoulder, is getting nervous. "Are they going to fight?" he asks. "Are they playing some kind of game? What are they doing?"

"A bicycle," Darin announces, pointing toward Couch Street. Sure enough, a rider crosses at the corner. As he pedals toward the cats, the one we don't recognize peels away, back into the park. Fup retreats to the store. Our crowd disperses.

"Wait!" Clyde calls out. "What just happened? Who won?"

POWELLS.COM BESTSELLERS (UPDATED HOURLY)
1. Katrina Project Book Pledge (Special)
2. The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan (Sociology)
3. Crashing the Gate, Signed Edition by Jerome Armstrong and Maroks Moulitsas Zuniga (Politics)
4. The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster by Bobby Henderson (Humor)
5. Grammar Snobs Are Great Big Meanies by June Casagrande (Reference)
6. Field Notes from a Catastrophe by Elizabeth Kolbert (Nature Studies)
7. The Irresistible Revolution by Shane Claiborne (Christianity)
8. God Laughs and Plays by David James Duncan (Philosophy)
9. American Theocracy by Kevin Phillips (Politics)
10. The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown (Popular Fiction)