Simon Van Booy reads and discusses his novella...
15 South Dubuque St. • Iowa City, IA 52240 • 319-337-2681 • 800-295-BOOK • Open 9:00 a.m. daily
Live
Live From Prairie Lights
“Live from Prairie Lights” is an internationally known readings series, which features some of the best up-and-coming and well-established authors & poets from all over the globe. Presented before a live audience and streamed over the world wide web, this long running series brings the spoken word from the bookstore to the masses.
Most readings begin @ 7:00 p.m. Arrive early to assure yourself a seat.
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Ellen Lewin
Start Date
February 9, 2010 - 7:00pm
End Date
Event Location
Prairie Lights
Name
Ellen Lewin
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In an event co-sponsored by The University of Iowa Alumni Association, feminist anthropologist, Dr. Ellen Lewin, will read from her work about the challenges faced by lesbian, gay, bisexual, and trans-gendered people as they try to negotiate legitimacy and recognition for their families. Her books Gay Fatherhood and Recognizing Ourselves will be on hand.
John D' Agata
Start Date
February 10, 2010 - 7:00pm
End Date
Event Location
Van Allen Hall 2
Name
John D' Agata
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University of Iowa professor of Creative writing, John D’Agata, reads from his book About a Mountain. While moving his mother to Las Vegas, D’Agata began to follow the story of the government’s plan to store high-level nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain. Exploring intertwined questions of time, communication, and annihilation, D’Agata’s highly-anticipated second book is an unflinching, terrifying, and beautifully written meditation on nothing less than the future of human life. Book signing to follow at Prairie Lights.
D.A. Powell & David Trinidad
Start Date
February 11, 2010 - 5:00pm
End Date
Event Location
Prairie Lights
Name
D.A. Powell & David Trinidad
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D.A. Powell and David Trinidad will read from their collaboration, By Myself: An Autobiography. Composed of individual sentences drawn from three hundred separate memoirs penned by everyone from Lana Turner to Harpo Marx, this book unfolds as the story of a singular, plural, famously anonymous character. Frequently hilarious, as familiar as it is strange, Powell and Trinidad, both widely published poets, offer a new take on hybridity, commonality and the written life. Note early time of 5 p.m
Lucy Silag
Start Date
February 11, 2010 - 7:00pm
End Date
Event Location
Prairie Lights
Name
Lucy Silag
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Lucy Silag, currently an MFA candidate in The Iowa Writer's Workshop, will read from her young adult novel Wanderlust. Angst and betrayal abound as teens search the French countryside for their missing cousin in this exciting sequel to The Beautiful Americans. In addition to her novels, Lucy Silag has written for many publications, including Salon, Allure, and New York Magazine.
Wells Tower
Start Date
February 12, 2010 - 7:00pm
End Date
Event Location
Prairie Lights
Name
Wells Tower
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Wells Tower, who took the literary world by storm last year, will read from his stunning collection of stories Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned. Exploring men down on their luck in their roles as fathers, brothers, stepfathers, husbands and sons, these stories are filled with both wry humor and primal rage. "Wells Tower is a blindingly brilliant writer who does more than raise the bar for debut fiction: he hurls it into space.” --Ben Marcus
Jeffrey S. Copeland
Start Date
February 16, 2010 - 7:00pm
End Date
Event Location
Prairie Lights
Name
Jeffrey S. Copeland
Jeffrey S. Copeland, head of the English department at the University of Northern Iowa, will read from Olivia’s Story, the riveting account of the 1948 landmark supreme court case, Shelley v. Kramer. The story is told through the voice of Olivia Merriweather Perkins as she challenges St. Louis’ covenant of “whites only” neighborhoods. Olivia’s Story takes the reader into a different, possibly more vital time and reminds us that dreams can have power if we are willing to fight for them.
Jeff Biggers
Start Date
February 17, 2010 - 7:00pm
End Date
Event Location
Prairie Lights
Name
Jeff Biggers
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Jeff Biggers will read from Reckoning at Eagle Creek: The Secret Legacy of Coal in the Heartland. Journalist Biggers tallies up the human cost of more than two centuries of coal mining in southern Illinois as he excavates the history beneath the homestead at Eagle Creek where his family lived for eight generations. The displacement of the indigenous Shawnee, the hidden legacy of slavery, and the intense all come sharply into focus in the personal and historical account. Biggers also presents a devastating critique of the myth of clean coal.
JERRY GABRIEL & KAREN LEONA ANDERSON
Start Date
February 18, 2010 - 7:00pm
End Date
Event Location
Prairie Lights
Name
JERRY GABRIEL & KAREN LEONA ANDERSON
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Writers’ Workshop graduates Jerry Gabriel and Karen Leona Anderson will read from their work. Jerry Gabriel will read from his story collection Drowned Boy. "Drowned Boy is a collection of linked stories that explore isolation, death, and moral and social significance in small-town rural America. Ray Carver would recognize these characters and situations, as would poet Philip Levine."–Andrea Barrettand. Karen Leona Anderson will read from her poetry collection, Punish Honey, winner of the Carolina Wren Press Poetry Series Prize. “An unstinting, in fact sumptuous, linguistic feast. Few first books make such a heady contribution to poetics.” —Alice Fulton
Geoffrey Becker
Start Date
February 19, 2010 - 7:00pm
End Date
Event Location
Name
Geoffrey Becker
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Geoffrey Becker, who won the 2008 Flannery O’Connor award for his novel Black Elvis, will read from his new novel, Hot Springs. The book recounts the emotional misadventures of vibrant, sexy and perhaps crazy Bernice Click. Determined to reclaim the child she gave up for adoption five years ago, she convinces her boyfriend, Landis, to help carry out her plan. Once the abduction is accomplished, however, Bernice–whose own mother was given to manic episodes and strange behavior– is plagued with doubts.
Matthew Davis
Start Date
February 24, 2010 - 5:00pm
End Date
Event Location
Prairie Lights
Name
Matthew Davis
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As part of the Prairie Insight Program, Matthew Davis will read from his travel memoir When Things Get Dark: A Mongolian Winter's Tale. At 23, Matt Davis moved to a remote Mongolian village to teach English. There he was caught in a downward spiral of alcohol abuse and violence – a scenario he saw played out by many of the Mongolian men around him. His book tells the tale of his personal struggles, interlaced with essays on Mongolian history and culture. Matthew Davis is a MFA graduate of the University of Iowa’s Nonfiction Writing Program and currently a graduate student at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. A chapter of this book has won the 2005 Atlantic Monthly prize in nonfiction and another chapter was a "notable essay" in the 2006 Best American Travel Writing series. Matt lives in Washington, D.C.
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