May 2011 5 Thursday, May 5, 7 P.M
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May 2011 5 Thursday, May 5, 7 p.m. 15 Sunday, May 15, 1 p.m. Monday, May 23, 7 p.m. May 11 Michael & May 11 Amy Stolls 23May 11 Roméo Dallaire Audrey Levatino The Ninth Wife They Fight Like Soldiers, They Die The Joy Of Hobby Farming (HarperCollins, $14.99) Like Children (Skyhorse, $14.95) An accomplished author of novels for young (Walker, $26) Proprietors of a twenty-three-acre farm near adults, Stolls here shifts to an older age group In 1994, then Lieutenant-General Dallaire led U.N. Gordonsville, the authors grow vegetables, raise with a story about marriage. Bess has just got- peace-keeping forces in Rwanda. He was horrified livestock, and participate in local farmers’ markets. ten engaged and is shocked to learn that her at the use of children as soldiers, and his outrage has They support this rural lifestyle with careers else- intended has eight former wives. Desperate to fueled this urgent call to action to end the practice— where, and their primer offers advice on the nuts and bolts of small-scale understand him, she sets out on a cross-country which has grown more extensive since the 1990s. agriculture, from compost to tractors, berries to cut flowers. Buy a trip to meet each of her fiancé’s erstwhile spouses. copy of the book, attend the event, and enter to win products fresh from Tuesday, May 24, 7 p.m. the farm like eggs, honey, llamanure soil amendment, homeade jam or Sunday, May 15, 5 p.m. Arthur Phillips 24May 11 flowers. Marc Kaufman 15May 11 The Tragedy Of Arthur First Contact (Random House, $26) Friday, May 6, 7 p.m. 6 (Simon & Schuster, $26) In his fifth novel, the author of Prague and The Alexi Zentner May 11 Once thought inhospitable to living creatures, Song is You channels Shakespeare. Or is the newly- Touch glaciers, volcanoes, and other extreme habitats discovered work by the Bard in fact the latest (W.W. Norton, $24.95) in fact do harbor life. So why not the universe forgery by the father of a writer named Arthur An accomplished short story-writer, Zentner has beyond Earth? Kaufman follows a range of scien- Phillips? An ingenious literary romp, the story is written a haunting first novel. Set in northern tists, from geologists and physicists to astrobiolo- also an exploration of love and family ties. Canada, it focuses on Stephen, an Anglican priest gists, explaining the challenges and theories of who has come home to see his dying mother. His the search for extraterrestrial life. Wednesday, May 25, 7 p.m. vigil is full of memories, and Zentner’s evocative 25May 11 Hannah Nordhaus prose balances the somber occasion with powerful descriptions of log- Monday, May 16, 7 p.m. The Beekeeper’s Lament ging, long winters, woodland spirits, and unforgettable characters. 16 May 11 Alexandra Styron (Harper Perennial, $14.99) Reading My Father Saturday, May 7, 1 p.m. Like an apian version of Johnny Appleseed, John Miller (Scribner, $25) May7 11 Sophia Rosenfeld travels the country with his bees, bringing hives of pol- Common Sense: A Political History Styron’s biography of her father, the great nov- linators to farmers who have none. Nordhaus’s book (Harvard Univ., $29.95) elist William Styron, is studded with famous profiles Miller and examines the challenges he and Before Tom Paine made common sense names, book awards, and ambition. It’s also other beekeepers face as the still unexplained Colony American and integral to popular democracy, it a memoir of living under the shadow of her Collapse Disorder continues to decimate these essential insects. had played a varied role in Europe during the father’s depression—a complement to his Darkness Visible Enlightenment and the Age of Revolutions. In , in which she comes to terms Thursday, May 26, 7 p.m. 26 her history of populist wisdom as a political with the anguish that caused them both pain. Francine Prose May 11 tool, Rosenfeld, a history professor and author of A Revolution in My New American Life Language, shows that it has been as manipulable as any other ideal. Tuesday, May 17, 7 p.m. 17 (HarperCollins, $25.99) Michael Spence May 11 Prose’s 16th novel is narrated by Lula, a young Saturday, May 7, 6 p.m. The Next Convergence Albanian working (legally) as a nanny in New Miranda Kennedy May7 11 (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $27) Jersey. Her life has gone from a nightmare to a Sideways On A Scooter As the extraordinary growth of China, India, dream, but American society and politics during (Random House, $26) and other developing nations continues apace, the second Bush term give Lula plenty of material Kennedy lived in New Delhi for five years, working the new world economy poses fresh challenges for sharp, ironic commentary. And if suburban life is a tad dull, three as a journalist and experiencing the fast pace of a for everyone involved. Spence, the 2001 winner Albanian thugs and the immigration bureaucracy liven things up. vibrant modern city. But beneath the Westernized of the Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences, offers surface, traditional culture continued to exert a a lucid analysis of current trends and what they Saturday, May 28, 6 p.m. strong hold, especially for women. Kennedy’s mean for the future. Matthew Algeo 28May 11 memoir introduces several Indian women she knew, The President Is A Sick Man recounting how they negotiated old and new rules of behavior. 18 Wednesday, May 18, 7 p.m. (Chicago Review, $24.95) May 11 Roy Blount, Jr. Author of the popular Harry Truman’s Monday, May 9, 7 p.m. Alphabetter Juice Excellent Adventure, Algeo here reveals how May9 11 Sixth & I Historic Synagogue (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $26) Grover Cleveland spent the Fourth of July in Geraldine Brooks Words have sense appeal, Blount declares. And 1893: Cleveland disappeared from public view Caleb’s Crossing proves. The humorist and author of Alphabet and had surgery for cancer. When the secret (Viking, $26.95) Juice has combed a range of sources, from the operation was reported, Cleveland denied it and As she did in her People of the Book, Brooks again OED to YouTube, for language with a “son- the public believed him. Twenty-four years later, Cleveland’s sur- transforms a suggestive historical nugget into a icky” punch. Eschewing objective definitions, geon admitted the truth—and still no one believed it. rich, fascinating novel. The eponymous Caleb, Blount clearly indicates his picks and his peeves, fleshing out ety- a Wampanoag from Martha’s Vineyard, in 1665 mologies and usage with many a crazy story. Tuesday, May 31, 7 p.m. became the first Native American to graduate Tayari Jones 31May 11 from Harvard. As narrated by Bethia—herself denied an education Thursday, May 19, 7 p.m. Silver Sparrow in her patriarchal Puritan community—Caleb’s is a powerful story Joel Achenbach 19May 11 (Algonquin, $19.95) of soaring aspirations and constraining realities. A Hole At The Bottom Of The Sea In her third novel, the author of Leaving Atlanta and This is a ticketed event. Tickets are $10 each in advance of the event (Simon & Schuster, $25.99) The Untelling chronicles the two families of a biga- ($12 on the day of and at the door), or two free admission tickets are The explosion on the Deepwater Horizon last mist. James’s daughters are born four months apart provided with each book purchased from P&P. April set in motion an environmental disaster and despite his best efforts to prevent it, meet and Tuesday, May 10, 7 p.m. that posed engineering challenges of unprec- become friends. While they share a biological father, edented proportions. Achenbach, Washington Post Melissa Fay Greene 10May 11 their material and emotional circumstances are strikingly different, and No Biking In The House columnist and National Geographic science writer, Jones skillfully contrasts their distinct coming-of-age stories. Without A Helmet focuses on the event’s political dimension as well (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $26) as on the daunting technical aspects of plugging the burst Macondo Children and Teens’ Department In Without Me There is No You, Greene told the well that lay a mile below the ocean’s surface. ! moving story of AIDS orphans in Ethiopia. Her Wednesday, May 4, 10:30 a.m. new memoir is a humorous, and no less affecting, Friday, May 20, 7 p.m. 4 20May 11 Mary Gordon John Flanagan May 11 account of her own experiences with adoption; The Love Of My Youth The Emperor Of Nihon-Ja: Book 10 she and her husband have nine children, five (Philomel, $17.99) of them adopted, one from Bulgaria, and the others from Ethiopia. (Pantheon, $25.95) In the tenth and final book of the Ranger’s How this group has formed a family makes for a lively, loving book. Adam and Miranda seemed made for each other when they were teenagers during the sixties. Then Apprentice series, Horace is sent on a mission to 11 Wednesday, May 11, 7 p.m. their passions turned to careers and they went the eastern nation of Nihon-Ja. After no word May 11 Adam Hochschild their separate ways. Meeting again after 30 years, from him for months, Will, Alyss, and Evanlyn To End All Wars they walk around Rome and gradually relive the set out to discover his whereabouts, eventually (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $28) past. A veteran novelist, Gordon skillfully evokes her characters finding that Horace has been caught up in a Hochschild’s history of World War I focuses on through a subtle range of emotions.