Events
THIS EVENT HAS BEEN CANCELLED.
Linda Gray Sexton talks about Half in Love: Surviving the Legacy of Suicide ($15.95). After the agony of witnessing her mother's multiple — and ultimately successful — suicide attempts, Linda Gray Sexton, daughter of the acclaimed poet Anne Sexton, struggles with an engulfing undertow of depression. Here, she speaks about the need to escape the legacy of suicide.
This special event is co-sponsored by National Alliance of Mental Illness (NAMI). This is a fundraiser. Book Passage will donate a portion of proceeds from book sales during the event to NAMI San Francisco.
A gifted writer in her own right, Linda Gray Sexton has written four novels; her first memoir Searching for Mercy Street was published to critical acclaim.
Arlie Hochschild is the author of The Time Bind, The Second Shift, and The Managed Heart. She is a professor of sociology at the University of California, Berkeley and her articles have appeared in Harper's, Mother Jones, Psychology Today and elsewhere. She lives in San Francisco.
Admission $115 per person/ $185 per couple
Call (415) 927-0960, ext. 1 to reserve
Join Cindy Pawlcyn, one of America's leading
chef's, for what we know will be a very special event! Twice nominated
as the James Beard Best Chef in California, Pawlcyn is rocking the food
world with her new cookbook, Cindy's Supper Club.
It's
no secret that legions of fans flock to Pawlcyn's restaurants for her
globally influenced signature dishes. What is not so well known is that
Cindy has turned her passions for cooking and travel into a popular
supper club, where she creates an adventurous menu celebrating a
different international cuisine each week. Cindy's Supper Club has
become a destination event, presenting a world tasting tour on a plate.
Pawlcyn's new book, drawn from the weekly menus of her supper clubs, is a
collection of 125 complete recipes and menus from around the globe - as well as a delicious delight.
Pawlcyn
helped make the Napa Valley a destination for food and wine in Northern
California. Today, her trio of restaurants - Mustard’s Grill, Cindy’s Backstreet Kitchen, and Brassica - are as much loved among locals as
they are popular with visitors. Besides owning three of region's popular
restaurants, Pawlcyn is also the author of four award-winning cookbooks
including Mustard's Grill Napa Valley Cookbook, Big Small Plates, and Cindy Pawlcyn's Appetizers. She received a James Beard award for Mustards Grill Napa Valley Cookbook and is the author of Fog City Diner Cookbook.
Don't miss this event! Tickets are $115 per person / or $185 per couple. Price includes meal, wine, coffee, tax, tip, & a signed copy of the book.
Eugenia Bone speaks about Mycophilia: Revelations from the Weird World of Mushrooms ($25.99). Engrossing, earthy, surprising, and packed with up-to-date science and cultural exploration, Mycophilia is part narrative and part primer for foodies, science buffs, environmental advocates, and anyone interested in learning more about ‘shrooms.
Eugenia Bone is an author and a food writer who has been featured in numerous national publications. She writes a blog on preserving foods for the Denver Post, and lives in New York City.
Captain Chesley B. Sullenberger III is a retired airline pilot, speaker, consultant and the author of the New York Times bestseller Highest Duty. He was named one of Time's 100 Most Influential People, and has been a visiting scholar at the University of California, Berkeley's Center for Catastrophic Risk Management.
Susan Morse was educated at Williams College and has worked as an actress in L.A. and New York. She now lives in Philadelphia. She has edited fiction, although this book is nonfiction. Mostly. She promises.
Cosponsored by CUESA
Ani Phyo presents Ani's 15-Day Fat Blast: The Kick-Ass Plan to Get Lighter, Tighter, and Sexier . . . Super Fast ($24.00). On Saturday mornings, chefs and cookbook authors lead free cooking demonstrations using seasonal ingredients from the Farmers Market. Join us out front of the Ferry Building in the Farmer's Market for tips, recipes, and a sample. We’ll be there with the books.
After culinary school, Mona Talbott was hired by Alice Waters to work at Chez Panisse and the Edible Schoolyard program. She later worked at Eli Zabar’s Vinegar Factory and EAT stores in New York and consulted for Hillary Clinton at her home in Chappaqua, New York. In 1999, Talbott began working for photographer Annie Leibovitz, and in 2004, she was hired by Bette Midler’s New York Restoration Project to design a children’s gardening and cooking program. Since 2007, Talbott has been executive chef at the Rome Sustainable Food Project. She is the author of Biscotti.
In the context of two very different 1960s communities, two UC Santa Cruz faculty members will discuss the overlapping theme of the desire for community, and also the desire for freedom from it. Karen Yamashita discusses I Hotel ($19.95), a multi-voiced fusion of prose, playwriting, graphic art, and philosophy which spins an epic tale of America’s struggle for civil rights. Micah Perks discusses her Pagan Time: An American Childhood ($15.95), a memoir about the 1960s which also conveys the texture of those wild times.
Karen Tei Yamashita is the author of four previous novels and the recipient of an American Book Award and the Janet Heidinger Kafka Award. I Hotel was a finalist for the 2010 National Book Award. A California native, Yamashita teaches at the University of California-Santa Cruz. Micah Perks is also the author of a novel, We Are Gathered Here. She has been twice nominated for a Pushcart Prize and currently lives in Santa Cruz where she also teaches at the University of California-Santa Cruz.
Yamashita and Perks codirect the Living Writers Series at UC Santa Cruz, which brings visiting writers, poets and publishing professionals to campus to give students an in-depth look into the world of the working writer.
Roger Housden
May 28 to June 5,
2012
A unique and leisurely journey through southern England and the landscape that inspired Jane Austen, Thomas Hardy, TS Eliot, Wordsworth, and Shakespeare.
While visiting their homes and the places that inspired them, Roger will draw from the work of these authors as a guide for our own soul's journey.
We visit Jane Austen's house in Hampshire, as well as the City of Bath; Thomas Hardy's home in the county town of Dorchester, and Stonehenge along the way. Then to the village of East Coker, location for one of TS Eliot's Four Quartets, and Tintern Abbey, the subject of Wordsworth's famous poem. We spend a day at Hay on Wye Literature Festival, the greatest festival of its kind in the world, which takes place every year in the Welsh border country. After visiting Stratford on Avon we shall attend a performance at the Globe Theatre in London, and then spend our final day visiting our own choice of London's great sights. We never drive more than a hundred miles in a day at most, and usually much less, so this is indeed a leisurely pilgrimage with no early starts.
Cost:
$3750
Maximum participants: 12 Includes all hotels ( 3x3 star and 2x5 star), tips for hotel staff, seven
dinners, six breakfasts, group transport by minibus, airport transfers, services
of Roger Housden and Braeda Horan.
Not included: international airfare,
lunches, all beverages except for included breakfasts.
Full
itinerary and registration form:
Download Itinerary
You can email Roger at info@rogerhousden.com. Visit Roger on the Web at www.rogerhousden.com.
About Roger Housden:
Roger
Housden has written some twenty books, including the best-selling Ten
Poems series, three travel books, the novella Chasing Rumi, and a
book on Rembrandt. All his books, whatever the subject, encourage us to ask
questions that help us to live into the best that we are. His Ten Poems
series has shown many thousands of readers how literature can be a guide for the
soul. He will be assisted by his partner, English designer Braeda
Horan.
Anne Cherian’s earlier novel, A Good Indian Wife, won the South Asian Excellence Award. She lives in Los Angeles, California.
Thomas McNamee talks about The Man Who Changed The Way We Eat: Craig Claiborne and the American Food Renaissance ($27.00). In the 1950s, America was a land of overdone roast beef and canned green beans — a gastronomic wasteland. Many restaurants relied on frozen ingredients, and served bogus “continental” cuisine. One man helped changed all that.
Thomas McNamee is the author of Alice Waters and Chez Panisse. His writing has been published in The New Yorker, Life, The New York Times, and The Washington Post. He lives in San Francisco.
Buzz Bissinger is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of four books, including the New York Times bestseller 3 Nights in August and Friday Night Lights, which has sold two million copies and inspired a film and TV franchise. He is a contributing editor for Vanity Fair and a sports columnist for The Daily Beast. He has written for The New Republic, Time and many other publications.
Ambassador and political insider Henry Crumpton discusses The Art of Intelligence ($27.95). This legendary CIA spy and counterterrorism expert 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.
With the rank of ambassador at large, Henry Crumpton served as the coordinator for counterterrorism at the U.S. Department of State from August 2005 until February 2007. Crumpton joined the Central Intelligence Agency in 1981 and spent most of his twenty-four-year career working undercover in the foreign field. He is the recipient of the Distinguished Intelligence Medal, the CIA's highest award for achievement.
3 Minute Reads
from San Francisco Grotto Writers
50+ Writers, 3 Minutes Each!
Joins us for a fast-paced and irreverent evening, showcasing new work from the students of the San Francisco Writer's Grotto writing classes. On this Friday evening, both fiction and nonfiction writers will read their work — but only for 3 minutes each! Their instructors (Grotto authors) will enforce the time limit. Join us for wine, fun, and fresh new writing.
Melanie Gideon reads from Wife 22 ($26.00). For fans of Helen Fielding’s Bridget Jones’s Diary and Allison Pearson’s I Don’t Know How She Does It comes an irresistible novel of a woman losing herself . . . and finding herself again in the middle of her life. Wife 22 is praised by Elizabeth Berg as a book “… wise in matters of the heart.”
Melanie Gideon is the bestselling author of The Slippery Year: A Meditation on Happily Ever After, which was named an NPR and San Francisco Chronicle best book of the year. She is also the author of two young adult novels: Pucker and The Map That Breathed. Gideon was born and raised in Rhode Island, and now lives in the Bay Area.
Please note new date and time!
Bring your laptop! Blogger extraordinaire Sophie Epstein, from the young adult book blog MrsMagooReads.com, teams up with her mother Liz Epstein (Jane Austen Literary Salon) as they present their ever-popular blogging workshop—now with a twist! Beginning bloggers of all ages are invited to learn how to start a blog, how to attract readers, how to position your blog, and much more. New to this workshop, using Blogger.com as a platform, you will receive hands-on help to create your own blog before you leave class!
Special teen event! Stages on Pages presents five YA authors reading from their work. Don’t miss Gretchen McNeil (Possess), Kim Culbertson (Instructions for a Broken Heart), Elise Allen (Populazzi), Stasia Kehoe (Audition), and Katherine Longshore (Gilt) debut new fiction for young adults.
Cancelled -- please contact Zack at zruskin@bookpassage.com to receive updates when this class is rescheduled
Lindsay Whiting shows the Sonoma Collage Studio method—a process in which artists create collages and then hang them up to engage with the work. It provides a direct and powerful way of approaching your inner world and imagination by combining the art of collage with the art of dialogue. The class format is hands-on practice using magazines, calendars, and images. Whiting has six years of experience in collaging at the Sonoma Collage Studio. She is the author of Living into Art: Journeys Through Collage. New and continuing students welcome! Artists should bring 5-7 favorite magazines to cut for making a finished collage. Pre-cut images okay. Bring images to share. $5 materials fee due to instructor during first class.
Pulitzer Prize winner Richard Ford reads from Canada ($26.99), a deeply affecting new novel of boundaries traversed, of innocence lost and reconciled, and of the mysterious and consoling bonds of family. Told in spare, elegant prose both resonant and luminous, Canada is a masterwork of haunting, even spectacular vision from one of our great writers.
Richard Ford is the acclaimed author of the Bascombe novels, which include The Sportswriter and its sequels, Independence Day — the first novel to win the Pulitzer Prize and the PEN/Faulkner Award — and The Lay of the Land, as well as the short story collections Rock Springs and A Multitude of Sins, which contain many widely anthologized stories.
Anthony DeBenedict discusses his debut novel Culpable Innocence: The American Dream Reprised ($25.95). Set in the 1960s and against the backdrop of the Vietnam War, this recently published novel traces the story of Regis Fallen as he attempts to secure the promise of his American birthright in the midst of racial, political, and military strife.
Born in Philadelphia, Anthony DeBenedict grew up in California. He was drafted and sent to Vietnam, and for his service was awarded the Bronze Star. Upon his return to the States, DeBenedict pursued a career in systems development.
Ayesha Mattu talks about Love, InshAllah: The Secret Love Lifes of American Muslim Women ($15.95). Romance, dating, sex and Muslim women? In this groundbreaking collection, 25 writers sweep aside stereotypes and share stories of their search for love — from singles' events and online dating to college flirtations and arranged marriages, all with a Muslim twist. For this special event, Ayesha Mattu will be joined by local contributor and comedian, Zahra Noorbakhsh.
Pakistani-American Ayesha Mattu is a writer and international development consultant. Her writing has appeared in The Huffington Post, CNN.com, the International Museum of Women, Religion Dispatches, and the award-winning blog, Rickshaw Diaries. She was selected a Muslim Leader of Tomorrow by the UN Alliance of Civilizations and the ASMA Society in 2009. She lives in Northern California.
Everyone has a unique life story, so whether you’re writing for publication or to give the gift of family history to your children and grandchildren, you’re never too young or too old to write your memoirs. In this half-day course, Mary will show you how to find your personal voice, help you decide what to put in and what to leave out, and teach you techniques to make your memoir vivid and compelling. Mary Mackey is the New York Times bestselling author of 14 novels. Her latest novel is The Widow’s War.
Special for kids! Gena Dawn reads from The Rainbow’s Journey ($19.95), a children’s book that uses colorful photography and rhyming poetry to take children on a magical journey through the cultures and landscapes of South and Southeast Asia. The book tells the tale of a young Rainbow who travels across the world – and discovers rainbow colors wherever she goes!
Gena Dawn is an art educator and travel photographer based in San Francisco. Brad Kane is a writer in the entertainment industry. In 2009-2010, they spent a year traveling in Asia, where their adventures inspired The Rainbow’s Journey.
Dr. Tricia Hellman Gibbs, MD, is a member of the 2008 San Francisco Wexner Heritage group and co-founder of the San Francisco Free Clinic, a clinic providing free care to the medically uninsured. She is also a former member of the United States Ski Team and, along with her husband, Dr. Richard Gibbs, 1998 California Family Physician of the Year.
Marta Fuchs discusses Legacy of Rescue: A Daughter's Tribute ($30.00). Fuchs’ father was one of 100 Hungarian Jews saved by Zoltán Kubinyi, the commanding officer of their forced labor battalion. This memoir, illustrated with family photographs, is in part a tribute to Kubinyi — a devout Seventh Day Adventist posthumously honored as a Righteous Among the Nations.
Marta Fuchs was born in Hungary and escaped with her family to the U.S. in the wake of the ’56 Revolution. She is a professional librarian and Director of Library Services at Drew School in SF and a licensed Marriage & Family Therapist in Albany. She is the author of Fragments of a Family: Remembering Hungary, the Holocaust, and Emigration to a New World.
Make ‘em laugh, make ‘em cry, make ‘em come back for more. Whether you’re writing literary fiction, mysteries, or romance novels, you need to learn the secret of creating lively, realistic, compelling dialogue that will make your readers feel as if they’re eavesdropping on a great conversation. Are your characters speaking woodenly right now or (worse yet) refusing to speak at all? Don’t worry. Mary is ready to share the secret of creating dialogue that will jump off the page and into your readers’ hearts and minds. Mary Mackey is the New York Times bestselling author of 14 novels. Her latest novel is The Widow’s War.
Poets John Miatech (What the Wind Says) and Rebecca Radner (What you least expect - selected poems 1980 – 2011) read from their recent books. Each are gifted writers. Each are veterans of the local poetry scene. Each will surprise. Each will delight.
John Miatech has been writing since 1969, and was recent poetry award winner at the San Francisco Writer’s Conference in 2012. Rebecca Radner's work has appeared in numerous publications, anthologies and textbooks. For more than 20 years she reviewed books regularly for the San Francisco Chronicle.
Photographer William Carter presents his fifth book, Causes and Spirits: Photographs from Five Decades ($60.00). Both autobiography and a study of people, both photojournalism and fine art photography, Carter’s images capture something beneath their surface – whether he was shooting Iraqi Kurds for LIFE, the streets of London for Women's Wear Daily, or nudes or the American West for exhibit.
"Watch any mother kneeling beside her toddler, pointing and explaining what they are looking at. Our urge to see, and to connect, starts there." – William Carter
William Carter graduated from Stanford University in 1957. He became a professional photographer, writer and editor while concurrently pursuing fine art photography. He has worked as a book editor, free-lance photographer, and jazz musician (even touring with Turk Murphy). Carter's photographs have been widely exhibited in the U.S. and Europe, and are in the permanent collection of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles, National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. and elsewhere.
Allison Wenglin Belger presents The Power of Community: CrossFit and the Force of Human Connection ($24.95). The power of community is about making lives better and helping people achieve their goals. Psychologist Belger describes the importance of group affiliation – of having a network of mutual support and human connection in the midst of our hectic lives.
Allison Wenglin Belger grew up in a suburb of New York City where she was introduced to the pleasures and rigors of training and competing in varsity sports. With her husband, Dr. Belger owns four CrossFit affiliate gyms in Northern California where she juggles management of the family business, her work as a licensed psychologist and fitness coach, and her role as mom to two young daughters.
Brian Doherty speaks about Ron Paul's rEVOLution: The Man and the Movement He Inspired ($26.99). An enigmatic and surprising politician, Representative Ron Paul is unique among Republican candidates. He has strong traditional conservative bona fides. But he is an equally passionate advocate for such progressive-left stances as ending the drug war.
Brian Doherty is a senior editor at Reason magazine. He is the author of three previous books, including Radicals for Capitalism: A History of the Modern American Libertarian Movement and Gun Control on Trial. His work has appeared in the Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, and National Review, among other publications.
New Bay Area Voices read from their work: writers Liz Demi Green (Flinging Singing Things), Chris Carosi (Bright Veil), Keely Hyslop (Things to Say to Pirates on Nights When I Miss You), Fia Maxwell (If We Could Friends on Facebook You Would Know How Much I Love You), Janey Smith (Animals), and Jeff von Ward (Mormonia: Stories) present new work recently published.
This session will be taught in French.
Spending the night in Paris? The precious hours can slip away faster than a good bottle of Bordeaux. Nicolas Wolff provides an overview of everything a night in Paris has to offer: museums, walks, underground movie theaters, jazz clubs and, of course, food and wine. Bring questions about your upcoming trip and get expert, tailored advice.
“Even though I know Paris fairly well he provided me with many new places of interest to check out on my trip there this Fall. His handouts are super detailed and will be very useful too” one student reported.
Nicolas Wolff grew up in Paris and teaches French.
Acclaimed science fiction writer Kim Stanley Robinson reads from his new novel, 2312 ($25.99). Scientific and technological advances have opened gateways to an extraordinary future. Earth is no longer humanity's only home; new habitats have been created throughout the solar system. In 2312, however, events will force humanity to confront its past, present, and future.
Kim Stanley Robinson is a winner of the Hugo, Nebula, and Locus Awards. He is the author of eleven previous books, including the bestselling Mars trilogy and the critically acclaimed Fifty Degrees Below, Forty Signs of Rain, The Years of Rice and Salt, and Antarctica - for which he was sent to the Antarctic by the U.S. National Science Foundation as part of their Antarctic Artists and Writers' Program. He lives in Davis, California.
Will Allen discusses The Good Food Revolution ($26.00). In this new book, a pioneering urban farmer and MacArthur “Genius Award” winner points the way to building a new food system that can feed — and heal — broken communities. An eco-classic in the making, The Good Food Revolution is the story of a grassroots movement that is changing the way our nation eats.
After retiring from professional basketball and executive positions at Kentucky Fried Chicken and Procter & Gamble, Allen cashed in his retirement fund for a two-acre plot a half mile away from Milwaukee’s largest public housing project. The area was a food desert with only convenience stores and fast-food restaurants to serve the needs of local residents.
Four Wednesdays: June 6 - 27
Have you always wanted to write but weren’t sure where to begin? Do you think you don’t have the time or the discipline? Leslie Keenan
has 28 years’ experience in helping people uncover and release their
ideas. She has worked on over 80 published books. She knows what it
takes to get a book from the first glimmer of an idea into its published
form. A student wrote, “Leslie is inspiring, compassionate and has a
natural gift for creating a safe place for a writer. She’s like a living
life preserver.”
"If it weren't for Leslie
Keenan's courses at Book Passage, I would never have written a word of
fiction, and I would never have been published. To this day, I still use
the tools she gave me for understanding my process, finding my voice,
and fighting my fears."
-Tammy Kaehler, author of Dead Man's Switch, Poisoned Pen Press
Anthony Swofford talks about Hotel, Hospitals, and Jails: A Memoir ($26.99). Following the success of Jarhead, Swofford assumed he had exorcised his military demons — but as every veteran knows, that isn't exactly how it works. In these searing, courageous pages, Swofford struggles to make sense of what his military service meant, and what his life should become.
Anthony Swofford served in a U.S. Marine Corps Surveillance and Target Acquisition/Scout-Sniper platoon during the Gulf War. After the war, he was educated at American River College; the University of California, Davis; and the University of Iowa Writers' Workshop. His fiction and nonfiction have appeared in Harper's, Men's Journal and other publications; his memoir Jarhead was a major New York Times bestseller, and the basis for the movie of the same name.
David Talbot, author of the New York Times bestseller Brothers: The Hidden History of the Kennedy Years, is the founder and CEO of Salon. He lives in San Francisco.
Alison Bing talks about Italy and her two published travel guides Discover Italy ($24.99) and Lonely Planet Italy ($25.99). If you have an interest in Rome, Milan, The Italian Lakes, Venice, Tuscany, Naples, Sicily, or Sardinia not to mention Italian food, great art, the Forum in Rome, the Grand Canal in Venice, Pompeii or the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, then don’t miss this event. Carpe diem.
Alison Bing has written and contributed to many travel guides.
Calories — too few or too many — are the source of health problems affecting billions of people in today's globalized world. In Why Calories Count ($29.95), Marion Nestle and Malden Nesheim explain what calories are and how they work, both biologically and politically. The authors also offer some candid advice: Get organized. Eat less. Eat better. Get political.
Marion Nestle and Malden Nesheim will be in conversation with Clark Wolf.
Marion Nestle is Paulette Goddard Professor in the Department of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health and Professor of Sociology at New York University. She is the author of What to Eat and Food Politics: How the Food Industry Influences Nutrition and Health; Safe Food: The Politics of Food Safety; and Pet Food Politics: The Chihuahua in the Coal Mine. Malden Nesheim is Professor Emeritus of Nutritional Sciences at Cornell University. He is coauthor (with Marion Nestle) of Feed Your Pet Right: The Authoritative Guide to Feeding Your Dog and Cat and (with Ann L. Yaktine) of the Institute of Medicine report Seafood Choices: Balancing Benefits and Risks.
3 Minute Reads
from San Francisco Grotto Writers
50+ Writers, 3 Minutes Each!
Joins us for a fast-paced and irreverent evening, showcasing new work from the students of the San Francisco Writer's Grotto writing classes. On this Friday evening, both fiction and nonfiction writers will read their work — but only for 3 minutes each! Their instructors (Grotto authors) will enforce the time limit. Join us for wine, fun, and fresh new writing.
Nell Freudenberger reads from her new novel The Newlyweds ($25.95), a powerful, funny, richly observed tour de force by one of America’s most acclaimed young writers: a story of love and marriage, secrets and betrayals, that takes us from the backyards of America to the back alleys and villages of Bangladesh.
“Wise, timely, ripe with humor and complexity, The Newlyweds is one of the most believable love stories of our young century.” — Gary Shytengart
“Freudenberger draws women's complex lives as brilliantly as Austen or Wharton or Woolf, and, with The Newlyweds, has given a performance of beauty and grace.” — Andrew Sean Greer
“A
big, complicated portrait of marriage, culture, family, and love.
Freudenberger never settles for an easy answer, and what she delivers is
a story that feels absolutely true. Every minute I was away from this
book I was longing to be back in the world she created.” —Ann Patchett
“Exceptional . . . Here is an
honest depiction of life as most people actually live it: Americans and
Asians, Christians and Muslims, liberals and conservatives.
Freudenberger writes with a cultural fluency that is remarkable and in a
prose that is clean, intelligent, and very witty.” — David Bezmozgis
Nell Freudenberger is the author of the novel The Dissident and the story collection Lucky Girls, winner of the PEN/Malamud Award and the Sue Kaufman Prize for First Fiction from the American Academy of Arts and Letters; both books were New York Times Book Review Notables. A recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Whiting Award, and a Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Fellowship from the New York Public Library, she was named one of Granta’s Best Young American Novelists and one of The New Yorker’s “20 Under 40.”
People aren’t simply vehicles for stories, they are the stories—that’s true of novels, memoirs, screenplays, or even nonfiction. Through discussion & writing exercises, Martha Engber shows what makes a character irresistible and unbelievable. Engber is an editor, and author of the novel Wind Thief and Growing Great Characters from the Ground Up.
Join me for a three hour, hands on workshop in which you will learn how to keep your relationship on a loving track. We’ll use personal examples to flesh out common struggles that we all go through in our search to make our relationships more loving. To get the most out of the workshop it would be best to read Who’s Talking Now? The Owl and the Crocodile, $24.95. Seymour Boorstein, M.D., Psychiatrist/Psychoanalyst has been in practice in Marin for 50 years. He is a Professor of Psychiatry at UCSF Medical School.
Cosponsored by CUESA
Ruta Kahate presents Quick-Fix Indian: Easy, Exotic Dishes in 30 Minutes or Less ($16.99).On Saturday mornings, chefs and cookbook authors lead free cooking demonstrations sing seasonal ingredients from the Farmers Market. Join us out front of the Ferry Building in the Farmer's Market for tips, recipes, and a sample. We’ll be there with the books.
Calories — too few or too many — are the source of health problems affecting billions of people in today's globalized world. In Why Calories Count ($29.95), Marion Nestle explains what calories are and how they work, both biologically and politically. The author also offer some candid advice: Get organized. Eat less. Eat better. Get political.
Marion Nestle is Paulette Goddard Professor in the Department of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health and Professor of Sociology at New York University. She is the author of What to Eat and Food Politics: How the Food Industry Influences Nutrition and Health; Safe Food: The Politics of Food Safety; and Pet Food Politics: The Chihuahua in the Coal Mine.
Morton Beebe is a world-renowned documentarian of San Francisco. His photographs have been published in various magazines throughout his career, which has spanned more than fifty years. Peter Beren, literary agent and publishing consultant, is the author of six books.
Dixon Long discusses Markets of Paris 2nd Edition ($18.95). The food scene in Paris has changed dramatically since 2006, when Markets of Paris was published. Markets are held in the same locales — but many have undergone a transformation led by a new generation focused on local and organic produce. This new edition revisits & updates the entire market scene.
Dixon Long is a novelist and short story writer, as well as the author of the first edition of Markets of Paris, and Markets of Provence. He has lived in Paris and Provence, and now lives in the Bay Area.
Left Coast Writers book launch: Editors Joanna Biggar & Linda Watanabe McFerrin discuss Wandering in Bali: A Tropical Paradise Discovered ($14.95). This collection of varied tales, some mystical, some funny, some terrifying — are each told in a different, highly personal voice. From temples to Balinese feasts to classical music and dance, the writers here sample and share the multiple faces of Bali.
Joanna Biggar is a writer, journalist, and teacher who has published fiction, poetry, personal and travel essays and hundreds of feature articles for newspapers and magazines. She has traveled solo in the most remote corners of China, chaired a school board in Ghana, worked as a journalist in Washington, DC, and taught school kids in Oakland, California, where she lives.
Poet, travel writer and novelist Linda Watanabe McFerrin has been traveling since she was two and writing about it since she was six. A contributor to numerous journals, newspapers, magazines, anthologies and online publications, she is the author of poetry collections, award-winning novels and a short story collection, and the editor of a travel guidebook and literary anthologies.
Jon Young is on the leading edge of animal tracking and understanding bird language. He has been exploring animal communication for 35 years and was mentored by the famous tracker Tom Brown Jr. as well as a tribal elder in Africa.
Discover how writing scenes for the stage is different from writing scenes for the page. This workshop will introduce you to the 3 Ds: Discovery, Decision, Doing that form the basis for powerful stage scenes. In addition, we will explore the concept of character masks: What face(s) do characters present to the world? What is the back story behind them? How do these masks crumble, melt, and fade as the action of the play progresses? You will be guided through short evocative writing exercises. Nina Solomita, MFA, has had plays produced in Massachusetts and California; her monologues were published in the ICWP Mother-Daughter Series, and she has taught playwriting at Pacific Repertory Theatre, Carmel.
Olin Dodson is a licensed psychotherapist, and Founder and Executive Director of the Melissa Project, a non-profit corporation assisting Cystic Fibrosis treatment in Costa Rica. He holds graduate degrees from San Francisco Theological Seminary (Theological Studies) and Sonoma State University (Psychology), and recently returned from his 15th trip to Central America.
Left Coast Writers book launch: Editors Joanna Biggar & Linda Watanabe McFerrin discuss Wandering in Bali: A Tropical Paradise Discovered
($14.95). This collection of varied tales, some mystical, some funny,
some terrifying — are each told in a different, highly personal voice.
From temples to Balinese feasts to classical music and dance, the
writers here sample and share the multiple faces of Bali.
Joanna
Biggar is a writer, journalist, and teacher who has published fiction,
poetry, personal and travel essays and hundreds of feature articles for
newspapers and magazines. She has traveled solo in the most remote
corners of China, chaired a school board in Ghana, worked as a
journalist in Washington, DC, and taught school kids in Oakland,
California, where she lives.
Poet, travel writer and novelist Linda Watanabe McFerrin has been traveling since she was two and writing about it since she was six. A contributor to numerous journals, newspapers, magazines, anthologies and online publications, she is the author of poetry collections, award-winning novels and a short story collection, and the editor of a travel guidebook and literary anthologies.
Bryan Gruley is reporter at large for Bloomberg News and the former Pulitzer Prize-winning Chicago bureau chief of The Wall Street Journal. He has won the Anthony, Barry, and Strand Awards and was nominated for an Edgar Award for best first novel. He lives in Chicago.
Three Tuesdays: June 12-26
Poetry is prophetic speech, a spoken epiphany. A good poem gives voice to feelings, thoughts, and intuitions in us that we may have sensed the presence of, but never known how to say. This is poetry’s power: it summons the best, the deepest of who we are, and captures it in language.Roger will explore some of the world’s great poems, and with the help of simple exercises and reading aloud, the group shall reflect together upon the echoes, meanings, and relevance they have for our own lives. Poetry phobics are as welcome as poetry lovers—the point is not to study poetry, but to use it as a means to explore our own authentic feelings and perceptions.
This session will be taught in English.
Spending the night in Paris? The precious hours can slip away faster than a good bottle of Bordeaux. Nicolas Wolff provides an overview of everything a night in Paris has to offer: museums, walks, underground movie theaters, jazz clubs and, of course, food and wine. Bring questions about your upcoming trip and get expert, tailored advice.
“Even though I know Paris fairly well he provided me with many new places of interest to check out on my trip there this Fall. His handouts are super detailed and will be very useful too” one student reported.
Nicolas Wolff grew up in Paris and teaches French.
Rosecrans Baldwin reads from Paris, I Love You But You're Bringing Me Down ($26.00), a fresh take on the City of Light in which the author, a self-described Francophile, dreams of living in Paris — drinking le café, eating les croissants, walking in les jardins — despite the fact that he wasn’t exactly fluent in French and is ill prepared to earn a living in the French city.
Rosecrans Baldwin's first novel, You Lost Me There, was named one of NPR's Best Books of 2010, a New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice, and a Time and Entertainment Weekly Best Book of Summer 2010. He is a cofounder of the online magazine The Morning News.
Upstairs at the Ferry Building
Cosponsored by CUESA
David and Michael Hanson discuss Breaking Through Concrete ($29.95). Urban farming is a social movement that's transforming our national food system. In their book Breaking Through Concrete, brothers David and Michael Hanson and urban farmer Edwin Marty document twelve successful urban farms, from an alternative school for girls in Detroit to a restaurant supply garden on a rooftop in Brooklyn. They offer practical advice for budding farmers, such as composting and keeping livestock in the city and decontaminating toxic soil.
The talk will be followed by a book signing (books for sale by Book Passage) and reception with farmers market refreshments. Please note: if the event fills up, there will be a limited number of seats available on the day of the event. First come, first served. More info at http://breakingthroughconcrete.eventbrite.com/
Steven Saylor reads from The Seven Wonders: A Novel of the Ancient World ($25.99). The year is 92 B.C., and Gordianus has just turned eighteen and is about to embark on a journey to see the Seven Wonders of the World. Gordianus is not yet called “the Finder” — but at each of the Seven Wonders, the young Roman encounters a mystery to challenge the powers of deduction.
Steven Saylor is the author of acclaimed historical mystery novels featuring Gordianus the Finder, including The Triumph of Caesar, as well as the internationally bestselling historical novels Empire and Roma. He has appeared on the History Channel as an expert on Roman politics and life.
Neil Abramson speaks about his novel, Unsaid ($14.99), a poignant book that will make you think about the relationship between people and animals. "If you love legal dramas... or dogs... or terrific writing... or originality... or people... or discovering wonderful new writers, then Neil Abramson's Unsaid is a book you simply must read.” — David Rosenfelt
"An extraordinary story of animals, mortality, and the power of love. Everyone needs to read this novel!" - Garth Stein
Neil Abramson is a partner in a Manhattan law firm, and his wife is a veterinarian. Abramson is also a past board member of the Animal Legal Defense Fund, an award recipient from the ASPCA for his legal work on behalf of animals, and a founding member of the New York City Bar Association Committee on Legal Issues Relating to Animals.
For nearly two decades, Scott Jurek has been a dominant force — and darling — in the grueling and growing sport of ultrarunning. And yet, perhaps even more impressive than his extensive list of race victories and course records is the fact that he achieves these astonishing accomplishments of endurance on an entirely plant-based diet. In Eat and Run: My Unlikely Journey to Ultramarathon Greatness ($26.00), Jurek opens up about his life and career — as an elite ultrarunner and a vegan — and inspires athletes at every level.
Group run will start at 7:00 pm from Fleet Feet. The run will end back at the store in time for Scott’s talk, Q&A and signing to start at 8:00 pm. Book sales provided by Book Passage. More info about Scott Jurek's Fleet Feet San Francisco event at http://www.fleetfeetsanfrancisco.com/
Scott Jurek is a world-renowned ultramarathon champion who trains and races on a vegan diet. He has prominently appeared in two New York Times bestsellers, Born to Run and The 4-Hour Body.
Learn the Skills & Make the Connections to Write, Illustrate & Publish Books for Children & Young Adults!
This year's participants will spend four event-filled days writing, workshopping, networking, and perfecting their craft with a celebrated faculty featuring prize-winning authors and illustrators including Gennifer Choldenko (Newbery Honor Book Al Capone Does My Shirts), Adam Kefman (Editor at McSweeney's), Annie Barrows (Ivy and Bean series, The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society), and many more!
View the complete faculty list >>
The evening events with Barney Saltzberg and Katherine Applegate & Michael Grant are free and open to the public, although priority seating is reserved for conference participants.
Andrew Blackwell discusses Visit Sunny Chernobyl: And Other Adventures in the World's Most Polluted Places ($25.99). For most of us, traveling means visiting the most lively or beautiful places on Earth — like Paris or the Taj Mahal. This new book embraces a different kind of travel, taking a jaunt through the most gruesomely polluted places on Earth.
Andrew Blackwell is a journalist and filmmaker living in New York City. He is a 2011 fellow in nonfiction literature from the New York Foundation for the Arts.
Barney Saltzberg talks about Arlo Needs Glasses ($15.95). Arlo is a shaggy, free-spirited dog who loves to play catch until one day he can’t. As a matter of fact, Arlo can’t really see the ball anymore. He needs glasses! Every child who wears glasses will know just how Arlo feels. And every parent will want that child to know that glasses are cool and fun and enable us to do the things we want to do. Like play!
Barney Saltzberg is the author of more than 30 books for children, including Beautiful Oops!, Good Egg and the bestselling Touch and Feel Kisses series, with over 800,000 copies in print. Additionally, he’s recorded four albums of songs for children. He lives in Los Angeles with his wife, two dogs, and a pond full of fish.
Barney Saltzberg is on the faculty of the 6th annual Book Passage Children's Writers & Illustrators Conference, which takes place June 14-17 at Book Passage. This event is part of the Conference. It is open to the public, though priority seating is reserved for Conference participants.
As chefs go, Angelo Sosa is a fascinating blend of the classical and the modern. Having worked with culinary visionaries Alain Ducasse and Jean-Georges Vongerichten, his personal sensibility for food combines the elegance and sophistication of his rigorous training along with his passion for global flavors and more contemporary preparations. Known to many for his compelling role on Bravo's acclaimed "Top Chef," Angelo is currently Executive Chef at Social Eatz and Añejo Tequileria in New York City.
Katherine Applegate and Michael Grant wrote the hugely popular Animorphs series, which has sold more than 35 million copies worldwide.
Katherine Applegate and Michael Grant are on the faculty of the 6th annual Book Passage Children's Writers & Illustrators Conference, which takes place June 14-17 at Book Passage. This event is part of the Conference. It is open to the public, though priority seating is reserved for Conference participants.
Cosponsored by CUESA
John Toulze and Sondra Bernstein present Plats Du Jour: The Girl and the Fig’s Journey Through the Seasons in Wine Country ($48.00). On Saturday mornings, chefs and cookbook authors lead free cooking demonstrations using seasonal ingredients from the Farmers Market. Join us out front of the Ferry Building in the Farmer's Market for tips, recipes, and a sample. We’ll be there with the books.
Dr. Justin Frank, a widely-published national expert on psychoanalysis, is a clinical professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science at the George Washington University in Washington, D.C.
Four Mondays: June 18-July 9
for kids entering 4th & 5th grade with Karen Benke, author of RIP THE PAGE! and Prartho Sereno, author of Causing a Stir
Here’s a camp to get you to open up to your inner life, rip into favorite words, and cook up some tantalizing images. We’ll play on and off the page with original detail and paint—literally—our poems into illustrations and greeting cards. You’ll leave with favorite haiku, pantoums, and poetry riddles. Just come with your curiosity and willingness to be surprised! All materials included.
Karen Benke has inspired kids’ creative journeys in the form of poem-making for 17 years as a California Poet in the Schools and has authored a collection of poems, Sister, and a new book for kids and kids-at-heart, Rip the Page! Adventures in Creative Writing. Prartho Sereno has been one of Marin County’s beloved Poets-in-the-Schools for over 12 years. Her prize-winning poetry collections include Causing a Stir: The Secret Lives and Loves of Kitchen Utensils (winner of a 2008 IPPY) and Call from Paris.
4 Mondays, June 18 - July 9
Continuation of grammar and language immersion through conversation. Must have prior Spanish experience; speak to instructor to join if you're unsure.
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.” Readers of Williams’s iconic and unconventional memoir, Refuge, well remember that mother. She was one of a large Mormon clan in northern Utah who developed cancer as a result of the nuclear testing in nearby Nevada. 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.
"The writing of Terry Tempest Williams is brilliant, meditative, and full of surprises, wisdom, and wonder. She's one of those writers who changes peoples' lives by encouraging attention and a slow, patient awakening." --Anne Lamott
Terry Tempest Williams is the award-winning author of fourteen books, including Leap, An Unspoken Hunger, Refuge, and, most recently, Finding Beauty in a Broken World. She divides her time between Castle Valley, Utah, and Moose, Wyoming.
Robert Moss is the creator of Active Dreaming, an original synthesis of modern dreamwork and ancient shamanic techniques for healing and journeying. Born in Australia, he survived three near-death experiences in childhood. A former lecturer in ancient history at the Australian National University, he is a best-selling novelist, journalist, independent scholar, and author of nine books on dreaming, shamanism, and imagination.
Alix Ohlin is the author of The Missing Person, a novel; Babylon and Other Stories; and Signs and Wonders, a new collection. Her work has appeared in Best American Short Stories, Best New American Voices, and on public radio’s Selected Shorts. “Ohlin has a great eye, a great ear, and all the other equipment auguring a very successful future.” — Jay McInerney
Four Tuesdays: June 19 - July 17 (no class July 3)
Bring your laptop (if you have one) and roll up your sleeves. We’re going to Create Your Buzz-Kicking Blog. In this workshop you will learn: The Keys to Highly Successful Author Blogs and Why They Work; The 6 Essential Things Your Blog Must Have and Where to Put Them; How to Set Up Your Blog; Write Great Content Your Readers Will Love; Time-Saving Tools; How to Avoid Common, Costly Mistakes; Promote Your Blog Without Being Obnoxious.
Robert Dugoni has practiced as a civil litigator in San Francisco and Seattle for seventeen years and is a two-time winner of the Pacific Northwest Writers Association Literary Contest.
Ridley Pearson reads from his new thriller The Risk Agent ($25.95). Rich with the atmosphere of Shanghai and crackling with tension-filled suspense, Pearson's latest introduces two compelling new characters — and heralds the start of a brilliant new series. “Pearson writes thrillers, the kind that try to yank you to the edge of your seat and keep you there.” — Boston Sunday Globe
Ridley Pearson is the author of more than two dozen novels, including the New York Times-bestsellers In Harm’s Way, Killer Summer, Killer View and Killer Weekend, the bestselling Lou Boldt crime series, and many books for young readers including those with Dave Barry. Peter and the Starcatcher, the musical based on Ridley Pearson's and Dave Barry's best selling series, has received 9 Tony Award nominations.
Renowned author Francine Du Plessix Gray presents The Queen's Lover ($25.95), a work of historical fiction which tells the story of a love affair between Marie Antoinette and a Swedish aristocrat. Expertly researched and deeply imagined, this new novel offers a fresh view of the French Revolution and French royal family, as told through the love story that was at its center.
Francine du Plessix Gray has been a regular contributor to The New Yorker and is the author of numerous works of fiction and nonfiction, including Simone Weil, At Home with the Marquis de Sade: A Life, and Soviet Women. She is most recently the author of the memoir Them: A Memoir of Parents.
4 Thursdays, June 21 - July 13
A very basic introduction for students who have never studied Spanish. Study guide can be purchased from the instructor the first day of class.
Graciela Pera was born in Buenos Aires. She is a graduate of the University of Buenos Aires. She has been teaching Spanish for 35 years.
Tickets $55(includes lunch & a signed book)
Call (415) 927-0960, ext. 1 to reserve
Join us for lunch with Belva Davis as she discusses her memoir Never in My Wildest Dreams — the story of a journalist who helped change the face of television news, a history-maker, an award-winning reporter, and a pioneering feminist. Born to a 15-year old Louisiana laundress during the Great Depression and raised in the projects of Oakland, Davis overcame abuse, racism, and sexism to become the first black female news anchor on the West Coast. Davis reported on some of the most explosive stories of the past decades, including the rise and fall of the Black Panthers, the Jonestown massacre, the Moscone/Milk murders, and the onset of the AIDS epidemic. She recounts her interviews with world leaders, including Fidel Castro and three U.S. presidents.
Davis has traveled the world reporting on politics, terrorism, racial and gender issues, and the role of art and culture in increasing human understanding. She has anchored at three major network affiliates, and currently hosts a highly respected political affairs program on KQED-TV in San Francisco.
Book Passage hosts literary luncheons with celebrated authors at our Marin store. These events are catered by the outstanding Insalata’s Restaurant of San Anselmo.
Rich Roll has been featured on CNN and has been named “one of the world’s 25 fittest men” by Men’s Fitness magazine. He is a graduate of Stanford University and Cornell Law School. He lives in Los Angeles.
Andrew Blum is a journalist and author whose Tubes: A Journey to the Center of the Internet is the first book-length look behind the scenes of our digital lives and at the physical heart of the Internet itself. Before falling into the Internet's depths, Blum wrote about architecture, design, technology, urbanism, art, and travel — all subjects arising out of his interest in the relationship between place and technology.
Medea Benjamin is a co-founder of the peace group CODEPINK and the international human rights organization Global Exchange. She has been an advocate for social justice for more than thirty years. Described as “one of America’s most committed—and most effective—fighters for human rights” by New York Newsday, and called “one of the high profile leaders of the peace movement” by the Los Angeles Times, Benjamin has distinguished herself as an eloquent and energetic figure in the progressive movement.
Mark Shriver talks about A Good Man: Rediscovering My Father, Sargent Shriver ($24.00). When the founder of the Peace Corps and architect of President Johnson's War on Poverty died in 2011, thousands of tributes poured in from friends and strangers worldwide. A Good Man is an inspirational personal story about a son discovering the true meaning of his father's legacy.
Mark K. Shriver is the senior vice president of U.S. Programs at Save the Children in Washington, D.C., and a former Maryland state legislator. Shriver also started the Choice Program and served on the coalition to create the National Commission on Children and Disasters following the devastation of Hurricane Katrina.
What's going on in the art world? What are galleries and museums looking for now? What does an artist need to do to break through to the next level? This workshop will help emerging and established artists learn the basic business strategies required for success. Topics include how to create an "artist-friendly" business plan, how to think like an entrepreneu, and how to use professional networks to advance your career. Mary Edwards is a Career & Life Coach for artists and creative entrepreneurs. She works with painters, sculptors, photographers, designers, graphic artists, and other creative people. Mary has a Ph.D. from The University of Michigan and has taught workshops and classes for college students, business executives, and aritsts.
Colin Dickey is the author of Cranioklepty: Grave Robbing and the Search for Genius. His fiction and nonfiction have appeared in Lapham's Quarterly, Cabinet, TriQuarterly, and The Santa Monica Review. He is also coeditor of Failure! Experiments in Aesthetic and Social Practices.
Katie Workman is the founding editor in chief of Cookstr.com, the website that features recipes by well-known chefs and cookbook writers. She writes about food and cooking for websites and magazines
Dana Kelly returns to the Book Passage Gallery with a show of photographs from all over Italy - from a beggar sitting in the midst of a swarm of tourists at Trevi Fountain to a Greco-Roman Parthenon near Salerno. "Rome, Venice & the Amalfi Coast" runs through the end of July. There will be a reception with the artist on Saturday, June 23 at 5:30 pm.
Book Passage patrons will know Dana as your frequent author event host, but in his other lives he's been an actor, comedian, puppeteer, graphic artist, film editor -- and photographer. He's pleased to be back in the Gallery.
Alan Furst is widely recognized as the master of the historical spy novel. Now translated into eighteen languages, he is the author of The Polish Officer, The World at Night, Kingdom of Shadows, The Foreign Correspondent, The Spies of Warsaw, and other books
Jean Zimmerman reads from her debut novel, The Orphanmaster ($27.95), a gripping historical thriller set in pre-Revolutionary America. It’s 1663 in the tiny, hardscrabble Dutch colony of New Amsterdam, and orphan children are going missing. Looking into the matter is a quick-witted 22-year-old trader, Blandine von Couvering. What she finds will surprise.
Jean Zimmerman was born in Tarrytown, New York. An honors graduate of Barnard College, she is the author of several works of nonfiction, including Love, Fiercely: A Gilded Age Romance and The Women of the House: How a Colonial She-Merchant Built a Mansion, a Fortune, and a Dynasty.
Anita Amirrezvani reads from Equal of the Sun ($26.00). Legendary women changed the course of history in the royal courts of England. They are celebrated in history books and novels, but few people know of the powerful women in the Muslim world. Amirrezvani’s gorgeously crafted tale of power, loyalty, and love in the royal court of Iran brings one such woman to life.
Anita Amirrezvani is the author of The Blood of Flowers, which was long-listed for the Orange Prize, and a former staff writer and dance critic for the San Jose Mercury News and the Contra Costa Times. She is currently an adjunct professor at the California College of the Arts in San Francisco.
Please note: This event has been cancelled. Agapi Stassinopoulos discusses Unbinding the Heart ($19.95), in which the Greek-born author, speaker, and Huffington Post regular invites readers on an inspiring journey of inner exploration to reconnect with their true selves. These 32 heartfelt stories will inspire readers with the confidence to let go of the beliefs that bind them and come to a deeper understanding of life.
“Besides being a loving sister, Agapi has an innate wisdom and a gift for communicating it to her readers. The insight and passion that she brings to Unbinding the Heart, and the lessons it holds for bringing freedom and grace into our lives, make it a must-read book.” - Arianna Huffington
“I laughed, I cried, I got a craving for hummus . . . read this book, it’s smashing.” - Tracey Ullman
Agapi Stassinopoulos was born and raised in Greece. At age 18, she entered the prestigious Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts in London and afterward became a member of the Young Vic. She moved to the United States to do film and television. While her sister, Arianna Huffington, was doing research for her book about Greek mythology, Agapi’s love for the gods and goddesses was ignited and led to two books of her own — Conversations with the Goddesses and Gods and Goddesses in Love — as well as a one-woman show and a PBS special
Jess Walter reads from Beautiful Ruins ($25.99). The award-winning author of the bestselling The Financial Lives of the Poets returns with his funniest, most romantic, and most purely enjoyable novel yet: the story of an almost-love affair that begins in 1962 and is rekindled fifty years later. “Why mince words? Beautiful Ruins is an absolute masterpiece.” — Pulitzer Prize winner Richard Russo
Jess Walter is the author of The Zero (a finalist for the National Book Award), Citizen Vince (a winner of the Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best Novel), Land of the Blind, Ruby Ridge, and Over Tumbled Graves (a New York Times Notable Book of the Year). He lives in Spokane, Washington.
8 Tuesdays: June 26 - Aug. 21 (no class July 3)
This class is for beginners and for those who have previously had some exposure to German. You’ll focus on conjugating verbs in the present tense, declension of nouns, articles, and your ability to carry on a simple conversation with a native German speaker. Hamid Emami has a Masters from the University of Hamburg, and he is fluent in German, English, French, Spanish & Farsi. He has taught German for many years.
Shehan Karunatilaka reads from The Legend of Pradeep Mathew ($16.00), in which a drunk and totally unreliable narrator runs alongside the reader insisting on the great fictional possibilities of cricket. The Sunday Times (London) called this book “The first genuine contender for the title of Great Sri Lankan Novel.” While Booker Prize winner Michael Ondaatje called it “A crazy ambidextrous delight.”
Shehan Karunatilaka lives and works in Singapore. He has written advertisements, rock songs, travel stories, and bass lines. Here is a write-up of a recent event with Shehan which should convince you, dear reader, to attend our event. Don't miss it!
Peter Zuckerman presents Buried in the Sky: The Extraordinary Story of the Sherpa Climbers on K2's Deadliest Day ($26.95), a compelling account of tragedy and the men who have literally shouldered the rest of the world’s mountaineers up the second-highest mountain on Earth. "I admired Buried in the Sky and enjoyed it, too.” — Peter Matthiessen
Check out this terrific review in the Wall Street Journal.
Peter Zuckerman is one of the youngest journalists ever to have received the Livingston Award, which is given for excellence to professional journalists under the age of 35. He lives in Oregon.
Adrienne Arieff is an expert in new media and communications, and is the principal of the public relations firm Arieff Communications. She has freelanced for Daily Candy and C Magazine and writes her company's blog, Weekly Pulse. She lives in San Francisco with her husband and their two children.
Bonnie Jo Campbell is the author of three previous books of fiction. She lives in Kalamazoo, Michigan. And, she has promised to personally apply American Salvage temporary tattoos to everyone who buys a book. There was also mention made of Bell's Two Hearted Ale. It ain't Stroh's.
Join us for a special workshop event with Phil Stutz & Barry Michels, authors of The Tools: Transform Your Problems into Courage, Confidence, and Creativity ($25.00). As seen on The Dr. Oz Show, this groundbreaking book about personal growth presents an effective set of five tools that bring about dynamic change.
Admission to this special event is by purchase of The Tools from Book Passage.
The Tools offers a solution to the biggest complaint patients have about therapy: the interminable wait for change to begin. The traditional therapeutic model sets its sights on the past, but Phil Stutz and Barry Michels employ an arsenal of techniques—“the tools”—that allow patients to use their problems as levers that access the power of the unconscious and propel them into action. Suddenly, through this transformative approach, obstacles become opportunities—to find courage, embrace discipline, develop self-expression, and deepen creativity.
For years, Stutz and Michels taught these techniques to an exclusive patient base, but with The Tools, their revolutionary, empowering practice becomes available to every reader interested in realizing the full range of their potential. The authors’ goal is nothing less than for your life to become exceptional—exceptional in its resiliency, in its experience of real happiness, and in its understanding of the human spirit.
“An ‘open secret’ in Hollywood . . . [Stutz and Michels] have developed a program designed to access the creative power of the unconscious.”—The New Yorker
International bestselling author Jeffery Deaver delivers XO: A Kathryn Dance Novel ($26.99), the latest sensational thriller in his wildly popular Kathryn Dance series. Newsweek calls Jeffery Deaver a “suspense superstar,” and in his new novel he lives up to the accolades as he sets his heroine on a quest to stop an obsessive stalker from destroying a beautiful young singer.
More info on the accompanying CD by Jeffrey Deaver at http://jefferydeaverxomusic.com
Jeffery Deaver is the international, #1 bestselling author of more than twenty-seven suspense novels, including The Bone Collector, which was made into a film starring Denzel Washington.
Glen Duncan reads from Talulla Rising ($25.95). Harnessing the same audacious imagination and dark humor, the same depths of horror and sympathy, and the same full-tilt narrative energy with which he crafted his acclaimed novel The Last Werewolf, Duncan now gives us a heroine like no other. “Loaded with beautifully constructed lunatic ravings,” Independent on Sunday.
Glen Duncan is the author of eight previous novels. He was chosen by both Arena and The Times Literary Supplement as one of Britain’s best young novelists. He lives in London.
Natalie Serber received an MFA from Warren Wilson College. Her work has appeared in The Bellingham Review and Gulf Coast, among others, and her awards include the Tobias Wolff Award.
Kristen Iversen discusses Full Body Burden: Growing Up in the Nuclear Shadow of Rocky Flats ($25.00), a memoir about growing up in a small Colorado town close to Rocky Flats, a secret nuclear weapons plant once designated "the most contaminated site in America." Its the story of Iversen’s childhood and adolescence in the shadow of the Cold War in a landscape at once startlingly beautiful and — unknown to those who lived there — tainted with invisible, deadly particles of plutonium.
Kristen Iversen will be introduced by Daniel Ellsberg.
Kristen Iversen grew up in Arvada, Colorado and received a Ph.D. in English from the University of Denver. She is Director of the MFA Program in Creative Writing at The University of Memphis, and is the author of Molly Brown: Unraveling the Myth and Shadow Boxing: Art and Craft in Creative Nonfiction. Her new book, based on extensive interviews, FBI and EPA documents, and class-action testimony, is a taut, beautifully written book which promises to have a very long half-life.
Anita Hughes attended UC Berkeley’s Masters in Creative Writing Program, and has taught Creative Writing at The Branson School in Ross, California. Hughes has lived at The St. Regis Monarch Beach for six years, where she is at work on her next novel.
Andy Couturier is an essayist, poet, and writing teacher. He lived in Japan for four years where he taught, was a journalist, and worked on environmental causes. He now lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Francis Slakey is a lecturer on physics and public policy at Georgetown University. The founder and co-director of the Program on Science in the Public Interest and a MacArthur Scholar, Dr. Slakey has been profiled by NPR, National Geographic, and others, and his writing has appeared in The Washington Post, The New York Times, and Scientific American.
The interview is so much a part of our multi-media society that rarely do we consider what it takes. In this workshop, we will look at the structure of interviews - dialogue, conversation, street exchanges,. We will explore in-class how to use these in subtle or surprising ways to feed our own writing. Tressa Berman has interviewed people from the hood of a car on a North Dakota highway to a five-star hotel in NYC to a tent in the middle of Occupied Oakland. She is the author of two books and numerous magazine articles. She credits her success to listening to the stories of others.
Cosponsored by CUESA
Georgeanne Brennan and Ann M. Evans presents The Davis Farmers Market Cookbook ($24.95). On Saturday mornings, chefs and cookbook authors lead free cooking demonstrations sing seasonal ingredients from the Farmers Market. Join us out front of the Ferry Building in the Farmer's Market for tips, recipes, and a sample. We’ll be there with the books.Christian Kiefer reads from his novel The Infinite Tides ($26.00), the story of an astronaut aboard the International Space Station who one day receives word that his sixteen-year-old daughter has died in a car accident, and that his wife has left him. Returning to earth, he is alone with the ghosts, memories and feelings of the past. Kiefer's band will provide musical accompaniment; refreshments, including TANG, will also be served.
There is a good deal of buzz around The Infinite Tides, which is the July selection of our Signed First Editions Club.
Christian Kiefer earned his Ph.D. in American literature from the University of California, Davis, and is on the English faculty of American River College in Sacramento. His poetry has appeared in various national journals including the Antioch Review and Santa Monica Review. He is also an accomplished songwriter and recording artist who has been profiled on National Public Radio.
Katherine Chiljan discusses Shakespeare Suppressed: The Uncensored Truth About Shakespeare and His Works ($35.00). For hundreds of years, debate has swirled around the identity of The Bard and the authorship of his plays and poems. This new book makes the case that “William Shakespeare” was only the great author's pen name.
Katherine Chiljan is an independent scholar who has studied the Shakespeare authorship question for over 26 years. She has debated the topic with English professors at the Smithsonian Institution and at the Mechanics Institute in San Francisco. Chiljan served as editor of the Shakespeare-Oxford Newsletter, and edited two anthologies: Dedication Letters to the Earl of Oxford, and Letters and Poems of Edward, Earl of Oxford.
Donna Sheehan, a Northern California native, is an artist, community / environmental visionary activist and Evolutionary Behaviorist. At the age of almost eighty and in partnership with Paul, she feels successful, beautiful and sensual. Paul Reffell, an English transplant to Northern California, is an Evolutionary Behaviorist activist who writes poetry, fiction, and non-fiction on nature and human nature.
In conversation with Isabel Allende.
William Gordon reads from and discusses his new novel The King of the Bottom ($14.95). On a cold and gloomy morning the mutilated body of a prosperous businessman is found hanging from the gate of his toxic dump. The finger of the law points one way, but crime reporter Samuel Hamilton uncovers a sordid world of ancient revenge and violence.
William Gordon is an international man of mysteries – as well as an attorney with a law office in Sausalito, a father, photographer, and world traveler with his wife, author Isabel Allende.
Stephanie Lucianovic is a freelance writer, editor, and sometime cheese-monger in the San Francisco Bay Area. A former book editor and graduate of the Cambridge School of Culinary Arts in Massachusetts, she helped develop a line of cookbooks for Williams-Sonoma and worked in the prep kitchen of a Jacques Pépin cooking show. She is the author of CocktailSmarts and VampireSmarts, and was featured in Best Food Writing 2005.
Join us for an evening of poetry with members of the Marin Poetry Center (MPC). Their annual and always popular Summer Traveling Show will be hosted by Ethel Mays and will feature readers Catlyn Fendler, Lily Iona MacKenzie, Stephanie Noble, Terry Phelan, Maggie Morley, and Bruce Sams.
For more information visit www.marinpoetrycenter.org.
Three Wednesdays: July 11 - 25
Find the "flow" in your story and discover the secrets of transforming life experiences into memoir. You'll learn to uncover your best material and craft it into engaging, compelling pieces. Includes instruction, in-class writing, and an opportunity to bring writing for feedback. All levels welcome.
Laura Deutsch's personal essays, memoir and feautres have appeared in the L.A. Times, S.F. Chronicles, and More magazine, among others. Her next book, Writing From the Senses, will be published by Shambhala in 2013. Laura has taught writing at U.C. Berkeley, and leads writing retreats from Tassajara to Tuscany.
Manuel Roig-Franzia presents The Rise of Marco Rubio ($25.00). Florida’s junior senator has risen through the ranks of American politics with astonishing speed, so much so that this 40-year-old son of immigrants is known as the "Michael Jordan" of the Republican party. Having gained a level of national notoriety never before achieved by a Cuban-American, Rubio - considered by some to be the crown prince of the Tea Party - is poised to continue making history this fall. In this just released book, a Washington Post reporter chronicles Rubio's historic climb, tracing a family saga that began beneath a thatched roof in rural Cuba.
Manuel Roig-Franzia is a writer in The Washington Post's Style section. He writes long-form pieces on a broad range of subjects, exploring politics, power and the culture of Washington, as well as profiling major political figures and authors.
This event has been cancelled.
Priscilla Gilman discusses her memoir The Anti-Romantic Child: A Memoir of Unexpected Joy ($14.99). In her widely acclaimed and profoundly moving memoir, Gilman explores our hopes and expectations for our children, our families, and ourselves—and the ways in which experience and the arts, notably literature, may lead us to re-imagine them.
Priscilla Gilman grew up in New York City and received her B.A. and Ph.D. in English and American literature from Yale University. She was a professor of English literature at both Yale and Vassar College before leaving academia in 2006. She has published numerous articles, and chaired panels and lectured at literary and early childhood conferences.
Four Wednesdays: July 11 - August 1
This class will guide students through simple yet profound mindfulness exercises, dynamic fun writing practices, readings, and discussion. Open to beginning and advanced writers. Internationally published poet, author, publisher, and writing coach, Albert Flynn DeSilver is the author most recently of "Beamish Boy: A Memoir" (The Owl Press, 2012) and several books of poetry. He has taught writing workshops everywhere from the British Institute in Paris to San Quentin State Prison. He served as Marin County's Poet Laureate from 2008-2010.
This class is also available on a per session basis ($20/class). Please register over the phone or in-person if you prefer to sign-up for a single class.
Old friends read from new books. Brian Doyle reads from Bin Laden's Bald Spot ($16.95), a quirky collection of stories populated by curious characters of every sort and stripe. Gerald Asher reads from A Carafe of Red ($21.95), a collection of elegantly written and insightful essays on the subject of wine. Cheers!
Brian Doyle is the author of ten previous books: five collections of essays, two nonfiction books, two collections of short prose, and the sprawling novel Mink River, which Publishers Weekly called an “original, postmodern, shimmering tapestry of small town life.” Gerald Asher is author of four earlier books on the subject of wine. As an international wine merchant, he was decorated by the French Government in 1974 for his contribution to French viticulture.
Admission $110 per person - EVENT SOLD OUT
Although the event is sold out, you may still order a signed copy of the book: Order a
signed copy
Join Marcus Samuelsson at the top rated Jardinière restaurant
in San Francisco, along with co-owner and award winning chef/restauranteur Traci Des Jardins, for what is sure to be a very special event.
Some may recognize Marcus Samuelsson as the winner of Top Chef: Master's Season 2 or as the James Beard Foundation award winning chef of New York City's Red Rooster Harlem. In his memoir, YES, CHEF, Samulesson chronicles his incredible journey from the age of 3 when he was orphaned along with his sister in Ethiopia after walking 75 miles from a remote village to a hospital to try and save his mother from succumbing to tuberculosis. Later, when he was adopted by a loving Swedish family, Samuelsson developed a lifelong passion for cooking alongside his Swedish grandmother, Helga. From this humble beginning to some of the most demanding restaurants in Europe, Samuelsson then arrived in NYC's Aquavit. While there, he earned a coveted three-star rating from the New York Times at the age of 24. President Clinton writes, "In his famed dishes, and now in this memoir, Marcus Samuelsson tells a story that reaches past racial and national divides to the foundations of family, hope and downright good food."
Marcus Samuelsson is chef and co-owner of the New York City restaurant Aquavit. He is the youngest chef ever to receive two three-star ratings from the New York Times, and has appeared as the star of Discovery Home Channel's The Inner Chef television series. Samuelsson is the author of The Soul of a New Cuisine and Aquavit: And the New Scandinavian Cuisine
Carlos Ruiz Zafón is the author of six novels. His work has been published in more than forty different languages, and honored with numerous international awards, including the Edebé Award, Spain's most prestigious prize for young adult fiction. His break-out novel, The Shadow of the Wind, has been described as “Gabriel García Márquez meets Umberto Eco meets Jorge Luis Borges for a sprawling magic show." Zafón divides his time between Barcelona, Spain and Los Angeles, California.
Joshua Henkin reads from The World Without You ($25.95). From the author of the Los Angeles Times Notable Book Swimming Across the Hudson and the New York Times Notable Book Matrimony ["Beautiful . . . Brilliant."—Michael Cunningham] comes a moving and mesmerizing new novel about love, loss, and the aftermath of a family tragedy.
“Like a more bittersweet version of Jonathan Tropper’s This Is Where I Leave You or a less chilly variation on Jonathan Franzen’s The Corrections, Henkin tenderly explores family dynamics in this novel about the ties that bind, and even lacerate . . . .” — Publishers Weekly (starred review). Joshua Henkin's new novel has also been praised - and warmly so, by four authors familiar to those who attend events at Book Passage, Julia Glass, Heidi Julavits, Jim Shepard, Gary Shteyngart.
Joshua Henkin is the author of the novels two novels. His stories have been published widely, cited for distinction in Best American Short Stories and broadcast on NPR's Selected Shorts. He directs the MFA Program in Fiction Writing at Brooklyn College.
Julie Otsuka was born and raised in California. She is the author of the novel When the Emperor Was Divine and a recipient of the Asian American Literary Award, the American Library Association Alex Award, and a Guggenheim Fellowship. She lives in New York City.
Jennifer Woodlief is a former reporter for Sports Illustrated. Her first book Ski to Die: The Bill Johnson Story was optioned by Warner Brothers. A graduate of Stanford University and UCLA School of Law, her past jobs included prosecuting first-degree murder cases as a district attorney and working as a case officer with top secret clearance for the CIA.
This practical “How to” workshop will give you the tools you need to get your writing published in magazines, newspapers, and other media. We’ll look at writer’s guidelines from various publications, as well as where to send your work and how to get editors to read your submissions (and accept them!). We'll discuss sending query letters instead of completed pieces, writing cover letters that work, formatting your piece for submission, and more. “Laura was terrific—organized and original, a generous and talented teacher. This is one of the best classes I’ve taken.”
Laura Deutsch is a freelance writer whose work has appeared in the N.Y. Times, S.F. Chronicle, More magazine, San Francisco magazine, and many others. She has taught writing at U.C. Berkeley and leads writing retreats from Tassajara to Tuscany. Laura's coaching clients have been published in top-tier magazines, newspapers, anthologies and other media.
Sean Meshorer talks about The Bliss Experiment: 28 Days to Personal Transformation ($24.00). We have a higher standard of living and more ways to fulfill every desire than ever before. Then why are we unhappy? Is it because happiness isn’t what we really want. Meshorer contends that happiness is good, but bliss is better.
Sean Meshorer is an inspirational speaker, teacher, and spiritual coach based in Los Angeles. He graduated from Stanford in 1993 with a degree in Philosophy and Religious Studies. He spent fifteen years meditating, studying, practicing, and living at Ananda, the renowned ashram and network of spiritual communities headquartered in Northern California.
Come discover the exciting art of altering books and journals. Through easy techniques and a rainbow of art supplies, you will take a used book and transform it into your own object d'art or journal. Even if you don't think you are creative, you will find altering books inspiring, liberating, and deeply satisfying! Virginia Simpson-Magruder of Kentucky Girl Designs is a jewlery, collage and altered artist. Materials included.
Cynthia Pepper has worked on 75 film productions with budgets ranging from pennies to $15 million. Her short films have won Emmy Awards and are distributed worldwide. This class will discuss all elements involved in translating a short story into a film. Topics discussed include writing a simple treatment or screenplay, creating shooting boards, casting, finding locations, directing, producing, editing, and scoring a short film with no experience on a variety of budgets. Students are invited to send a three sentence synopsis prior to the class (instructions provided at time of registration). Submissions are allowed up to seven days prior to class.
Linda Fairstein was chief of the Sex Crimes Unit of the district attorney’s office in Manhattan for more than two decades and is America’s foremost legal expert on sexual assault and domestic violence. Her Alexandra Cooper novels are international bestsellers and have been translated into more than a dozen languages.
Unwind your mind and play with words in a whole new way. Surprise yourself with syntax, verb your nouns, write in fragments and feel right at home. We'll leap from open-ended writing experiments and sample meandering mini memoirs, using never-before-seen prompts from Karen's forthcoming book for tweens, LEAP WRITE IN! Adventures in Creative Writing that will s-t-r-e-t-c-h & surprise your one-of-a-kind mind! (Shambhala, 2013)
PLEASE NOTE: THIS CLASS HAS BEEN MOVED TO SUNDAY, AUGUST 5. CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE LISTING.
Bring your laptop! Join blogger extraordinaire Sophie Epstein, from the young adult book blog MrsMagooReads.com and her mother Liz Epstein (LiteraryMasters.net) as they present a fun and friendly workshop where you will learn how to use Facebook and Twitter to promote your blog or business, or just to keep in touch with friends. Before leaving, you will create your own Facebook Page and your own Twitter account, and you will learn how to navigate them and how to link them to your existing (or future) blog or website.
A freelance writer and passionate chef, Ronda Giangreco has written features for magazines for the past twenty years. She resides in Sonoma.
Douglas Brinkley discusses Cronkite ($34.99), the definitive biography of the television journalist known as the "the most trusted man in America." Drawing on unprecedented access to Cronkite's private papers as well as interviews with his family and friends, an acclaimed historian now brings this American icon into focus as never before.
Douglas Brinkley is a professor of history at Rice University and a contributing editor to Vanity Fair. His most recent books are The Quiet World, The Wilderness Warrior, and The Great Deluge. Six of his books have been selected as New York Times Notable Books of the Year. He lives in Texas.
Valerie Coleman Morris is an Emmy award winning journalist and the former Business Anchor for CNN domestic and international. Her broadcast career spans more than 35 years and includes both coasts. She came to CNN in 1996 from WPIX-TV in New York where she was both a general assignment reporter and weekend anchor. Morris began her career as a broadcast journalist in San Francisco where she worked for KRON-TV and KGO-TV. Morris was also the morning drive anchor at KCBS Radio in San Francisco and midday anchor at KCBS-TV in Los Angeles. In 2007, Morris made the decision to focus exclusively on financial literacy as an aspect of business and social economics.
Aminta Arrington has an M.A. in international relations from Johns Hopkins University School of advanced International Studies and studied at Waseda University in Tokyo. She has written about China for The Seattle Times, and she edited the anthology Saving Grandmother's Face: and Other Tales from Christian Teachers in China. Arrington continues to live and work in China with her family.
Please note this class now starts one week later (on July 16) than as listed in our newsletter!
Four Mondays: July 16 - August 6
The four classes will review the basic structures of Beginning Italian the present tense, gender and number of nouns and adjectives and the always pesky articulated prepositions. Much conversation and laughter.
In Shakespeare's day, the story of King John was hugely popular on the Elizabethan stage. Today, the play is rarely produced. Join Marin Shakespeare Company's Lesley Currier and actor Barry Kraft in a discussion of the history and theatricality of this little known Shakespeare play. You can see Barry Kraft perform in King John at the Forest Meadows Amphitheatre through August 12.
Lesley Currier is a founder of Marin Shakespeare Company, now in its 23rd year. She produces, directs and teaches Shakespeare with people of all ages, and run the Shakespeare at San Quentin program. Lesley is the director of this summer's main stage production of King John at Dominican University's Forest Meadows Amphitheatre.
Barry Kraft has been an actor and dramaturg at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival for 25 years, as well as performing as King Lear and Julius Caesar at Marin Shakespeare Company. Barry will be seen this summer as the King of France in King John.
Please note this class now starts one week later (on July 17) than as listed in our newsletter!
Four Tuesdays: July 17 - August 7
The four classes will review the basic structures of Italian the present tense, gender and number of nouns and adjectives and the always pesky articulated prepositions. Much conversation and laughter.
Please note this class now starts one week later (on July 17) than as listed in our newsletter!
Four Tuesdays: July 17 - August 7
In these four weeks students will intensively review the major tenses of the Indicative mood of this wonderful language: presente, passato prossimo, imperfetto, trapassato prossimo, futuro, [presente e passato] condizionale [presente e passato]. Much pratice and conversation.
An attorney, motivational speaker, and youth advocate, Carissa Phelps works as part of a global collective to help local and international survivors of sex trafficking rebuild their lives. Her life story was the subject of the award-winning documentary Carissa.
Karen Thompson Walker reads from The Age of Miracles ($26.00), a luminous, haunting, and unforgettable coming of age novel set against the backdrop of an utterly altered world…. On a seemingly ordinary Saturday in a California suburb, Julia and her family awake to discover, along with the rest of the world, that the rotation of the earth has suddenly begun to slow.
“The Age of Miracles spins its glowing magic through incredibly lucid and honest prose, giving equal care and dignity to the small spheres and the large. It is at once a love letter to the world as we know it and an elegy.”—Aimee Bender
Karen Thompson Walker is a graduate of UCLA and the Columbia MFA program and a recipient of the 2011 Sirenland Fellowship as well as a Bomb magazine fiction prize. A former editor at Simon & Schuster, she wrote The Age of Miracles in the mornings before work.
Tickets $55
(includes lunch & a signed book)
Call (415) 927-0960, ext. 1 to reserve
Join us for lunch as Chris Cleave, the author of Little Bee, talks about his new novel Gold, which asks “What would you sacrifice for the people you love?” With heart-in-throat storytelling, with humanity and glorious prose, Cleave examines the values that lie at the heart of our most intimate relationships, and the choices we make when lives are at stake and everything is on the line.
Chris Cleave is the author of Incendiary and the #1 New York Times bestseller Little Bee. He lives with his wife and three children in Kingston-upon-Thames, England.
Book Passage hosts literary luncheons with celebrated authors at our Marin store. These events are catered by the outstanding Insalata’s Restaurant of San Anselmo.
Andrea Nguyen presents Asian Tofu: Discover the Best, Make Your Own, and Cook it at Home ($30.00), whose nearly 100 recipes explore the culinary spirit of East, Southeast, and South Asia. Included are favorites from Japan, Korea, Thailand, Singapore, and India, as well as delicious dishes from the United States. Tofu goodies will be provided by Delica Restaurant.
“This book is worth buying just for the glorious Tofu Chicken Meatballs in Lemongrass Broth. But it is full of other tofu wonders from up and down the East Asian coast such as Soft Tofu and Seafood Hotpot and Savory Tofu Pudding. It will find much use on my shelf.” — Madhur Jaffrey
“Andrea Nguyen’s exquisite book restores tofu to its proper place.” — Deborah Madison
Andrea Nguyen is one of the country’s leading voices on Asian cuisine and the author of the acclaimed Asian Dumplings and the James Beard – and IACP-nominated Into the Vietnamese Kitchen. She has written for Saveur magazine, where she is also a contributing editor, the Los Angeles Times, and many more publications.
Abrahm Lustgraten is an award-winning reporter for ProPublica and a former writer for Fortune. He covers energy and environmental topics, and is a winner of numerous prizes, including the George Polk Award for environmental reporting. He has appeared frequently in national media to discuss energy issues, including NPR's Fresh Air, Rachel Maddow, and Hardball with Chris Mathews. In 2004 Lustgarten recieved a grant from the MacArthur Foundation to support his international reporting in China and Tibet, a project that led to his first book, China's Great Train. He lives in San Francisco.
Please note this class now starts one week later (on July 19) than as listed in our newsletter!
Four Thursdays: July 19 - Aug. 9Indicative and Subjunctive:The first two classes will be dedicated to the sequence of tenses in the Indicative; the following two weeks to that of the Subjunctive. Challenging with much drill and conversation.
Dave Eggers visits Book Passage to sign copies of acclaimed new novel, A Hologram for the King (McSweeneys, $25.00). We are excited, as the reviews have been stunning: Carmela Ciuraru, writing in the San Francisco Chronicle, called Eggers' book “An extraordinary work of timely and provocative themes.... This novel reminds us that above all, Eggers is a writer of books, and a writer of the highest order….An outstanding achievement in Eggers's already impressive career, and an essential read.”
Please note: this is a booksigning only. If you cannot attend this special event and would like a signed 1st edition of A Hologram for the King, please follow < this link > and please note "signed 1st ed" in the comments field.
“Mr. Eggers uses a new, pared down, Hemingwayesque voice to recount his story... he demonstrates in Hologram that he is master of this more old-fashioned approach as much as he was a pioneering innovator with A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius.... A comic but deeply affecting tale about one man’s travails that also provides a bright, digital snapshot of our times.” — Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times
Dave Eggers is the bestselling author of Zeitoun, winner of the American Book Award and Dayton Literary Peace Prize. His novel What Is the What was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and won France’s Prix Medici.
Two Pre-Book Passage Mystery Writers Conference Classes
Best Laid Plans: What Were They Thinking?
Crime
fiction writers must learn to think like criminals. They must plot the
perfect crime so that when their protagonist solves the caper, he or she
will be a true hero. To do this the writer must answer several basic
questions: What goes on in a criminal’s mind when he decides that some
criminal activity is the only solution to his problems? What pushes him
to act? What steps does he take to plan, commit, and attempt to get away
with the crime? Where do his plans jump the tracks? In this lecture we
will look at several famous crimes and attempt to gain some insight into
what the criminal was thinking, the logic—or illogic—of his planning,
and the fatal flaws that unraveled his best laid plans.
And
Voice: Whose Story Is It?
What is voice? How do you find it and what do you do with
it? In this class we will discover the sound, the rhythm, and the feel
of a writer’s most powerful tool, his or her voice.
These classes are part of the pre-conference events leading up to the Book Passage Mystery Writers Conference. The classes are open to both conference participants and non-particpants, although conference participants receive a discount. To learn more about the conference, please visit this link.
A Pre-Book Passage Mystery Writers Conference Class
Crime fiction writers must learn to think like criminals. They must plot the perfect crime so that when their protagonist solves the caper, he or she will be a true hero. To do this the writer must answer several basic questions: What goes on in a criminal’s mind when he decides that some criminal activity is the only solution to his problems? What pushes him to act? What steps does he take to plan, commit, and attempt to get away with the crime? Where do his plans jump the tracks? In this lecture we will look at several famous crimes and attempt to gain some insight into what the criminal was thinking, the logic—or illogic—of his planning, and the fatal flaws that unraveled his best laid plans.
This class is part of the pre-conference events leading up to the Book Passage Mystery Writers Conference. The class is open to both conference participants and non-particpants, although conference participants receive a discount. To learn more about the conference, please visit this link.
A Pre-Book Passage Mystery Writers Conference Class
Almost everything you need to know about writing a great crime story can be learned from wisely analyzing this classic film. David Corbett will lead the class in a group analysis of the story to explore such techniques as: Charting the character arcs for the greatest dramatic impact; creating the exterior desire, the inner need and the "crisis of insight" that define a compelling hero; how to orchestrate the opposition from an offscreen villain; the love interest and her role in exposing the hero; employing "four-corner conflict" to create moral complexity; using secondary characters to flesh out major characters; the importance of a symbol system in intensifying your thematic concerns; and more. Student works will also be discussed to explore these same issues to examine how works-in-progress can be dramatically strengthened, thematically deepened, and better structured. (Class time will not permit a full viewing of the film, so students should reacquaint themselves with it before hand.)
This class is part of the pre-conference events leading up to the Book Passage Mystery Writers Conference. The class is open to both conference participants and non-particpants, although conference participants receive a discount. To learn more about the conference, please visit this link.
A Pre-Book Passage Mystery Writers Conference Class
What is voice? How do you find it and what do you do with it? In this class we will discover the sound, the rhythm, and the feel of a writer’s most powerful tool, his or her voice.
This class is part of the pre-conference events leading up to the Book Passage Mystery Writers Conference. The class is open to both conference participants and non-particpants, although conference participants receive a discount. To learn more about the conference, please visit this link.
Discover All the Clues for a Successful Career as a Mystery or Suspense Writer!
This year's participants will spend four event-filled days in beautiful Northern California writing, workshopping, networking, and perfecting their craft with a celebrated faculty featuring prize-winning authors including conference keynote speaker Don Winslow (New York Times bestselling author of Savages--adapted to film by Academy Award-winning filmmaker Oliver Stone, The Dawn Patrol, and the forthcoming The Kings of Cool: A Prequel to Savages); Cara Black (Author of the Aimée Leduc Investigation series); Tarquin Hall (Author of the Vish Puri mysteries); Karin Slaughter (Internationally bestselling author of the Grant County series) and others.
View the complete faculty list >>
The evening events with Tarquin Hall, Don Winslow, and Karin Slaughter are free and open to the public, although priority seating is reserved for conference participants.
Tarquin Hall has lived and worked throughout South Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. He has also written dozens of articles and three works of nonfiction. He and his family live in Delhi.
Tarquin Hall is on the faculty of the 19th Annual Book Passage Mystery Writers Conference, which takes place July 19-22 at Book Passage. This event is part of the Conference. It is open to the public, though priority seating is reserved for Conference participants
Book Passage is thrilled to announce that the widely acclaimed, bestselling crime fiction writer Don Winslow will be the keynote speaker at the 2012 Mystery Writers Conference. Winslow is the author of the forthcoming The Kings of Cool: A Prequel to Savages ($25.00), due out from Simon & Schuster in June. Winslow’s new novel is being published to coincide with the release of the film adaption of Savages, directed by Academy Award-winning filmmaker Oliver Stone. Set to hit theaters in July, Stone’s widely anticipated film stars John Travolta, Blake Lively, Benecio Del Toro, Uma Thurman, Emile Hirsch, Taylor Kitsch, Aaron Johnson, and Salma Hayek.
In Savages, Winslow introduced Ben and Chon, twenty-something best friends who risk everything to save O, the girl they both love. Among the most celebrated literary thrillers in recent memory, Savages was selected as a Top 10 Book of 2010 by Janet Maslin in The New York Times and Stephen King in Entertainment Weekly, as well as other publications around the world. Now, in his high-octane prequel, Winslow reaches back in time to tell the story of how Ben, Chon, and O became the people they are. A series of breakneck twists and turns puts two generations on a collision course, culminating in a stunning showdown that will ultimately force them to choose between their real families and their love for each other.
Don Winslow is The New York Times bestselling author of more than a dozen novels, including The Gentlemen’s Hour, Satori, The Dawn Patrol, The Winter of Frankie Machine, The Power of the Dog, California Fire and Life, and The Death and Life of Bobby Z.
The 19th Annual Book Passage Mystery Writers Conference takes place July 19-22 at Book Passage in Corte Madera, CA. This event is open to the public, though priority seating is
reserved for Conference participants.
Karin Slaughter is the New York Times and #1 internationally bestselling author of twelve thrillers. She is a native of Georgia.
Karin Slaughter is on the faculty of the 19th Annual Book Passage Mystery Writers Conference, which takes place July 19-22 at Book Passage. This event is part of the Conference. It is open to the public, though priority seating is reserved for Conference participants
