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Kerry's View from the Skylight |
Well, here it is mid-March and we're just sending out our March newsletter. But, believe me, there's a reason! I'm happy to tell you that we are going to be expanding our store to include a storefront next door! It will be at least a few months before all is ready, but we plan to move our art, film, music, theatre and a few other sections to the new space, which will allow us to also expand a few sections like Fiction and the Children's section. It's all so exciting--we'll keep you posted on our progress. 
If you didn't see this last Sunday's LA Times (March 9), there was a wonderful page in the Arts & Music section, with Los Angeles authors writing about some of their favorite independent bookstores -- in light of the sad recent announcement of the imminent closing of our colleague bookstore, Dutton's Brentwood. Janet Fitch did a beautiful piece about us, calling us "a real neighborhood bookstore in that it's a mirror of the neighborhood." And Susan Straight wrote: "Skylight Books, where the audience always asks great questions and the crowd is cool and the bookstore cat seemed to be studying me (she passed away this year, sadly), where the magazine and journal selection is amazing." ( Click here for the full article)
More news next month about our expansion...
Kerry Slattery, General Manager
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CAL ARTS MFA WRITING PROGRAM GRADS |
Friday, March 14 at 7:30 p.m.
SARA FINNERTY, JENN HAWE, ANNE-MARIE JETTER, ERIC LINDLEY, IAN McCARTY and MICHAELE PAUWEN
Upcoming graduates of the Master of Fine Arts Writing Program at the California Institute of the Arts read from recent work. |
MARK MONTANO |
Saturday, March 15 at 5:00 p.m.
The Big-Ass Book of Crafts: More Than 150 Crafts to Fill Your Home, Give to Friends, Decorate The Yard, or Send to Mom
(Simon Spotlight Entertainment)
Montano, who is host of TLC's 10 Years Younger, part of the design team for While You Were Out and cohost of the Style Network's My Celebrity Home and She's Moving In, has a crafty conversation about great things to make.
SURPRISE GIVE-AWAYS!! 
He says, "Growing up, I never even thought that we should go out and buy something new-it was always more fun to see if we could make something from scratch or rework something we already had. For me, crafting isn't about attaining some level of perfection, but about making something so funky and unique that it could never be mass-produced." "Finally!" VenusZine writes. "A how-to craft book for the practical, curious, and 'granny-chic' alike. |
MAUREEN SELWOOD in conversation with Susan Morgan |
Sunday, March 16 at 5:00 p.m.
Green is for Privacy: A Book of Devotional Images
This is a new book by Selwood, a leading figure in American independent animation.
It is an unfolding narrative of Selwood's mother's life through her drawings. She performed devotions and made images as expressions of the interiority of her spiritual life which began in a convent in Ireland.
The entitlements given the drawings are part of this posthumous collaboration with her daughter, creating an exhibition catalogue of her work. 
Selwood makes films that display a joyous eroticism and buoyant wit, often highlighted by the dynamic use of hand drawn animation, live footage and the creative blending of words and images. She has received many grants and prizes -- most recently the Rome Prize from the American Academy in Rome. She is currently on the faculty of the Experimental Animation Department at California Institute of the Arts.
Susan Morgan is a contributing editor for Metropolitan Home, author of "Joan Jonas: I Want to Live in the Country (And Other Romances)," received a fellowship from the Graham Foundation for the Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts to work with archive of Esther McCoy, the preeminent architectural writer about California modernism. She is currently at work on a memoir about her recent past, her dying parents and convicted criminal siblings.
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NINA HACHIGIAN (rescheduled from February) |
Friday, March 21 at 7:30 p.m.
The Next American Century: How the U.S. Can Thrive as Other Powers Rise (Simon & Schuster) Is the U.S.'s role as the world's lone superpower at an end? Is there hope for a post-unilateral America? This book may have the answers to those questions and more.
Hachigian previously worked as an assistant to the National Security Advisor in the Clinton Administration. From 2001 to 2006 she was the director for the Center for Asia Pacific Policy and a senior political scientist at RAND.
Hachigian is co-author (with Mona Sutphen) (Photo by Ralph Alswang)
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Translating poetry and fiction:
CLAYTON ESHLEMAN & MICHAEL HEIM |
Saturday, March 22 at 5:00 p.m.
A fascinating discussion of issues involved in translating poetry and literature by two top translators, who will read from recent translations
 Award-winning poet and translator Eshleman reads from The Complete Poetry of Cesar Vallejo (Univ. of California Press) and renowned translator Heim will present his recent translations, Gunter Grass' Peeling the Onion (Harcourt) and Bernard Schlink's Homecoming  (Pantheon).
Eshleman has published more than forty books of poetry and prose, as well as ground-breaking translations of César Vallejo, Pablo Neruda, Aimé Césaire, and Antonin Artaud.
Heim, professor of Slavic Languages and Literature at UCLA, is also known for his translations of Milan Kundera, Chekhov, and many others. |
ELISA ALBERT |
Tuesday, March 25 at 7:30 p.m.
The Book of Dahlia (Free Press)
"Hilarious and heartbreaking...Albert's superb first novel...delivers Dahlia's laissez-faire attitude toward other people and lack of ambition with such exactness as to strip them of cliché and make them grimly vivid. Her brilliant style makes the novel's central question-should we mourn a wasted life?-shockingly poignant." - Publishers Weekly, Starred review
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JENNIFER 8. LEE |
Friday, March 28 at 7:30 p.m.
The Fortune Cookie Chronicles: Adventures in the World of Chinese Food (Twelve)
Join us for a bite of Chinese food with the author as she discusses her fascinating behind-the-scenes cultural history.
"Readers will take an unexpected and entertaining journey-through culinary, social and cultural history-in this delightful first book on the origins of the customary after-Chinese-dinner treat by New York Times reporter Lee...
There are satisfying minihistories on the relationship between Jews and Chinese food and a biography of the real General Tso, butLee also pries open factoids and tidbits of American culture that eventually touch on large social and cultural subjects such as identity, immigration and nutrition. Copious research backs her many lively anecdotes, and being American-born Chinese yet willing to scrutinize herself as much as her objectives, she wins the reader over. Like the numbers on those lottery fortunes, the book's a winner." --Publisher's Weekly (starred review)
(Photo: Jennifer Subin) |
DREW FRIEDMAN with Ben Schwartz |
Saturday, March 29 at 5:00 p.m.
More Old Jewish Comedians (Fantographics)
Note: Larry Gelbart, who was originally scheduled as part of this event, will not be able to attend
This comprehensive collection of portraiture of Jewish comedians is a sequel to 2006's wildly popular Old Jewish Comedians, which earned Friedman raves from Jerry Lewis, Howard Stern, The Believer, Entertainment Weekly and many more, and earned Friedman his own roast at New York's legendary Friar's Club.
The Reuben Award-winning Friedman, one of the great caricaturists of his age, presents a thorough visual history of the 20th Century's greatest Borscht-Belt comedians through 28 full-page portraits; every crease, mustache hair, and liver spot looks utterly real.
"A festival of drawing virtuosity and fabulous craggy faces. Drew Friedman might very well be the Vermeer of the Borscht Belt." - The New York Times Book Review
"Fabulous... sensational... on the nose. He really gets their attitude." - The Los Angeles Times
He will be 'in conversation' with Ben Schwartz, who has written about comics and cartooning in Comic Art, Suck.com, "Krazy & Ignatz 1929-1930," the Chicago Reader and the Comics Journal. |
SMALL PRESS MONTH:
A Handful of LA Small (& Innovative!) Presses |
Sunday, March 30 at 5:00 p.m.
In recognition of Small Press Month, join this hearty group from LA's burgeoning experimental writing and publishing scene. Brief readings with authors followed by Q&A with press editors.
Participating presses include:
Siglio Press featuring Lisa Pearson, editor, and The Nancy Book by Joe Brainard
Semiotext(e) featuring Veronica Gonzalez, author, with Hedi Kholti, editor
Les Figues Press featuring Sissy Boyd, author, with Teresa Carmody and Vanessa Place, editors
Insert Press featuring Ara Shirinyan, author, with Mathew Timmons, editor
eohippus labs featuring Amanda Ackerman, author/editor, with Harold Abramowitz, editor
CLOVERFIELD PRESS featuring Carol Treadwell, author, with Laurence Dumortier, editor
Small Press Month, now in its 12th year, is a nationwide promotion highlighting the valuable work produced by independent publishers. An annual celebration of the independent spirit of small publishers, Small Press Month is an effort to showcase the diverse, unique, and often most significant voices being published today. This year's slogan is "Celebrate Great Writing".
About Small Press Month (from http://www.smallpressmonth.org/) |
In the Neighborhood... |
Thursday, March 13 at 6:45 p.m. at the Los Feliz Branch Library
The Architecture and Beyond series presents Dr. Lauren Weiss Bricker and Sarah Lorenzen, both of Cal Poly Pomona, who will talk about the Neutra VDL House in Silver Lake. Prof. Lorenzen is the resident director of the architectural landmark. We'll be there with books. 1874 Hillhurst Ave; (323) 913-4710
Monday, March 24 at 7:30 p.m. :
Poverty Matters presents
An Evening with JIM HIGHTOWER
$10 at the door to benefit Poverty Matters
The best-selling author, fiery and funny public speaker and NPR commentator will speak and sign his new book
We'll be there with books! | |