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Greetings from Politics & Prose!
Week of March 24

Author Events with Sarah Vowell, Cal Ripken, Jr., and Téa Obreht

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Click here for our events calendar to preview upcoming events through the end of May.
Members always save 20% on author event books and titles included in other special promotions. Click here to register!

Thursday, March 24
7 p.m. James Gleick - The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood

Friday, March 25
7 p.m. Ian Rankin - The Complaints

Saturday, March 26
6 p.m. Sarah Vowell - Unfamiliar Fishes

Sunday, March 27
1 p.m. Mark Richard - House of Prayer No. 2 CANCELLED
5 p.m.Greg Myre and Jennifer Griffin - This Burning Land: Lessons from the Front Lines of the Transformed Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

Monday, March 28
3:30 p.m. Cal Ripken, Jr. - Hothead
7 p.m. Téa Obreht - The Tiger's Wife

Tuesday, March 29
7 p.m. Tina Rosenberg - Join the Club: How Peer Pressure Can Transform the World

 

 

Wednesday, March 30
7 p.m. John Darnton - Almost a Family: A Memoir

Thursday, March 31
7 p.m. Joseph Lelyveld - Great Soul: Mahatma Gandhi and His Struggle with India

Friday, April 1
7 p.m. Peter Godwin - The Fear: Robert Mugabe and the Martyrdom of Zimbabwe

Saturday, April 2
1 p.m. Liz Lerman - Hiking the Horizontal: Field Notes from a Choreographer
3:30 p.m. CD Release Party - Jazz: The Smithsonian Anthology
6 p.m. Jacqueline Winspear - A Lesson in Secrets

Sunday, April 3
1 p.m. Cokie and Steven Roberts - Our Haggadah: Uniting Traditions for Interfaith Families

BOOKNOTES BY MARK


MONDAY, MARCH 28, 7 p.m.
DEBUT NOVELIST: TEA OBREHT - THE TIGER'S WIFE

Tea ObrehtIf you have been in the store, you may have heard me rave about THE TIGER'S WIFE (Random House, $25), Téa Obreht’s debut novel about a young woman doctor in Yugoslavia and the legacy of stories she’s inherited from her grandfather. You also may have received a taste yourself when a portion of the novel was included last year in the New Yorker's Summer Fiction 20 Under 40. Now that it’s finally here, the reviews from The New York Times and The Washington Post overflow with adulation; I can finally place it in readers’ hands and share my enthusiasm with more than a description.

The authority and assuredness with which the book unfolds belies the fact that The Tiger’s Wife is a first novel written by twenty-something author. Obreht’s narrator, Natalia, is on a mission to inoculate children at an orphanage in a town once separated from her own by a civil war. While she’s there, she learns of the death of her grandfather, the source of all of her childhood stories. She informs the reader:

Everything necessary to understand my grandfather lies between two stories: the story of the tiger’s wife, and the story of the deathless man. These stories run like secret rivers through all the other stories of his life.

Fantastic and fable-like, these powerful stories from Natalia’s grandfather’s childhood make up a large part of the novel. They embody timeless ideas: courage, honor, trust, and - in the story of the deathless man, matters of life and death. As she travels to her grandfather’s hometown, Natalia learns that the stories are actually born of real events and real people.

In the town where the orphanage is located, a group of diggers are searching for the body of their kinsman killed during the recent war. They’re convinced that until they are able repatriate the remains, sickness will continue to plague the families. Natalia becomes interested in the diggers’ children, hoping she can inoculate them, too, but the parents’ belief in the magical source of the illness confounds her. This juxtaposition between superstition and reality, between magic and medicine, contributes to the richness of the novel.

The Tiger’s Wife is an amazing book, the heralding of a phenomenal literary talent. We are so very pleased to host Téa Obreht this coming Monday, March 28 and certainly hope you will join us in welcoming this extraordinarily talented, debut novelist.

- Mark LaFramboise

Click here to watch the video our booksellers have made about the book!

Tiger

SIGNED FIRST EDITIONS CLUB


SignedWe at the P&P Signed First Editions Club are very excited to share our upcoming selections with you:

While the store has sold out of first printings for the general public, if you enroll now, we still have a limited quantity of signed first editions of THE TIGER'S WIFE (our March selection) available only to subscribers.

As April is Poetry Month, we’re featuring THE HUNGER MOON: New and Selected Poems, 1980-2010, (Knopf, $30) the newest collection by celebrated poet and novelist, Marge Piercy. This landmark edition is her first volume of selected poems in over twenty years.

I have worn the faces, the masks
of hieroglyphs, gods and demons,
bat faced ghosts, sibyls and thieves,
lover, loser, red rose and ragweed,
these are the tracks I have left
on the white crust of time.
- from "Tracks," p. 269

Signed First EditionHistorian Adam Hochschild (National Book Award finalist and P&P staff favorite) set the standard for narrative nonfiction with books such as King Leopold's Ghost and Bury the Chains. He returns with our May selection, TO END ALL WARS: A Story of Loyalty and Rebellion, 1914-1918 (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $28), a searing account of the personalities surrounding World War I. Tony Horwitz, author of A Voyage Long and Strange, has said:

Adam Hochschild is the rare historian who fuses deep scholarship with novelistic flair. In his hands, World War I becomes a clash not only of empires and armies, but of individuals: king and Kaiser, warriors and pacifists, coal miners and aristocrats. Epic yet human-scaled, this is history for buffs and novices alike, a stirring and provocative exploration of the Great War and the nature of war itself.

And we can’t wait for June, which brings us Ann Patchett's wonderful new novel, STATE OF WONDER (HarperCollins, $26.99). Like her Orange Prize and Pen/Faulkner award-winning Bel Canto Patchett takes the stuff of thrillers (the Amazonian jungle, lost tribes, intrepid researchers) and focuses exquisitely on the intimate human dramas within. The New York Times Book Review says, “Expect miracles when you read Ann Patchett’s fiction.”

Click here for more information and to register for - or give the gift of - the Signed First Editions Club!

BARBARA'S BYLINE

My favorite book so far this spring is Sándor Márai’s PORTRAITS OF A MARRIAGE (Knopf, $27.95). I first encountered this Hungarian novelist eight years ago when Knopf published a translation of his earler novel, Embers. In translation, Embers became such an international success that Knopf immediately made plans to publish the rest of Márai’s oeuvre.

Like Embers, Portraits of A Marriage takes place in the first half of the 20th century in the slowly dying Austro-Hungarian Empire. The marriage at the heart of this novel is also dying, and in the course of the story the reader catches contradictory glimpses of a myriad of remembrances, perceptions, and emotions barely visible behind bourgeois facades. Márai writes so hypnotically that the novel is difficult to put down.

- Barbara Meade

HAGGADAH

CHOOSE A HAGGADAH FOR PASSOVER

Politics & Prose has selected Haggadot that represent major traditions in Judaism. All of them are gender-neutral ("ancestors" instead of "forefathers," "four children" instead of "four sons"). We encourage you to experiment with several Haggadot, especially if you are just starting to hold Seders. Then you will be able to make an informed choice when investing in eight, ten or twelve of the same Haggadah. 

We already have a large selection in the store, which you can preview by clicking here.
If you are purchasing 5 or more of the same Haggadah, you will receive a 10% discount.
A purchase of 10 or more receives a 20% discount.

Four questions to ask when choosing among Haggadot:

Is your Seder to be conducted in both Hebrew and English and does the balance between the two languages reflect the abilities of your guests?
 
How much commentary is included and does it reflect the issues that you wish to discuss?
 
Is the Haggadah attractive, and will you enjoy it over the years?
 
How many do you have to buy and do you expect to be using them for many years to come?

- from the archives, an annotated bibliography by Carla Cohen

 

SPRING TRIP - PICASSO MASTERPIECES

 
Picasso Signature

Saturday, May 14, 7:30 a.m.-5 p.m.
PICASSO: Masterpieces from the Musée National Picasso, Paris

Join us on a memorable spring trip to The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond, Virginia to view the exhibition, Picasso: Masterpieces from the Musée National Picasso, Paris. The VMFA is the only East Coast venue for the seven-city international tour. The exhibit presents iconic works from virtually every phase of Picasso’s legendary career, documenting the full range of his unceasing inventiveness and prodigious creative process. The Musée Picasso’s holdings stand apart from any other collection of his work because they represent the artist’s personal collection.

All registered participants will receive 20% off all books on Picasso up to our departure date.

The price is $130.00 per person or $120.00 for members. Space is limited. Please reserve early to avoid disappointment.

For more information, please contact Bonnie Kogod at 202-363-7738 or [email protected]. To reserve a ticket, please call the store at 202-364-1919 or click here to make a payment online.

 

PODCAST OF THE WEEK

Social Animal

On Wednesday, March 16, at 7 p.m. Politics & Prose hosted David Brooks as he introduced his most recent book, THE SOCIAL ANIMAL: The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement (Random House, $27). In Brooks’s inventive narrative, Harold and Erica are a paradigm of success: happily married, materially well off, careers on track. The story of his protagonists is also the story of current advances in cognitive science, psychology, and sociology, all of which suggest that people are less self-determined than they think.

Click here to download the MP3 or to listen to our podcast, which includes David Brooks's talk and the question and answer session with the audience.

We record nearly every in-store author event. You can listen to our current selection of author event recordings here, or click here to browse and download more MP3s. If you would like to request a CD or MP3 recording from a past event which is not already posted, send an email to Wendy Brown.

 

 

UPCOMING TICKETED EVENTS

In order to accommodate a larger audience, we sometimes hold our events at other locations. Please reserve your tickets early if you plan to attend.

Thursday, April 7, 7 p.m.

Finkler Question

 

Politics & Prose hosts
HOWARD JACOBSON
THE FINKLER QUESTION
(Blooomsbury, $15)
with Sixth & I Historic Synagogue
600 I Street, NW
Metro: Gallery Place/Chinatown

Winner of the 2010 Man Booker Prize, Jacobson's novel was cited for being "very funny…but also very clever, very sad and very subtle. It is all that it seems to be and much more than it seems to be." The eponymous Finkler is a popular Jewish philosopher, writer, and television personality, and the story focuses on his long friendship with gentile Julian Treslove, who becomes obsessed with what it means to be Jewish.

Click here to purchase tickets ($10) to this event or to buy a copy of the book.

SIGNED BOOK OF THE WEEK

 

Be differentBE DIFFERENT: Adventures of a Free-Range Aspergian with Practical Advice for Aspergians, Misfits, Families & Teachers
By John Elder Robison
(Crown Archetype, $24)
March 2011 - Hardcover
Signed First Editions, First Printings

Previously known for his bestselling memoir, Look Me in the Eye, in which John Elder Robison described his experience growing up with Asperger’s syndrome at a time when the diagnosis didn’t exist. By the time he was diagnosed at age forty, Robison had already developed a myriad of coping strategies that helped him achieve a seemingly normal, even highly successful, life. In BE DIFFERENT, he shares a new batch of endearing stories about his childhood, adolescence, and young adult years, giving the reader a rare window into - and practical advice for living with - an Aspergian mind. He says, “I believe those of us with Asperger’s are here for a reason, and we have much to offer. This book will help you bring out those gifts.”

Click here for more of our signed books available now, or review our calendar of upcoming and recently past events and inquire about purchasing a signed book from any of our visiting authors.

 

NEW IN PAPERBACK

 

New Paperbacks

A Visit from the Goon Squad
by Jennifer Egan
(Anchor, $14.95)

Time is the goon squad, and it comes for us all. Characters are revealed in their past, present, and future tenses. They advance or decline like civilizations. They attract or repel each other like atoms. What begins in a 1970s San Francisco garage takes us to New York, Naples, Africa, an unnamed third world country. Location varies, but time is constant and cannot be ignored.

Egan experiments with language, with narrative style, with voice. Some of her final chapters explore the way technology may shape language in the very near future. Egan herself may be the goon squad, and she sets her sights on the genre of the novel. She is forcing it forward, like her characters, into the future.

  • Bill Leggett
Hellhound on His Trail: The Electrifying Account of the Largest Manhunt in American History
by Hampton Sides
(Anchor, $15.95)

Hampton Sides turned history into riveting stories in Ghost Soldiers and Blood and Thunder. Now he recounts Martin Luther King’s assassination by tracing the very different lives of King and his killer, James Earl Ray. Join us for the paperback release of this critically acclaimed study of the Civil Rights era when we host Hampton Sides for this paperback release on Wednesday, April 6 at 7 p.m.

 

 

Click here to see more recently released paperbacks,
both
Fiction and Non-Fiction.

P&P BESTSELLERS

 

All Politics & Prose Weekly Hardcover Bestsellers are 20% off for Members.
Click the book titles for more information about these featured books.
Click here to receive the benefits of Politics & Prose membership.

Bestsellers

FICTION

  1. The Tiger's Wife, by Tea Obreht (Random House, $25)
  2. The Complaints, by Ian Rankin (Reagan Arthur, $24.99)
  3. Drawing Conclusions: A Commissario Guido Brunetti Mystery, by Donna Leon (Atlantic Monthly, $24)
  4. The Trinity Six, by Charles Cumming (St. Martin's, $24.99)
  5. Started Early, Took My Dog, by Kate Atkinson (Reagan Arthur, $24.99)
  6. The Paris Wife, by Paula McLain (Ballantine, $25)
  7. When the Killing's Done, by T.C. Boyle (Viking, $26.95)
  8. Three Stages of Amazement, by Carol Edgarian (Scribner, $25)
  9. Open City, by Teju Cole (Random House, $25)
  10. The Saturday Big Tent Wedding Party: The New No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency Novel, by Alexander McCall Smith (Pantheon, $24.95)
  11. When the Thrill Is Gone, by Walter Mosley (Riverhead, $26.95)
  12. Freedom, by Jonathan Franzen (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $28)

Click here for our paperback fiction bestsellers.

Non Fiction Bestseller

NONFICTION

  1. The Social Animal: The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement, by David Brooks (Random House, $27)
  2. Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything, by Joshua Foer (Penguin Press, $26.95)
  3. The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood, by James Gleick (Pantheon, $29.95)
  4. Blood, Bones & Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef, by Gabrielle Hamilton (Random House, $26)
  5. To a Mountain in Tibet, by Colin Thubron (HarperCollins, $24.99)
  6. Rawhide Down: The Near Assassination of Ronald Reagan, by Del Quentin Wilber (Holt, $27)
  7. Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption, by Laura Hillenbrand (Random House, $27)
  8. Cleopatra: A Life, by Stacy Schiff (Little, Brown, $29.99)
  9. Modigliani: A Life, by Meryle Secrest (Knopf, $35)
  10. How to Live: Or A Life of Montaigne in One Question and Twenty Attempts at an Answer, by Sarah Bakewell (Other Press, $25)
  11. Townie, by Andre Dubus, III (W. W. Norton, $25.95)
  12. Baseball in the Garden of Eden: The Secret History of the Early Game, by John Thorn (Simon & Schuster, $26)

Click here for our paperback non-fiction bestsellers.

COMING SOON TO YOUR FAVORITE BOOKSTORE

If you can't attend a talk, but would like to buy a signed copy or a recorded author presentation,
click the title links to reserve your book online.
P&P members save 20% on all of these event titles.

Click www.politics-prose.com/event for our author events calendar through May.

events

Thursday, March 24

James Gleick - The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood
7 p.m. We live in the Information Age—but what exactly does that mean? Gleick, author of Chaos and Genius, looks back to the earliest information technologies, tracing the route from talking drums to alphabets, Morse code to computer languages, punch cards to the Internet. Along the way he profiles the inventors and visionaries involved and charts how the various machines have altered human consciousness itself.

Friday, March 25

Ian Rankin - The Complaints
7 p.m. In his latest crime novel, the Scottish creator of John Rebus introduces a new hero: Malcolm Fox, an Edinburgh cop. Fox's beat is the police force itself, and he must be on the trail of something big, because his colleagues are conspiring to frame him, and his only ally is a detective suspected of selling child porn.

Saturday, March 26

Sarah Vowell - Unfamiliar Fishes
6 p.m. Vowell's latest tour of American social history takes her to Hawaii. With her trademark dry wit Vowell, author of The Wordy Shipmates and a contributing editor for public radio's This American Life, retraces the steps of the 19th-century missionaries who tried to turn the islands into another New England.

See other books by Sarah Vowell and the writings of more of her compatriots from This American Life by clicking here.

Sunday, March 27

Mark Richard - House of Prayer No. 2
For personal reasons Mark Richard has had to cancel his event, there is no rescheduled date
1 p.m. The author of Fishboy grew up as a special needs child; his congenital problems were compounded by clumsy medical treatment.  Leaving his native South for New York City, Richard initially led a rough life, involved with crime, drugs, and sketchy companions. But he kept writing. His memoir is a powerful and unconventional bildungsroman.

Events

Greg Myre and Jennifer Griffin - This Burning Land: Lessons from the Front Lines of the Transformed Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
5 p.m. Myre and Griffin, reporters for The New York Times and Fox News, respectively, present the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as an asymmetrical war. Through interviews with settlers, ordinary farmers, and extremists from both sides, the authors show how and why this long-running conflict has eluded traditional routes to peace. 

Monday, March 28

Cal Ripken, Jr. - Hothead
3:30 p.m. Connor is an all-star shortstop, but he can’t control his temper. Threatened by the possibility that the school paper will run a story about his behavior, Connor has to learn to control himself.  This is a story told from the heart about doing your best and striving to be a credit to your team. Ages 8-12

In order to accommodate the most participation possible, we cannot accept any more signed-copy orders for customers who will not be present. Customers who want their books signed must attend the event. Cal enjoys taking time for photos with fans, but due to the amount of interest in the event, he will not personalize books.

Téa Obreht - The Tiger's Wife
7 p.m. Obreht was chosen by The New Yorker as one of its 20 young writers to watch, and her first novel is a haunting and powerful narrative, rich in myth and folklore. Set in a Balkan village, it follows a young doctor struggling to help orphans and to heal her own grief at the death of her grandfather. Unexplained occurrences around her lead her back to memories, and to stories both told and untold.

Tuesday, March 29

Tina Rosenberg - Join the Club: How Peer Pressure Can Transform the World
7 p.m. The idea of going along to get along may be a key to positive social change. Rosenberg, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, has drawn examples from around the world of how groups have exerted pressure to improve education, promote more healthful behavior, and even overthrow dictators.

Events

Wednesday, March 30

John Darnton - Almost a Family: A Memoir
7 p.m. Darnton was eleven months old when his father died; he grew up knowing him only from stories about his life and his career as a reporter during World War II. Decades later, a journalist himself, Darnton wanted a fuller understanding of the man who so deeply influenced his life, and this memoir of his search takes him around the world, ending on a beach in Papua New Guinea.

Thursday, March 31

Joseph Lelyveld - Great Soul: Mahatma Gandhi and His Struggle with India
7 p.m. Lelyveld’s biography looks at Mahatma Gandhi from the unusual perspective of its subject’s shortfalls rather than his achievements. The author of Move Your Shadow notes that during Gandhi’s two decades in South Africa, he failed to work for the rights of its black population.  Back in India, Gandhi sought to end the caste system and reconcile Hindus and Muslims but wasn’t able to do so. Despite these disappointments, Lelyveld confirms Gandhi as a powerful, admirable man.

Friday, April 1

Peter Godwin - The Fear: Robert Mugabe and the Martyrdom of Zimbabwe
7 p.m. Godwin’s When a Crocodile Eats the Sun was a frank and powerful account of the lives of his parents in Zimbabwe. In his new book he again combines journalistic skill, extensive interviews, and an intimate knowledge of the country for a vivid look at Zimbabwe in 2008, on the eve of elections Godwin hoped would end Mugabe’s thirty-year reign.

Saturday, April 2

Liz Lerman - Hiking the Horizontal: Field Notes from a Choreographer
1 p.m. Choreographer, Dance Exchange founder, and MacArthur Fellow, Lerman believes that “art belongs to everyone and dancing is a birthright.”  Her essays are wide-ranging discussions of the interactions of dance with society, politics, and the self; her book can be read both as a meditation on art and as a practical guide to cultivating one’s own creativity.

Events

CD Release Party - Jazz: The Smithsonian Anthology
3:30 p.m. A worthy successor to the 1973 Smithsonian Collection of Classic Jazz, this set of six CDs, with a 200-page book, charts the growth of a rich and diverse musical tradition. Join us for a panel discussion with some of the many producers, compilers, and writers involved in this project: Larry Appelbaum and Willard Jenkins, WPFW; Rob Bamberger, WAMU; John Hasse, Daniel Sheehy and Richard Burgess, Smithsonian.

Jacqueline Winspear - A Lesson in Secrets
6 p.m. Winspear’s eighth Maisie Dobbs novel finds the former World War I nurse/psychologist turned private investigator going under cover as a philosophy instructor. It’s 1932 and the government is monitoring the activities of a possibly subversive pacifist who runs a school. Maisie joins the faculty, someone is murdered, and….

Sunday, April 3

Cokie and Steven Roberts - Our Haggadah: Uniting Traditions for Interfaith Families
1 p.m. The Roberts’s Haggadah has evolved over the course of their forty years together, growing and changing along with the guest list at their Passover Seders. Emphasizing values as much as religious beliefs, it’s a practical guide for interfaith couples.

P&P CUSTOMERS ARE ALSO INVITED TO . . .

Friday, March 25, 7:30 p.m.

OffsitePEN/Faulkner Reading Series
Folger Shakespeare Library
201 East Capitol Street, S.E.
JOSHUA FERRIS
THE UNNAMED (Back Bay, $13.99)
VICTOR LaVALLE
BIG MACHINE
(Spiegel and Grau, $15)
Described as "audacious” and "chillingly beautiful," The Unnamed, Joshua Ferris's most recent novel is constructed around one of Emily Dickinson's poems. Ferris is also the author of Then We Came to the End, finalist for National Book Award and winner of the 2007 PEN/Hemingway Award His short fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, New Stories from the South 2007, and The Best American Short Stories 2009, among other publications.

Praised as a "wry fabulist,” Victor LaValle is the author of a short story collection, Slapboxing with Jesus, and two novels, The Ecstatic and Big Machine. His recent work has been published in Granta, The Nation, and The Paris Review. He is the winner of numerous awards, including most recently a Guggenheim Fellowship.
Click here for more information and to buy $15 tickets.
Bookmark this link for future offsite events.

Monday, March 28, 7:30 p.m.

Ragged EdgeNational Geographic Live
Grosvenor Auditorium
1600 M Street, NW
JOHN FRANCIS
THE RAGGED EDGE OF SILENCE: Finding Peace in a Noisy World (National Geographic, $26)

Pioneering activist and National Geographic Fellow John "Planetwalker" Francis took a 17-year vow of silence to walk across America, inspiring thousands. His book offers lessons on the need for reflection in one's life. Discover the power of silence in a participatory event with this environmental hero.

Click here for more information and to buy $18 Tickets (NG Members, $16).
$10 Student Rush tickets will only become available 45 minutes prior to event.

Monday, March 28, 7:30 p.m.

Lucky ChildFriendship Heights Village Center
4433 S. Park Avenue, Chevy Chase

JUDGE THOMAS BUERGENTHAL
A LUCKY CHILD: A Memoir of Surviving Auschwitz as a Young Boy (Back Bay, $14.99)
Judge Buergenthal has devoted his life to international and human rights law. He is currently the Lobingier Professor of Comparative Law and Jurisprudence at GWU Law School.  In his book he recounts his experiences as one of the youngest survivors of the concentration camps of Auschwitz and Sachsenhausen. Thomas Buergenthal was not quite six years old when he and his parents were forced into a Jewish ghetto in Poland. Four years later, they were placed on a train bound for Auschwitz, where Thomas was separated from his family. Alone, ten-year-old Thomas managed to survive Auschwitz. He was one of only three children to survive the infamous three-day death march.

Please sign up in advance for this FREE event by calling the Village Center at 301-656-2797.

Wednesday, March 30, 7 p.m.

ShushiNational Geographic Live
Grosvenor Auditorium
1600 M Street, NW
Grand Sushi Event with CASSON TRENOR
SUSTAINABLE SUSHI: A Guide to Saving the Oceans One Bite at a Time (North Atlantic, $15.95)
Join author Casson Trenor for a delicious tasting of sustainably caught or farmed sushi accompanied by wine and sake pairings. He'll sign his book Sustainable Sushi, a guide to enjoying this delicacy while protecting the planet at the same time. Trenor will be introduced by local chef, National Geographic Fellow, and sustainable seafood advocate Barton Seaver.

Presented with the National Cherry Blossom Festival and co-sponsored by Genji Sushi. Genji Sushi provides high-quality, all-natural sushi, nigiri and sashimi. By incorporating a variety of sustainably-caught, and responsibly-farmed fish, Genji encourages customers to make food choices which promote health, not only for themselves, but also for the environment.
Must be 21 or older to attend; ID required. Click here for more information and to buy $100 Tickets.

Thursday, March 31, 8-10 a.m.

OnwardGreater Washington Board of Trade Business Leadership Series
Capital Hilton
1001 16th St, NW
HOWARD SCHULTZ
ONWARD: HOW STARBUCKS FOUGHT FOR ITS LIFE WITHOUT LOSING ITS SOUL (Rodale, $25.99)
In 2008, Howard Schultz, the president and chairman of Starbucks, made the unprecedented decision to return as the CEO eight years after he stepped down from daily oversight of the company. Concerned that Starbucks had lost its way, Schultz was determined to help it return to its core values and restore not only its financial health, but also its soul. In Onward, he shares the remarkable story of his return and the company's ongoing transformation under his leadership, revealing how Starbucks again achieved profitability and sustainability without sacrificing humanity. Click here for more information and to purchase $75/$100 tickets.


Friday, April 1, 7:30 p.m.

Offsite 2PEN/Faulkner Reading Series
Folger Elizabethan Theatre
201 East Capitol Street, SE

DOROTHY ALLISON
BASTARD OUT OF CAROLINA (Plume, $15)
RON RASH
BURNING BRIGHT (Ecco, $12.99)

Widely honored for their searing realism and explosively imaginative prose, Allison and Rash read from new fiction.

Dorothy Allison is the author of Bastard Out of Carolina, a finalist for the 1992 National Book Award, and Cavedweller, a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. She has also written a memoir Two or Three Things I Know for Sure, a book of poetry, and Trash, a collection of short fiction. Her work has been included in The Best American Short Stories 2003 and New Stories from the South 2003. Allison has taught creative writing in numerous universities. A novel, She Who, is forthcoming from Penguin.

Ron Rash is the author of four novels, four collections of short stories, and three books of poems. He has been awarded NEA Fellowships in fiction and poetry. A short story collection, Chemistry, and novel, Serena, were both PEN/Faulkner Award Finalists. His most recent book, Burning Bright, was a 2010 finalist for the Frank O’Connor Short Fiction Award. He teaches at Western Carolina University.

Click here for more information and to buy $15 tickets.

Saturday, April 2, 12 - 3 p.m.

Offsite2011 Children’s Book Guild
Nonfiction Award Event

Pier 7 Restaurant at Channel Inn
650 Water Street SW

KATHLEEN KRULL

Since 1977, The Children’s Book Guild of Washington, D.C. has honored an author or author-illustrator whose body of work has made a significant contribution to the quality of nonfiction for children. Past winners have included Milton Meltzer, Russell Freedman, Seymour Simon, and Jean Craighead George. This year The Children’s Book Guild will honor Kathleen Krull as the winner of the 2011 Children’s Book Guild Nonfiction Award at a luncheon which will include a lively presentation by the author.

Kathleen Krull is the author of over 60 innovative, award-winning nonfiction books for young readers. Some of her outstanding titles include Lincoln Tells A Joke: How Laughter Saved The President (and the Country), an unusual picture book revealing Lincoln's life story through his love of humor. It was named to Smithsonian’s list of 2010 Notable Books for Children. Kubla Khan: Emperor of Everything was named to Kirkus Reviews' 2010 Best Children's Books, School Library Journal's Best Books 2010, and NYPL's 100 Titles for Reading and Sharing. Charles Darwin, released in October 2010, is the latest in Ms. Krull’s Giants of Science series. She brilliantly meets the Children’s Book Guild Nonfiction Award criteria for providing documentable facts and ideas in a lively, appealing manner sure to stimulate the imagination.

Click here to see more of Ms. Krull's books. Click here for more information and to purchase $35 tickets. Tickets include an elegant buffet lunch with meat, fish, and vegetarian choices.

Monday, April 4, 7 p.m.

Jerusalem, JerusalmeSixth & I Historic Synagogue
600 I Street, NW
Metro: Gallery Place/Chinatown

JAMES CARROLL
JERUSALEM, JERUSALEM: How the Ancient City Ignited Our Modern World (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $28)

James Carroll uncovers how Jerusalem became, unlike any other city in the world, an incendiary fantasy of a city. Central to the religious imagination, it has been the holy of holies, but it has also been a cockpit of violence. Tracing Jewish, Christian, and Muslim history, Carroll illuminates the mounting European fixation on Jerusalem as spark of both anti-Semitism and racist colonial contempt. Such deep history has relevance for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict today. No accident that this conflict is centered on Jerusalem—which is both the problem and the solution.

Click here to purchase tickets and for more informatin. Tickets are $8 in advance, $10 the day of the event, or receive 2 FREE tickets with the purchase of the book ($28) through Sixth & I. If you have questions, please call 202.408.3100.

Tuesday, April 5, 7 p.m.

Be different

The Ivymount School
11614 Seven Locks Road
Rockville, MD

JOHN ELDER ROBISON
BE DIFFERENT (Crown Archetype, $24)
Robison, who lives with Asperger’s Syndrome, has spent his fully realized and successful adult life involved in education and research into the autism spectrum. This is an essential guidebook for and about anyone who has difficulty fitting in. Please contact www.ivymount.org/asperger to attend.

Tuesday, April 5, 7:30 p.m.

Hidden AlaskaNational Geographic Live
Grosvenor Auditorium
1600 M Street, NW
MICHAEL MELFORD
HIDDEN ALASKA: Bristol Bay and Beyond (National Geographic, $24)

A veteran photographer with 12 stories in National Geographic, Michael Melford has documented some of the world’s most pristine places. For a magazine story and new National Geographic book, Hidden Alaska, he traveled to Bristol Bay, Alaska—both an important salmon breeding ground and location of enormous copper and gold deposits—where residents are being forced to choose between incompatible futures.

Co-sponsored by Renewal Resources Foundation.View a photo gallery of Michael Melford’s images from Bristol Bay. Read a biography of Michael Melford on the Nat Geo photography website.

Click here to buy $18 tickets (Masters of Photography 3-Part Series: $48); $16, NG Member (3-Part Series: $42)

Wednesday, April 6, 7 p.m.

Offsite 5National Geographic Live
Grosvenor Auditorium

1600 M Street, NW

BARTON SEAVER
FOR COD AND COUNTRY: Simple, Delicious, Sustainable Cooking (Sterling, $24.95)

Barton Seaver, Esquire magazine’s 2009 Chef of the Year and Nat Geo Oceans Fellow, offers a first-class tasting experience of sustainable seafood enhanced with wine pairings. Enjoy tantalizing recipes from Seaver’s new book, For Cod and Country (available for sale and signing after the presentation), as sumptuously delicious as they are good for the planet.

Must be 21 or older to attend; ID required. Read an interview with Barton Seaver on Nat Geo’s The Ocean website.

Click here to buy $85 tickets (NG Member, $75) and for more information.

Bookmark this link for future offsite events.

FROM THE CHILDREN AND TEENS' DEPARTMENT

Bookmarks

Children and Teens’ Department Announces Its Second Bookmark Contest

The Children and Teens’ Department is holding its second bookmark contest for 5-18 year olds.  The theme is:  Your favorite place to visit, real or imaginary, in a book

Pick up an entry blank in the Children and Teens’ Department or click here to download it
Submit one paper entry per person to the Children and Teens’ Department; electronic entries will not be accepted. 
The winner and runners-up will be featured on our web site and will receive $25 Politics & Prose gift cards. 
The winning design will be printed on Politics & Prose bookmarks. 

Contest ends April 4, 2011.  Politics & Prose will keep all original artwork.

Childrens and Teen

 

CHILDREN'S BOOK OF THE WEEK
(20% off through March 30)

Farmers’ gardens aren’t the only ones popping up everywhere this spring! Kathryn O. Galbraith teaches us about nature’s ways of PLANTING THE WILD GARDEN (Peachtree, $15.95). Out in nature strong gusts of wind, rainstorms, small animals, and even humans can carry seeds across fields and streams to nestle in new homes. Galbraith’s lovely and whimsical descriptions of seed distribution are magnificently brought to life in the detailed illustrations. With beautiful pastel colors and fine pencil lines, Wendy Anderson Halperin depicts not only the way seeds travel, but also their stages of growth. This book is one to be treasured as both an informative peek into the natural growth of meadows and a sweet story. Ages 4-7. Amy Kane


Read about - and buy - more of our favorite books for children and teens by clicking here. 

Monday, March 28, 3:30-5:30 p.m.


CAL RIPKIN, JR. - HOTHEAD  (Hyperion, $16.99)

HotheadConnor is an all-star  shortstop, but he can’t control his temper. Threatened by the possibility that the school paper will run a story about his behavior, Connor has to learn to control himself.  This is a story told from the heart about doing your best and striving to be a credit to your team. Ages 8-12

In order to accommodate the most participation possible, we cannot accept any more signed-copy orders for customers who will not be present. Customers who want their book signed must attend the event. Cal enjoys taking time for photos with fans, but due to the amount of interest in the event, he is not be able to personalize books.

Friday, April 15, 7 p.m.

Scorpia ANTHONY HOROWITZ - SCORPIA RISING (Philomel, $17.99)

In his latest–and final—mission, Alex battles Scorpia, the world’s most dangerous terrorist organization, in one of the most treacherous regions on Earth, the Middle East. Scorpia was behind the deaths of Alex’s parents, and they’ll stop at nothing to get him, too. Ages 10 and up

When customers come into the store to pick up their copies of Scorpia Rising, they will also receive one numbered signing-line ticket per copy. The number on each ticket corresponds to a spot in line, and tickets are distributed in the order that books are picked up. Customers must come into the store to get their tickets. No tickets will be held, mailed, or given out separately.

If you cannot attend this event, we can also accept orders for signed books without personalization.

Brush up on your Alex Rider facts--we’ll have a trivia contest with prizes.  And hold on to your line signing ticket: we’ll have a drawing with one lucky winner!

 


For upcoming events and more from the Children and Teens' Department, click here.


Click here to access the teen blog.

Monday mornings at 10:30 a.m.
STORY TIME
BearSong, the Guitar Man, leads his weekly morning story time with stories, songs, finger plays, and more for children from birth to 4 years old and their caregivers.
 

MARKDOWN BOOKS

 

Markdown

One of those writers who can write about anything, the prolific Peter Ackroyd has produced histories, novels, and biographies. Combining at least two of these genres for THAMES: A Biography, Ackroyd follows the river’s 215 miles through space and time, relating stories of wrecks and treasures, famous seafarers and anonymous suicides, the history of trade and the history of sludge. He traces the cultural effects the river has had on the British imagination, and surveys the music and art inspired by the waterway; this beautifully produced volume includes samples of the latter, in both color and black-and-white.  Available in hardcover, $6.98.

A couple of great titles are back in stock:

First, from the noted series of annotated classics, THE LANDMARK HERODOTUS: The Histories, edited by Robert B. Strassler. This volume contains the full text of Herodotus’s chronicle in a new translation by Andrea L. Purvis, along with extensive notes, numerous detailed maps, and a veritable anthology of scholarly essays on various aspects of Herodotus, his times, and the subject of his work. Handsome and substantial, this book is a worthy descendent of the “father of history” Available in hardcover, $24.98.

We also have more copies of Margaret Atwood’s linked story collection, MORAL DISORDER.  The eleven pieces here trace the arc of the 20th century from the 1930s to the 1990s, but Atwood flouts traditional chronology to let the characters’ various roles cast unusual light and shadows over each other. The reader meets Nell and Tig when they’re elderly and anxious about the future. From there, she looks back to Nell’s childhood and traces the beginning of family tensions that will haunt Nell throughout her life. As always, Atwood is incisive, vivid, and witty. Available in hardcover, $6.98.

Click here to shop for more recently acquired remainders.


Laurie Greer

MUSIC NEWS

Music

NEW & RECENT

Charlie Haden Quartet West, SOPHISTICATED LADIES (Emarcy, $17.98) – Bassist Charlie Haden grew up in California, and his long-running Quartet West has always evoked the musical side of Los Angeles noir, and the Hollywood of the 1940s and 1950s. On his latest, Haden enlists some great vocalists—Norah Jones, Cassandra Wilson, Renée Fleming, Diana Krall, Melody Gardot, and Ruth Cameron—to sing mostly moody, lesser-known ballads, backed by the quartet (and a string section). Turn the lights down low, and listen.

Ian Bostridge, THREE BAROQUE TENORS (EMI Classics, $17.98) – Tenor Ian Bostridge celebrates three 18th-century tenors (John Beard, Francesco Borosini, Annibale Fabri) who inspired composers to write more for the tenor voice, and move away from the castrati range. Bostridge sings arias from Caldera, Conti, Gasparini, Handel, Scarlatti, and Vivaldi, and includes six world premier recordings from new editions and sources. 

Marc Ribot, SILENT MOVIES (Pi, $15.98) – Guitarist Marc Ribot’s Silent Movies came out last fall, and it’s been on my CD rotation ever since. Solo acoustic and electric guitar instrumentals that were written for (or inspired by) films, Silent Movies is spare and moody.

Music

 

GET YOUR JAZZ QUESTIONS READY

On Saturday, April 2, at 3:30 p.m., we’ll have a panel discussion and CD release party for the new box set, JAZZ: THE SMITHSONIAN ANTHOLOGY (Smithsonian Folkways, 6 CDs & 200-page book, $107.98). Ben Ratliff wrote a provocative front page New York Times Arts & Leisure story on the history of the Smithonian box set, and its new incarnation (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/20/arts/music/jazz-the-smithsonian-anthology-out-march-29.html?ref=music ). Come hear and talk to Larry Appelbaum from the Library of Congress and WPFW; Rob Bamberger from WAMU; Willard Jenkins from WPFW; John Hasse from the Smithsonian’s American History Museum; and Daniel Sheehy and Richard Burgess from Smithsonian Folkways. The box set comes out next Tuesday.

 

Music 3

 

 

FREE LIMITED EDITION LITHOGRAPH WITH PRE-PURCHASE OF THE

NEW RADIOHEAD CD
We have lithographs for the first five customers who pre-order the new CD by Radiohead, THE KING OF LIMBS, to be released next Tuesday.
The print (19x19) is by Stanley Donwood who is known for his previous Radiohead album artwork. Please email me: [email protected] .

Click here for news and reviews. Please call us at 202-364-1919 or email me at [email protected] to order these CDs.

András Goldinger

 

BOOK GROUPS

 

 

Politics & Prose currently hosts sixteen different book groups in the store each month.
P&P's book groups meet monthly and are free and open to the public.
These are the selections for the next week. Click the titles to read more about these books.


Thursday, March 24, 7:30 p.m.
Fascinating History Book Group
Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb, by Richard Rhodes
April 28 selection: Grand Avenues, by Scott Berg

Monday, March 28, 7:30 p.m.
Public Affairs Book Group
The Fourth Turning, by William Strauss and Neil Howe
April 25 selection: Inside the Kingdom: Kings, Clerics, Modernists, Terrorists, and the Struggle for Saudi Arabia, by Robert Lacey

Book-group titles are discounted 20% to participants. Please join us!


NEWS FROM THE COFFEEHOUSE

We've been hearing about this for some time now. Read a discussion on coffee production, consumption, commodification and culture at The New York Times "Coffee, the New Shaky Commodity". "While "peak coffee" may not be the same as peak oil, coffee is a commodity like no other. . . .What does history tell us about the role of coffee in unifying communities and advancing civilization, let alone in keeping everyone awake?"

  • Anna Petrillo

 


Politics and Prose Logo

Store Hours:
Monday-Saturday: 9 a.m.-10 p.m.
Sunday: 10 a.m.- 8 p.m.
Modern Times Coffeehouse opens daily at 8 a.m.

 


Politics & Prose Bookstore
5015 Connecticut Avenue, N.W.
Washington, DC 20008
(202) 364-1919 or
(800) 722-0790
Fax: (202) 966-7532

www.politics-prose.com
e-mail: [email protected]
twitter:@politics_prose

Directions to Politics & Prose

Modern Times Coffeehouse
(202) 362-2408

www.moderntimescoffeehouse.com
moderntimescoffeehouse.blogspot.com