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Week of October 6

Memorial Display for Carla Cohen;
Author Events with Laurence Bergreen, Steven Pinker, and Jeremy Rifkin

Popular Destinations
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Upcoming Events Offsite Events
Bestsellers
Children and TeensMusic

 

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

 

Friday, October 7
10:30 a.m. Mark Pett
The Girl Who Never Made Mistakes
(Sourcebooks/Jabberwocky, $14.99)

Friday-Saturday, October 7-8
Yom Kippur - No Evening Events

Sunday, October 9
1 p.m. Mark N. Ozer
Northwest Washington, D.C.: Tales from West of the Park
(History Press, $19.99)

4:30 p.m. Mother-Daughter Tea with Tami Lewis Brown
The Map of Me
(Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $16.99)

5 p.m. Jeremy Rifkin
The Third Industrial Revolution: How Lateral Power Is Transforming Energy, the Economy, and the World
(Palgrave Macmillan, $27)

Monday, October 10
10:30 a.m. Special Story Hour with Rocknoceros
Colonel Purple Turtle
($14.98)
7 p.m. Jeremi Suri
Liberty's Surest Guardian: American Nation-Building from the Founders to Obama
(Free Press, $28)

Tuesday, October 11
7 p.m. Melissa de la Cruz
Lost in Time (A Blue Bloods Novel)
(Hyperion, $16.99)
at the Bethesda Library
7400 Arlington Rd,
Bethesda, MD

7 p.m. Steven Pinker
The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined
(Viking, $40)

Wednesday, October 12
10:30 a.m. Monica Brown
Waiting for the Biblioburro
(Tricycle Press, $16.99)
7 p.m. Iris Krasnow
The Secret Lives of Wives: Women Share What It Really Takes to Stay Married
(Gotham, $26)

Thursday, October 13
10:30 a.m. Padma Venkatraman
Island’s End
(Putnam, $16.99)
7 p.m. Kathryn J. McGarr
The Whole Damn Deal: Robert Strauss and the Art of Politics
(PublicAffairs, $29.99)

Friday, October 14
7 p.m. Anne Enright
The Forgotten Waltz
(W. W. Norton, $25.95)

Saturday, October 15
1 p.m. Stephen Mitchell (Translator)
Homer: The Iliad
(Free Press, $35)
3:30 p.m. Vernon Loeb
King's Counsel: A Memoir of War, Espionage, and Diplomacy in the Middle East
(W. W. Norton, $26.95)
6 p.m. Eli Saslow
Ten Letters: The Stories Americans Tell Their President
(Doubleday, $25.95)

Sunday, October 16
5 p.m. David Margolick
Elizabeth and Hazel: Two Women of Little Rock
(Yale Univ., $26)


The Scoop from Brad and Lissa


Local Interest

Washington, D.C. Display and a Memorial Tribute to Carla Cohen
One of Politics and Prose’s many distinctions as an independent bookstore is its location in the nation’s capital. The store’s presence in a city dominated by political debate and focused on the actions of government has long influenced the books that P&P has chosen to sell and the events it has hosted.

This is one reason that P&P has such an extensive offering of works about current events, U.S. history, international affairs and other non-fiction writings. It’s why the store carries so many local authors drawn from the worlds of government, journalism and academia. And it’s why having the word “politics” embedded in the very name of the store makes sense.

book MachineAs P&P’s new owners, we wanted to further highlight the store’s local roots by establishing a display devoted to Washington issues and authors. The new display, which was developed by our floor staff last month, is located to the right of the Information Desk as you enter the store.

It has sections on politics, presidential biographies, and the Obama administration. It contains books about the city’s history and wide-ranging works of fiction and non-fiction by local authors. And it features the texts of plays and other books related to cultural events taking place in our area. Additionally, it has Washington-oriented gift items—from playing cards with political themes to 3-D puzzles of Washington monuments and much more.

Our attempt to create relevant and interesting displays does not stop there. We’re working on new themes for our display tables throughout the store and altering the look of our front windows. In one window this week, we have just installed a memorial tribute to P&P’s much-beloved founder, Carla Cohen, who passed away a year ago this month. The window holds a large portrait of Carla as well as a collection of a number of her favorite books.

Finally, those of you who have ventured into the fiction room in recent days have no doubt noticed that our print-on-demand machine has arrived. We’ll be spending the next few weeks preparing for its official introduction to our customers. We’re very excited, but we still need a name for it. Thanks to those of you who have emailed us suggestions. Keep ‘em coming!

Brad and Lissa

 

David's Deliberations


Carla

Carla’s Legacy: Love for Books, Community, and Discussion

I am moved by the poster of Carla, with Politics & Prose in the background and an illustrative display of Carla's favorite books in the store window. The staff created the window with love, respect and admiration for Carla, for what Carla and Barbara initiated, and what the staff and our loyal, very unbashful customers built together. Friends, and people I am meeting for the first time, have told me how touched they are by the display. Click here to see these books (and more of her favorites) online. You can also click this link to see some of the books that I think of when I think of Carla.

Carla would be so pleased with the leadership that Brad and Lissa have shown as owners. They understand and believe in the community of Politics & Prose as a setting for ideas to be exchanged and vigorously discussed with, courtesy and civility. They recognize that part of Politics & Prose is that it is a place that connects with many Washington institutions that value thought. As initiating and innovating business people, who are adapting to a changing book-selling environment, they recognize the need for change as they continue the core values of Politics & Prose.

Click here for more.

 

Fall Classes


Pen Faulkner Book Club

Pen/Faulkner Reading Series Book Club

The PEN/Faulkner Reading Series consists of nine public readings held at the Folger Shakespeare Library and the National Cathedral. The Reading Series Book Club is held in conjunction with the series, and will feature discussion of work by featured authors approximately one week before their public readings. These sessions will be led by members of the PEN/Faulkner Board of Directors and affiliated writers, and will cover work by a broad range of invited authors, including Gary Shteyngart, Ann Patchett, Emma Donoghue, and Allegra Goodman, among others. Each of the books is discounted 20% to book club registrants. Book club participants will also receive access to exclusive PEN/Faulkner pre-reading receptions attended by the authors. Learn more about PEN/Faulkner's roster of authors here.

Click here to register for these discussions - or read on for information.

 

Ta-Nehisi Coates and R. Dwayne Betts

This afternoon, Thursday, October 6, 2-4 p.m., join award-winning scholar and educator Frazier O'Leary for a literary conversation on two memoirs: The Beautiful Struggle, by Ta-Nehisi Coates (Spiegel & Grau, $15), and A Question of Freedom, by R. Dwayne Betts (Avery, $16). Coates, a senior editor at The Atlantic, and Betts, a current Radcliffe Fellow, will be the first guests in the this season’s PEN/Faulkner Reading Series, and Dr. O’Leary’s afternoon discussion of their writings will kick off the PEN/Faulkner Reading Series Book Club for 2011.  

Dr. Frazier L. O'Leary, Jr. currently teaches English and coaches baseball at Cardozo High School in Washington, D.C. He has taught English in the DC public schools for 41 years and is also an assistant professor of English at the University of the District of Columbia. He is an AP Reader in English Literature and a consultant for the College Board in English Language and Literature. He is a Charter Member of The Toni Morrison Society and Vice President of the PEN/Faulkner Foundation.

Price: $40 ($35 P&P members and Reading Series subscribers) Please call Politics & Prose at 202-364-1919 if you would like to participate.

 

Emma Donoghue and Chris Adrian

On Wednesday, November 2, 1-3 p.m., join a literary conversation on two novels: Room, by Emma Donoghue (Back Bay, $14.99) and The Great Night, by Chris Adrian (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $26).  The Washington Post called Donoghue's novel "one of the most affecting and subtly profound novels of the year," and readers have agreed---Donoghue imagines a captive five-year-old whose room is his world.  Adrian is not only a celebrated author, who was just chosen one of The New Yorker's "20 Under 40," but is also a practicing pediatric oncologist in San Francisco. His novel places A Midsummer Night's Dream smack in the Mission district, as Titania and Oberon cope with their changeling child's leukemia.

 The discussion will be led by award-winning novelist Mary Kay Zuravleff, who is the author of two novels, The Bowl Is Already Broken (Picador, $17) and The Frequency of Souls (Picador, $15), and serves on the board of PEN/Faulkner.        

Price: $40 ($35 P&P members and Reading Series subscribers) Click here to register.

 

Edith Pearlman


On Monday, November 21, 1-3 p.m., join a board member of the PEN/ Faulkner Foundation for a literary conversation on the short story collection Binocular Vision: New & Selected Stories, by Edith Pearlman (Lookout Books, $18.95).  Pearlman is this year’s recipient of the PEN/Malamud award for excellence in the art of the short story.  She has written more than 250 works of short fiction and non-fiction and has been published in The Best American Short Stories, The O. Henry Prize Collection, New Stories from the South, and The Pushacart Prize Collection: Best of the Small Presses.

Price: $40 ($35 P&P members and Reading Series subscribers) Click here to register.

 

Gish Jen and Helen Simonson

On Wednesday, November 30, 1-3 p.m., join PEN/Faulkner board member Tracy McGillivary, and PEN/Faulkner’s Deputy Director, Emma Snyder, for a literary conversation on two novels: World and Town, by Gish Jen (Vintage, $15.95) and Major Pettigrew's Last Stand, by Helen Simonson (Random House, $15). Jen is a recipient of numerous awards, including the Lannan Award for Fiction and the Strauss Living Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.  Simonson, a graduate of the London School of Economics and former travel advertising executive, and her debut, set in her native England, has been a bestseller.

Price: $40 ($35 P&P members and Reading Series subscribers) Click here to register.


Click here to learn about our other classes currently offered.

Ticketed Events


 

Monday, October 17, 7 p.m.

Bill BrysonBill Bryson
At Home (Anchor, $15.95 / Doubleday, $28.95)
at Sixth & I Synagogue
600 I Street, NW

Bryson’s informative and genial chronicle of the evolution of the modern household might be subtitled “a short history of nearly everything in the house.” Moving room by room through his own abode, a 19th-century rural parsonage, he finds in the layout and objects a wealth of history on everything from disease to landscaping to lighting. Join us for the paperback release of this instant favorite.

Two free tickets will be provided with each purchase of the book (paperback or hardcover) from P&P. Additional tickets are $10 (or $12 the day of the event).

Pre-purchased books and tickets may be picked up at Politics & Prose. On October 17, the day of the event, books and tickets may be collected at the event Will Call at Sixth & I Synagogue. Doors open at 6 p.m. and the event begins promptly at 7 with General Admission seating.

Click here to purchase the book and tickets.


Monday, October 31, 7 p.m.

EugenidesJeffrey Eugenides
The Marriage Plot (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $28)
at Sixth & I Synagogue
600 I Street, NW

Mitchell, Madeleine, and Leonard: a classic triangle, but in the hands of the masterful author of The Virgin Suicides and Middlesex, the story of these three college classmates is much more. Set in the early 1980s, the novel chronicles the characters’ experiences as they finish college and face the “real” world. Given illness, unrequited love, and impossible models like Mother Teresa, of what help to them is semiotics, Jane Austen, or even Darwin?

Two free tickets will be provided with each purchase of the book from P&P. Additional tickets are $12 (or $15 the day of the event).

Pre-purchased books and tickets may be picked up at Politics & Prose beginning October 11. On October 31, the day of the event, books and tickets may be collected at the event Will Call at Sixth & I Synagogue. Doors open at 6 p.m. and the event begins promptly at 7 with General Admission seating.

Click here to purchase the book and tickets.



Monday, November 7, 7 p.m.

Five ChiefsThe Honorable John Paul Stevens
Five Chiefs
(Little Brown, $24.99)
at Sixth & I Synagogue
600 I Street, NW

John Paul Stevens knew the Supreme Court under five Chief Justices:  He clerked for Vinson; practiced before Warren; was a circuit judge and junior justice for Berger; and was a colleague of Rehnquist and current Chief Justice Roberts.  His tenure on the High Court from 1975 to 2010 was the third longest in history.  That unparalleled experience informs his remarkable memoir. Justice Stevens will be in-conversation with Judge David S. Tatel, who was appointed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in 1994.

Two free tickets will be provided with each purchase of the book from P&P. Additional tickets are $12 (or $15 the day of the event).

Pre-purchased books and tickets may be picked up at Politics & Prose through November 6. On November 7, the day of the event, books and tickets may be collected at the event Will Call at Sixth & I Synagogue. Doors open at 6 p.m. and the event begins promptly at 7 with General Admission seating.

Click here to purchase the book and tickets.


Wednesday, November 9, 7 p.m.

EccoUmberto Eco
The Prague Cemetery
(Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $27)
at Sixth & I Synagogue
600 I Street, NW

Eco’s historical novel dramatizes some of the most shocking ideas and events of nineteenth-century Europe. His protagonist, a montage of actual figures, is the man behind The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and numerous conspiracies of a like nature. The challenge Eco set himself here was to invent a character who’s “the most cynical and disagreeable in all the history of literature.” Eco will be in conversation with the novelist Keith Donohue (Centuries of June, Crown, $24, May 2011)

Two free tickets will be provided with each purchase of the book from P&P. Additional tickets are $12 (or $15 the day of the event).

Pre-purchased books and tickets may be picked up at Politics & Prose on November 8. On November 9, the day of the event, books and tickets may be collected at the event Will Call at Sixth & I Synagogue. Doors open at 6 p.m. and the event begins promptly at 7 with General Admission seating.

Click here to purchase the book and tickets.

 

Wednesday, November 16, 7 p.m.

Michael OndaatjeMichael Ondaatje
The Cat's Table
(Knopf, $26)
at Sixth & I Synagogue
600 I Street, NW

Set on a ship bound from Colombo to England in the 1950s, the haunting new novel by the Booker Prize-winning author of The English Patient is the coming-of-age story of an eleven-year-old boy. Finding unlikely tutors on jazz, literature, and women among his fellow passengers, the boy also glimpses things he doesn’t understand, from a mysterious shackled man to the elusive Miss Lasqueti.

Two free tickets will be provided with each purchase of the book from P&P. Additional tickets are $12 (or $15 the day of the event).

Pre-purchased books and tickets may be picked up at Politics & Prose through November 15. On November 16, the day of the event, books and tickets may be collected at the event Will Call at Sixth & I Synagogue. Doors open at 6 p.m. and the event begins promptly at 7 with General Admission seating.

Click here to purchase the book and tickets.


Signed Books of the Week


 

Signed

Lionheart
signed by Sharon Kay PenmanBottom of Form
(Marian Wood/Putnam, $28.95)
Hardcover - October 4, 2011
First editions, first printings

Feynman
signed by Jim Ottaviani
(First Second, $29.99)
Hardcover - August 30, 2011
First editions, first printings

 

Sidelines of the Week


Greeting Cards

Waldo Pancake Greeting Cards

We are happy to introduce a clever new line of greeting cards from Waldo Pancake in England. These bold (cheeky) cards offer the best of dry, British humor and cover the gamut of special occasions. Each card (with envelope) costs $3.03 and is made from recycled or environmentally-sensitive materials. We are proud that P&P is one of the few retailers to offer this collection of Waldo Pancake cards on this side of the pond.
Lissa Muscatine

calendar

Mutter Museum Calender

For those looking for an off-kilter gift, the Mutter Museum’s 2012 calendar (Blast Books, $19.95) is perfect for the infinitely curious. A distinguished group of photographers fuse medical science with high art in 12 stunning photographs. Each month presents a new biological oddity that leaves the viewer in awe of the intricate and delicate nature of the human form.  Images in this calendar are not for the squeamish - severed heads, genetic mutations, and skulls (oh my!) - may leave some feeling uneasy. However, for those who can stomach it, the Mutter Museum offers a fascinating and strangely beautiful calendar that will most likely hang around your house long after 2012 is over.
Mark Moran

 

EBooks of the Week


 

Ebooks

Alice Waters and Chez Panisse by Thomas McNamee and R.W. Apple (Penguin / Google eBook, $4.99 )

With great skill, McNamee traces the history of one of America's most respected restaurants. Waters stands at the center of this culinary world, but it's the array of eccentric, talented people who come into her life at opportune moments that makes this biography unlike any other. McNamee sets the scene with great precision: you can smell the food cooking in the open kitchen and hear the raucous laughter of the satiated, boisterous customers. You'll want to plant a garden and throw the most lavish dinner party with your crop. Conor Moran

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer (Mariner/ Google eBook$3.99)

Just in time for the movie, a special limited time offer from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt and Mariner Books!

Jonathan Safran Foer emerged as one of the most original writers of his generation with his best-selling debut novel, Everything Is Illuminated. With humor, tenderness, and awe, he confronts the trauma of our recent history. Nine-year-old Oskar Schell has embarked on an urgent, secret mission that will take him through the five boroughs of New York. His goal is to find the lock that matches a mysterious key that belonged to his father, who died in the World Trade Center on the morning of September 11. This seemingly impossible task will bring Oskar into contact with survivors of all sorts on an exhilarating, affecting, often hilarious, and ultimately healing journey.

Click here to see more recommended eBooks and to learn more about buying eBooks from Politics & Prose.

 

P&P Bestsellers


 

Bestsellers

All Politics & Prose Weekly Hardcover Bestsellers are 20% off for Members.
These are our top two titles. Click to see which other fiction and non-fiction books we are discounting this week.

River of Smoke, by Amitav Ghosh (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $28)
The Quest: Energy, Security, and the Remaking of the Modern World, by Daniel Yergin (Penguin Press, $37.95)

 

 

Coming Soon to Your Favorite Bookstore


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

Events

Thursday, October 6, 7 p.m.

Laurence Bergreen
Columbus: The Four Voyages
(Viking, $35)
With chronicles of Marco Polo and Magellan under his belt, Bergreen is a proven master of the history of adventure. Here he moves on to Columbus, telling the story not just of the famous 1492 expedition, but of the three other trips the Genoan made to the New World. All undertaken within a ten-year span, these voyages together reveal Columbus as both brilliant and deluded, strong yet fallible.

Friday, October 7,10:30 a.m.

Mark Pett
The Girl Who Never Made Mistakes
(Sourcebooks/Jabberwocky, $14.99)
Beatrice lived in constant fear of making a mistake, until a juggling fiasco taught her that a mistake is not the end of the world—and that it can even be funny. Ages 4-7.

Friday-Saturday, October 7-8

Yom Kippur - No Evening Events

Sunday, October 9, 1 p.m.

Mark N. Ozer
Northwest Washington, D.C.: Tales from West of the Park
(History Press, $19.99)
Author of Massachusetts Avenue in the Gilded Age and Washington, D.C.: Politics and Place, Ozer is the city’s unofficial resident historian. His new book offers a guided tour of the densely populated sector that includes Georgetown, Tenleytown, and Cleveland Park, communities rich in history, grand architecture, and colorful figures.

Sunday, October 9, 4:30 p.m.

Mother-Daughter Tea with Tami Lewis Brown
The Map of Me
(Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $16.99)
This is a ticketed event; seating is limited. Please call the store for details.
Twelve-year-old Margie is the daughter of a woman who loves things that have to do with chickens. When her mother leaves one day, Margie knows just where to find her, and she drives her father’s Ford to the International Poultry Hall of Fame to bring Momma home. Ages 8-10.

Events

Sunday, October 9, 5 p.m.

Jeremy Rifkin
The Third Industrial Revolution: How Lateral Power Is Transforming Energy, the Economy, and the World
(Palgrave Macmillan, $27)
The latest book from the visionary author of The Empathic Civilization, The European Dream, and others, presents an innovative outline for energy self-sufficiency. Based on projects already under way in Europe, Rifkin’s plan uses the way information is generated and shared on the Internet as a paradigm for how individuals will form a new green-energy grid.

Monday, October 10, 10:30 a.m.

Special Story Hour with Rocknoceros
Colonel Purple Turtle
($14.98)
Having already released three award-winning records, Rocknoceros has released their first kid-friendly concept album, Colonel Purple Turtle. This album tells tales of the Colonel and his friends in their make-believe home of Soggy Bog. The theme is one of friendship and working together, a subject that matters to the three members of Rocknoceros, as Coach, Boogie Woogie Bennie, and Williebob have been best friends since they were children.

Monday, October 10, 7 p.m.

Jeremi Suri
Liberty's Surest Guardian: American Nation-Building from the Founders to Obama
(Free Press, $28)
Suri’s history of America as a country of nation-builders looks back to the Founding Fathers. Their legacy, he argues, advocates that we encourage popular sovereignty around the world. Yet history also shows how often the U.S. has faltered. Suri, author of Power and Protest, cites a range of examples, including World War II and the Vietnam War, to guide our actions in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Tuesday, October 11, 7 p.m.

Melissa de la Cruz
Lost in Time (A Blue Bloods Novel)
(Hyperion, $16.99)
at the Bethesda Library
7400 Arlington Rd
Bethesda, MD
In the sixth installment of the bestselling Blue Bloods series, Schuyler Van Alen and Jack Force have to separate. As Schuyler goes to Egypt in search of the Gate of Promise, which is very different from what she was led to believe, Jack returns to New York, where he faces a difficult decision involving Mimi. Ages 12 and up.

Events

Tuesday, October 11, 7 p.m.

Steven Pinker
The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined
(Viking, $40)
In his new book, the cognitive scientist, author of How the Mind Works (W.W. Norton, $19.95), and professor of psychology at Harvard, uses his broad expertise—plus some history and sociology—to examine the human propensity for violence. While we’ve always been a violent species, Pinker finds that we have been growing less so in recent decades.

Wednesday, October 12, 10:30 a.m.

Monica Brown
Waiting for the Biblioburro
(Tricycle, $16.99)
Based on Luis Soriano, a Colombian librarian who uses burros to take books to people in remote areas, this is the story of Ana, a girl who loves to read but has no access to a library until Soriano brings one to her. The text by the two-time Pura Belpré honor-winner is illustrated with Spanish words and colorful drawings. Ages 6-8.

Wednesday, October 12, 7 p.m.

Iris Krasnow
The Secret Lives of Wives: Women Share What It Really Takes to Stay Married
(Gotham, $26)
While divorce rates often make the news, what of the still-married rates? Krasnow, author of Surrendering to Marriage, Surrendering to Motherhood, and other books, has interviewed some 200 women whose marriages have lasted for as long as 70 years; here she explores how these wives have made their unions work while not losing sight of themselves.

Thursday, October 13, 10:30 a.m.

Padma Venkatraman
Island’s End
(Putnam, $16.99)
The author’s experience on the Andaman Islands inspired this story of Uido, a girl selected as her tribe’s future leader. Among her challenges are her brother’s jealousy and the temptations of modern life brought by visitors from the mainland. Ages 11-14.

Events

Thursday, October 13, 7 p.m.

Kathryn J. McGarr
The Whole Damn Deal: Robert Strauss and the Art of Politics
(PublicAffairs, $29.99)
In her first book, McGarr, whose work as appeared in Politico, chronicles the life and, as important, the times of Robert S. Strauss. Granted extensive access to her subject, McGarr portrays the presidential advisor, ambassador, special trade representative, and chair of the Democratic National Committee not only as a superb politician, but as emblematic of the kind of productive, bipartisan figure sorely missed in Washington today.

Friday, October 14, 7 p.m.

Anne Enright
The Forgotten Waltz
(W. W. Norton, $25.95)
Enright’s first novel since the 2007 Man Booker-winner, The Gathering, is Gina Moynihan’s account of a recent affair with a serial philanderer. But this is a love story with multiple focuses and several twists. As Gina awaits the arrival of her lover’s troubled teenage daughter, a snowstorm brings post-boom Dublin to a halt, creating perfect conditions for Enright’s distinctive wry, dark, and startling voice.

Saturday, October 15, 1 p.m.

Stephen Mitchell (Translator)
Homer: The Iliad
(Free Press, $35)
Mitchell’s achievements as a translator are nearly unparalleled. From ancient epics like Gilgamesh to literary classics like Rilke’s poetry, from the Tao Te Ching toThe Bhagavad Gita to The Book of Job, he’s rendered timeless texts in today’s English. His new version of the ancient Greek tale of the Trojan War is a masterpiece of scholarship and craft.

Saturday, October 15, 3:30 p.m.

Vernon Loeb
King's Counsel: A Memoir of War, Espionage, and Diplomacy in the Middle East
(W. W. Norton, $26.95)
The late Jack O'Connell was CIA station chief in Amman from 1963 to 1971; thereafter, he served as King Hussein's U.S. attorney and Jordan's lobbyist. In his memoir, written with Loeb, a Washington Post editor, he portrays the Jordanian leader as a more passionate force for peace in the region than either the U.S. or Israel. Jack O'Connell's son, Sean, will be representing his father at this event and will be speaking alongside Vernon Loeb.

Events

Saturday, October 15, 6 p.m.

Eli Saslow
Ten Letters: The Stories Americans Tell Their President
(Doubleday, $25.95)
Every day, President Obama reads ten representative letters among the thousands he receives from citizens across the land. The letters come from people of all ages, walks of life, and political points of view. Saslow, a reporter at the Washington Post, became fascinated by the power of these letters and set out to find the stories behind them.

Sunday, October 16, 5 p.m.

David Margolick
Elizabeth and Hazel: Two Women of Little Rock
(Yale Univ., $26)
One indelible image from the civil rights movement is that of a black student enduring taunts as she enters Little Rock Central High School in 1957. The student was Elizabeth Eckford, and the jeering white classmate behind her was Hazel Bryan Massery. What happened to the two young women next is the subject of Margolick’s dual biography/narrative history. The author of Beyond Glory and Strange Fruit, Margolick brings a veteran journalist’s insights about race and America to this pivotal moment.

 

P&P Customers Are Also Invited To . . .


Politics & Prose sells books at many book signing parties and events. The events below are open to the public; however, reservations and tickets should be acquired from the hosting organization. Please contact [email protected] if you are planning an event and would like us to supply the books.

Thursday, October 6, 7 p.m.

ChopraSixth & I
600 I Street, NW
Metro: Gallery Place/Chinatown
Deepak Chopra and Leonard Mlodinow
War of the Worldviews: Science vs. Spirituality (Harmony, $26)

Two bestselling authors debate the most fundamental questions of human existence.

How did the universe begin? Where did life come from? Is there design in nature?

War of the Worldviews opens the public's eyes to the fascinating frontier where knowledge and mystery converge and every assumption about life, God, and the universe are open to debate. Moderated by Timothy Shriver, Chairman, Board of Directors and CEO of the Special Olympics.

Purchase $30 tickets (each includes one copy of the book) by clicking here. If you have questions, please call Sixth & I at 202-408-3100.

Thursday, October 6, 6:30 p.m.

Suffering of Light

Mexican Cultural Institute
2829, 16th Street, NW
A Photographer’s Journey: A Conversation with Alex Webb
Suffering of Light: 30 Years of Photographs (Aperture, $65)

In this artist talk, Webb will present his most recent monograph, which is largely drawn from his work in Latin America; provide insight into his fascinating photographs of the US/ Mexican border, featured in the current exhibition Mexico Through the Lens of National Geographic; and converse with Juan García de Oteyza about the important role of photographs and photographers in shaping our understanding of people and places. Copies of The Suffering of Light will be available for purchase.

[email protected]. (202) 728-1628

Friday, October 7, 7:30 p.m.

RollinsNational Geographic Live
1145, 17th Street NW

Music on…Photography
Henry Rollins
Occupants (Chicago Review, $35)

For 30 years, Henry Rollins—spoken word artist and former Black Flag frontman—has traveled to the world’s toughest corners, sharing observations through words, images, and music. His new book pairs Rollins’s visceral full-color photographs with powerful writings, creating a testimony to resilience in the face of anger and suffering.

Read Henry’s blog on the Nat Geo Channel site, and read an interview with him on the Nat Geo Music site. Watch a video of Henry Rollins on the Nat Geo WILD channel.

Click here for more information and for $40 tickets. (NG Members: $38)

Wednesday, October 12, 7:30 p.m.

Wonderful

National Geographic Live
1145, 17th Street NW

Music on…Photography
Pattie Boyd

Wonderful Tonight: George Harrison, Eric Clapton, and Me (Three Rivers, $14.95)

British fashion model and wife to two of music’s greatest legends, Pattie Boyd experienced firsthand the defining musical events of the ‘60s and ‘70s, documenting them intimately in photos. Inspiration for George Harrison’s “Something” and Eric Clapton’s “Layla,” Boyd will share images of their lives together.

Click here for more information and for $40 tickets. (NG Members: $38)

Thursday, October 13, 7:30 p.m.

Top SecretFriendship Heights Village Center
4433 S. Park Avenue
Chevy Chase, MD

Dana Priest
Top Secret America: The Rise of the New American Security State (Little, Brown, $27.99)

The two-year investigation revealed that the government has built a national security and intelligence system so large, complex, and difficult to manage, that nobody knows if it is actually keeping citizens safe.

Dana Priest is an investigative reporter for The Washington Post. She has won numerous awards, including the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for public service for "The Other Walter Reed" and the 2006 Pulitzer for beat reporting for her work on CIA secret prisons and counterterrorism operations overseas. Ms. Priest and her co-author, William M. Arkin, won a George Polk Award for National Reporting for the July 2010 Post series "Top Secret America.” 

Please sign up in advance for this FREE event by calling the Village Center at 301-656-2797. Copies of the book, provided by Politics & Prose, will be available for purchase.

 

From the Children and Teens' Department


Children's Book of the Week

Childrens(20% off through October 12)

His neighbors’ trash was Simon Rodia’s treasure. Uncle Sam, as he was known, collected tiles, glass, and broken pottery. He turned them into an amazing work of folk art: the Watts Towers. His work is a monument to his adopted homeland, which invited him to Dream Something Big (Dial, $17.99). Author Dianna Hutts Aston tells the story of the Watts Towers through the eyes of Marguerite, Rodia’s neighbor who helped him collect materials as a child and marveled at his finished work as an adult. Collage artist Susan L. Roth accurately and beautifully depicts the towers as a colorful potpourri. The author’s note provides facts about the towers and instructions for creating your own. Ages 5-9. Heidi Powell

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

 

Mother Daughter Tea

Brown

 

Sunday, October 9, 4:30 p.m.
Mothers and daughters, join us for tea with author Tami Lewis Brown, who will discuss her first novel, The Map of Me (Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, $16.99). Twelve-year-old Margie is the daughter of a woman who loves things that have to do with chickens. When her mother leaves one day, Margie knows just where to find her, and she drives her father’s Ford to the International Poultry Hall of Fame to bring Momma home. Ages 8-10.

This mother-daughter tea is a ticketed event. Please call the store at 202-364-1919 for details. Seating is limited. The cost is $10 per person or $8 for members. We will be serving light refreshments.

 

 

 

Story Hour

 

Story Time

 

Story hour with BearSong and his guitar takes place in the Children and Teens' Department each Monday at 10:30 a.m., Please join us each week for storytelling and music for children from birth to 5 years old.

 

Turtle

On Monday, October 10, Rocknoceros will visit for a special story hour to celebrate the release of their newest album Colonel Purple Turtle (Allegro/NewSound, $14.98) and companion book Colonel Purple Turtle’s Purple Turtle Journal (Rocknoceros, $9.98).

Having already released three award-winning records, Rocknoceros will be releasing their first kid-friendly concept album, Colonel Purple Turtle. This album tells tales of the Colonel and his friends in their make-believe home of Soggy Bog. The theme of "Colonel Purple Turtle" is one of friendship and working together, a subject that matters to Coach, Boogie Woogie Bennie, and Williebob, as the three members of Rocknoceros have been best friends since they were children. For more information, please check out their website: www.rocknoceros.com. If you cannot attend, you can still order the CD and book by clicking here.

Sign up here to receive email updates about the Politics & Prose story hour. We will inform you of special story hours, changes or cancellations.

 

Markdown Books


Markdown

Siberia occupies one-seventh of the land on Earth; what’s there? In his most recent book, Travels in Siberia, Ian Frazier, intrepid traveler, New Yorker contributor, and author of Great Plains and On the Rez, among others, recounts his unforgettable meetings not just with the present inhabitants of the region, both human and animal, but also with the many ghosts of the past, from 1820s Decembrist revolutionaries to Communist-era political prisoners. Available in hardcover, $9.98.

Another hardy world traveler is Sara Wheeler, author of Terra Incognita: Travels in Antarctica and Travels in a Thin Country. Her latest expedition took her to the northernmost point of the planet, and in The Magnetic North: Notes from the Arctic Circle, she visits the parts of Russia, Alaska, Canada, Denmark, Norway, and Finland that lie at the North Pole, reporting on the distinct cultures, languages, and natural environment of each region. While each of the various sectors of the Pole has its own native traditions, all share the consequences of economic hardship and climate change. To put the current situation in perspective, Wheeler looks back to earlier European explorers, comparing the impressions of then and now. Available in hardcover, $5.98.

Adolescence—not everyone survives it. In Paul Murray’s moving, funny, and honest novel, Skippy Dies, one Daniel “Skippy” Juster, of Dublin’s Seabrook College for boys, makes it only to age fourteen, collapsing in a donut shop. But who is responsible for this sad (or fitting) end? Murray lets the full tragicomic drama of young adulthood play out here, with a cast of colorful and rambunctious characters ranging from the precocious string-theory expert to the budding Casanova to Skippy’s beloved. Available in hardcover, $5.98.

Please call us at 202-364-1919 or stop by the store to shop for these discounted titles.

Laurie Greer

 

 

Music News


music

NEW

The Lost Notebooks of Hank Williams (Columbia, $13.98) – Hank Williams left several notebooks full of song lyrics which were never completed with melodies. Bob Dylan took on the project to enlist some Hank aficionados to write tunes to these lyrics. Highlights include songs by Norah Jones (with Gillian Welch and David Rawlings), Lucinda Williams, Vince Gill and Rodney Crowell, Levon Helm, Merle Haggard, Patty Loveless, and Hank’s granddaughter, Holly Williams. There are waltzes aplenty, and the sound of fiddles and pedal steel is very welcome, indeed.

 

 

PIANISTS, SOLO & DUET

Music

Solo:

Pierre-Laurent Aimard, The Liszt Project (Deutsche Grammophon, 2 CDs, $24.98) – Aimard is one of the most adventurous pianists on the world stage, and his programming of pieces is audacious and enlightening. On this 2-CD project, he juxtaposes works by Liszt with works by Wagner, Scriabin, Berg, Bartók, Ravel, Stroppa, and Ravel to demonstrate Liszt’s modernism and his long-lasting influence.

Alexandre Tharaud, Bach: Keyboard Concertos (Virgin Classics, $17.98) – Tharaud translates the baroque repertoire to the piano superlatively (he’s done wonders with Couperin, Rameau, and solo Bach). He’s followed up his solo recital disc from March, Plays Scarlatti, with a selection of Bach’s keyboard concertos, featuring Les Violons du Roy, conducted by Bernard Labadie.

Jean-Efflam Bavouzet, Haydn: Piano Sonatas, Vol. 3 (Chandos, $18.99) – After tackling five volumes of Debussy to great acclaim, Bavouzet is continuing his Haydn project, resulting in yet more accolades.

 

Duets:

MusicChick Corea & Stefano Bollani, Orvieto (ECM, $18.98) – Recorded live at the 2010 Umbria Jazz Winter, Orvieto is a standout; Corea and Bollani work out on classics blues, bossas, and standards, as well as original, and two spontaneous improvisations.

Brad Mehldau & Kevin Hays, Modern Music (Nonesuch, $17.98) – Mehldau and Hays took a different approach: they engaged composer Patrick Zimmerli to write original compositions and to arrange pieces by Steve Reich (an excerpt from Music for 18 Musicians), Philip Glass, and Ornette Coleman. The two pianists improvise on these themes to great effect.

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

András Goldinger

Book Groups


P&P's book groups meet monthly and are free and open to the public.

Thursday, October 6, 7:30 p.m.

Capital James Joyce
Paradiso, Canto One (Musa Translation), by Dante

Monday, October 10, 7:30 p.m.

Women's Biography
Lakota Woman, by Mary Crow Dog
November 14 selection: Inheriting China, by Margaret Hollister

Tuesday, October 11, 7:30 p.m.

Evening Fiction
A Visit From the Goon Squad, by Jennifer Egan
November 8 selection: The Fixer, by Bernard Malamud

Wednesday, October 12, 7:30 p.m.

Lez Read
The Stone Gods, by Jeanette Winterson
November 9 selection: Zami: A New Spelling of My Name, by Audre Lorde

Thursday, October 13

Science Fiction and Fantasy
6 p.m. Fantasy : Drowntide, by Van Scyoc
7:30 p.m. Science Fiction : The Left Hand of Darkness, by Ursula K. LeGuin
November 10 Fantasy selection: Children of Hurin, by Christopher Tolkien
November 10 Science Fiction selection: Dune, by Frank Herbert

Sunday, October 16, 6 p.m.

Spirituality
The Future of Faith, by Harvey Cox
November 20 selection: What is God?, by Jacon Needleham

 

 

News from the Coffeehouse


MillModern Times Coffeehouse is pleased to share their newest art show, “Peirce Mill: 200 Years in the Nation’s Capital,” an historical exhibit featuring the works of Washington designers/artists Katherine Lenard and Mary Belcher. The exhibit tells the story of a Quaker milling family, which became one of the largest landholders in Washington during the 19th century, and the later transformation of the Rock Creek Park mill into a beloved landmark operated by the National Park Service.

The show coincides with the re-opening of the mill after it was closed for 20 years. For more information on Friends of Pierce Mill, check out their website or their Facebook page.

An opening reception will be held from 6 to 8 p.m. tonight, Thursday, October 6 at the Coffeehouse to celebrate the exhibit. Complementary food and drink will be provided to guests, and wi-fi will be turned off during those hours.


Click here for more news from the Modern Times blog or to follow them on Twitter.

 



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