Grass Roots Books and Music — 227 SW 2nd Street, Corvallis OR 97339 — 541-754-7668
April 03, 2014
Contents
Newest Books
New in Paperback
Featured Books for Young Readers
Music
Events
News
This Week's Puzzle
Reading Group Selection
On Our Nightstands
Grass Roots Online — Contact Us
 
 

We are celebrating poetry all month long at Grass Roots. We have our first poetry reading of the month this Friday, April 4, with Holly Hughes. If you'd like a daily dose of poetry but don't want anything else clogging up your email, you can catch our Poem-A-Day on our Facebook page. If you're a poet yourself, don't forget to sign up for our Third Annual Community Poetry Night on April 30. It's an open mic event, but everyone is welcome to sit back and enjoy the variety of talent without reading. Please register to read prior to the event by stopping by Grass Roots Books & Music, call at 541-754-7668, or send an email to [email protected].

~Jenny

 
Newest Books

Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt

Michael Lewis

Michael Lewis establishes four inspiring characters within a financial sector that seems, as of late, grim at best: Wall Street. The flash boys decide, after working in different firms and making millions, they will come together in an attempt to amend the rampant corruption so deeply associated with the stock market. The boys embark on an investigation to shed light on big banks, the word�s stock exchange, and high-frequency trading firms in a comprehensive way that will give readers necessary insight into the pitfalls (and solutions) to the financial market.

Hardcover, $27.95

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company; ISBN: 9780393244663

A Sliver of Light: Three Americans Imprisoned in Iran

Shane Bauer, Joshua Fattal, and Sarah Shourd

�In this jointly authored memoir, three young, globetrotting journalists recount their two-year imprisonment in Iran. Bauer, Josh Fattal, and Sarah Shourd inadvertently hiked into unmarked Iranian territory where they were arrested and taken to a prison to be interrogated. The book details how the three rebelled against captivity by relying on one another for support and coordinating group hunger strikes. The trio describe with forceful detail how, despite frequent moves between prisons, they developed intense and diverse relationships with their captors.� �from Booklist

Hardcover, $27.00

Publisher: Eamon Dolan/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt; ISBN: 9780547985534

Frog Music

Emma Donoghue

�Donoghue flawlessly combines literary eloquence and vigorous plotting in her first full-fledged mystery, a work as original and multifaceted as its young murder victim. During the scorching summer of 1876, Jenny Bonnet, an enigmatic cross-dressing bicyclist who traps frogs for San Francisco�s restaurants, meets her death in a railroad saloon on the city�s outskirts. Exotic dancer Blanche Beunon, a French immigrant living in Chinatown, thinks she knows who shot her friend and why, but has no leverage to prove it and doesn�t know if she herself was the intended target. A compulsive pleasure-seeker estranged from her �fancy man,� Blanche searches desperately for her missing son while pursuing justice for Jenny, but finds her two goals sit in conflict.��from Booklist, Starred Review

Hardcover, $27.00

Publisher: Little Brown and Company; ISBN: 9780316324687

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New Life, No Instructions: A Memoir

Gail Caldwell

Writing about a sudden and dramatic change midlife, Gail Caldwell exposes the pain of absence just when she thought she had her life figured out. Explaining that she wanted to write a memoir about that great loss, Caldwell reminds us she simultaneously wishes to expose the healing process as an offer of hope. As humans, we will all experience, in some form or another, what Caldwell went through, and New Life, No Instructions gives us an alternative storyline to perpetual heartbreak, frustration, and angst.

Hardcover, $23.00

Publisher: Random House; ISBN: 9781400069545

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Family Life

Akhil Sharma

The Mishra family live in Delhi in 1978, waiting for the father to send over tickets to join him in America. When this finally happens, the children view their new home as a miracle land�magical elevators, automatic glass doors. The world suddenly seems theirs for the taking. That is, however, until tragedy strikes and one of the young boys ends up permanently brain damaged, while the other finds himself an orphan in a strange, new land.

Hardcover, $23.95

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company; ISBN: 9780393060058

 
New in Paperback
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Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal

Mary Roach

�In her latest rollicking foray into taboo, icky, and underappreciated aspects of the human body, best-selling science writer Roach takes readers on a wild ride down the alimentary canal. . . [Roach] begins this hilarious, mind-expanding inquiry into eating, digestion, and elimination with the symbiosis between smell and taste, guided by an olfactorily gifted �sensory analyst,� then profiles Horace Fletcher, proponent of a rigorous chewing routine known as �Fletcherizing� practiced by Henry James and Franz Kafka. We learn more than one can imagine about saliva and our passion for crispy and crunchy foods. Given Roach�s fascination with what we find disgusting, scientific obsessions and bizarre experiments, and horrifying things we do to ourselves, the stories get stranger as she proceeds down the body.� �from Booklist, Starred Review

Paperback, $15.95

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company; ISBN: 9780393348743

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The Other Typist

Suzanne Rindell

Rose Baker works for the New York City Police Department, and her job is to type. But perhaps it is more complicated than that�after all, Rose is one of the few keen ears to the city�s notorious criminal players, outrageous passions, and confessions of sin. Would it be expecting too much to wonder if she could stay out of the grim parts of their world? When Odalie joins her team of typists, the answer seems to be no�not completely.

Paperback, $16.00

Publisher: Berkley Publishing Group; ISBN: 9780425268421

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Tomorrow There Will Be Apricots

Jessica Soffer

�When 14-year-old Lorca is discovered cutting herself at school and is suspended, her mother decides to send her to a private school. Hoping to dissuade her, Lorca sets out to find a recipe for Masgouf, an obscure Iraqi dish that her mother, a chef, once said was the most delicious thing she had ever tasted. Lorca�s quest leads her to Victoria, an elderly Iraqi-Jewish immigrant who can teach her how to make the dish. Both lost souls, the two bond and soon begin to suspect there is a connection between them larger than that of teacher and student. Told in Victoria and Lorca�s alternating first-person voices, the character-driven novel focuses, sometimes microscopically, on the characters� troubled emotional lives.��from Booklist

Paperback, $14.95

Publisher: Mariner Books; ISBN: 9780544289734

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The Autistic Brain: Helping Different Kinds of Minds Succeed

Temple Grandin and Richard Panek

�Grandin is the face of autism. Because of her work, the general public is now aware of what was until fairly recently a strange, disturbing, and essentially unknowable condition. In her latest book, Grandin not only discusses her own experiences with autism but also explains the latest technological advances in the study of the disorder, including the genetics of autism. . . ��from Booklist

Paperback, $15.95

Publisher: Mariner Books; ISBN: 9780544227736

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Bunny Buddhism: Hopping Along the Path to Enlightenment

Krista Lester

Based on a much-followed Twitter feed, Bunny Buddhism offers whimsy and wisdom in the easy and compassionate arch of one bunny hop at a time. As an inspirational guide with such maxims as "What the bunny mind dwells on, the bunny becomes," and "The wise bunny knows the carrot will not hop to him," readers will learn that at the very heart of Buddhist philosophy is simplicity, optimism, and calm generosity.

Paperback, $14.00

Publisher: Penguin Group; ISBN: 9780399167874

 
Featured Books for Young Readers

Star Wars Lightsaber Thumb Wrestling

Chronicle Books

Ages 6 and Up

This Star Wars game in a book provides hours of fun for thumb-wrestling masters or their apprentices. Opponents Velcro on the lightsabers included (one blue, one red); open the book to one of seven durable "game board" pages depicting classic Star Wars battles; stick their thumbs through the holes; and use the Force (of thumb and imagination) to wrestle to victory!

Hardcover, $12.99

Publisher: Chronicle Books; ISBN: 9781452125749

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House of Secrets: Battle of the Beasts

Chris Columbus and Ned Vizzini

Ages 8 to 12

Since the siblings' last adventure in House of Secrets, life in the Walker household is much improved�the family is rich and the Wind Witch is banished. But no Walker will be safe until she is found, and summoning her to San Francisco brings all the danger that comes with her and puts the Walkers in the crosshairs of a mysterious journey through Denver Kristoff's books. As the Walkers travel from ancient Rome to World War II to Tibet, they'll be tested in ways that cut deeper than before, by Denver Kristoff, the Wind Witch, and each other.

Hardcover, $17.99

Publisher: Balzer & Bray/Harperteen; ISBN: 9780062192493

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Panic

Lauren Oliver

Young Adult


�Oliver brings the survivalist competition of the Hunger Games series to present day New York State, where newly graduated seniors can take part in an annual game called Panic. In a small town where factory closures laid off 40 percent of the population, students are understandably concerned about financial security, and Panic awards the ultimate winner a sizable cash jackpot gathered from mandatory contributions from all high-school students. . . Told in alternating chapters by Heather and Dodge, two players with siblings to protect and avenge, Oliver's novel is a wholly believable and compulsively readable tale of friendship, loyalty, survival, and courage.� �from Booklist

 

Hardcover, $17.99

Publisher: HarperCollins; ISBN: 9780062014559

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Music

Robert Cray Band

In My Soul

Genre: Jazz/Blues

Blues Hall of Fame guitarist is backed by a few new bandmates for this new record, inspired by the sounds of Memphis soul. Smooth originals are paired with covers of tunes originally by Isaac Hayes, Otis Redding, and more.
($15.95)

Holmes Brothers

Brotherhood

Genre: Jazz/Blues

Sherman and Wendell Holmes and Popsy Dixon combine their voices for an upbeat mix of gospel, R&B, and Americana. Their new record features more originals than usual, in addition to cuts written by Ted Hawkins, Ike Turner, and others.
($17.95)

Infamous Stringdusters

Let It Go

Genre: Pop/Folk

The prolific "new-grass" band releases its fifth studio album since their 2007 debut. The Stringdusters' sound is rooted in bluegrass, but incorporates shades of Americana, pop, and jam rock for an upbeat blend.
($12.95)

Various Artists

Looking Into You: A Tribute to Jackson Browne

Genre: Pop/Folk

California singer-songwriter Jackson Browne released his debut record in 1967. This double disc tribute features a wide range of artists paying tribute to Browne's work, including cuts from Lucinda Williams, Bonnie Raitt, Lyle Lovett, and more.
($24.95)

Carrie Newcomer

A Permeable Life

Genre: Pop/Folk

Carrie Newcomer's contemporary folk is characterized by her "warm voice, exquisite melodies and an irreverent yet spiritual view of the world" (carrienewcomer.com). Her new collection is the companion piece to her first book of poems and essays.
($15.95)

Nickel Creek

Dotted Line

Genre: Pop/Folk

Chris Thile, Sean Watkins, and Sara Watkins began playing together before most of them were even teenagers. Following a productive hiatus, they reunite for an album combining bluegrass, folk, and indie pop.
($18.95)

 
Events

Friday, April 4, 7 p.m.

Grass Roots Books & Music

227 SW 2nd St., Corvallis

Holly Hughes

Sailing by Ravens

Mariner and naturalist Holly Hughes has experienced first-hand the practical and philosophical consequences of navigating difficult waters. In Sailing by Ravens, she gathers wisdom gained from thirty seasons working off Alaska's shores, weaving personal experience and her love of the sea with the history and science of navigation. In this collection of poems, she deftly navigates "the wavering, certain path" of a woman's heart, finding that sometimes the best directions to follow are those that come from the natural forces in our lives.

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Wed., April 9, 7:00 p.m.

Grass Roots Books & Music

227 SW 2nd St., Corvallis

Abby Phillips Metzger

Meander Scars

These stories explore the scarring of the Willamette River region from an environmentalist�s point of view, taking care to illuminate the tender areas of riparian beauty that remain. For all those interested in nature conservation, sustainability, and the great outdoors.

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Thursday, April 10, 7:00 p.m.

Grass Roots Books & Music

227 SW 2nd St., Corvallis

Tim Paulson

Gentle Savage Still Seeking the End of the Spear

The saga of the Waorani has not ended. The great River Curaray, which bathes its lands in the Ecuadorian Amazon, feeds its people, transports its canoes, and conceals its history, then follows its winding course all the way to the sea, so that those who have died and were left on its beaches may rise up as story teller for us who remain. Gentle Savage is a tribute to the oral traditions of a people who did not know how to forgive, but along their pathway learned to do so. This remarkable narration is a rustic song that emerges out of indigenous culture with all the voices of liberty that our own moral censure does not know how to fully appreciate.

Upcoming Events

We have many more events coming up in the next few months! For a complete list of all of our upcoming events, please visit our website.

 
Community Events

Community Events

Darkside Cinema: Movies showing 04/3 to 04/10, showtimes daily, Darkside Cinema, Corvallis. Visit their website for showtimes.

  • Like Father, Like Son�NR A moving drama about parenthood from Japanese filmmaker Hirokazu Kore-eda. It�s well-acted and quietly powerful without settling for easy solutions for its unique dilemma.
  • Enemy�R �Enemy is a bewilderingly skillful metaphysical thriller combining Swiss-watch engineering and surrealism, like one of Dali's melted timepieces.� Star Tribune
  • Philomena�Pg-13 Equal parts uplifting tearjerker, odd-couple comedy, and righteous screed against abuse of power in the name of religion. Judi Dench.
  • Tim�s Vermeer�Pg-13 You don't even need to care about art to be entertained by this clever, swift documentary.


Opportunities:

  • Spring Creek Project Hosting environmental artist Ian Boyden Tuesday, April 8, 7 p.m., MU Journey Room at OSU. The free event will serve as the launch for the Spring Creek Project�s second annual Campus Creature Census.
    Boyden�s �Avian Flame� involved casting self-portraits out of bird seed, then watching and photographing as the seed-busts were fought over, shared, and ultimately consumed over the course of a week. Boyden will show video and photographs from the project, and offer reflections on the process of entering into the perceptual realities of other-than-human organisms.
    Ian Boyden works across multiple media including painting, sculpture, artist's books, photography, site-specific installations, and land art. Boyden's work has been described as simultaneously geological, industrial, lyrical, and mystical. He studied for several years in China and Japan, and ultimately received degrees in the History of Art from Wesleyan University and Yale University. His website is: http://ianboyden.com/
  • Writers on the River Playing with Poetry Forms, presented by Linda Varsell Smith Monday, April 21, 6:30-8:30 p.m., Dennis Hall at the First Presbyterian Church, 114 SW 8th St., Corvallis, OR 97333
    Using a free handbook and PowerPoint, we will play with new and favorite rhymed and unrhymed poetry patterns. Suggestions for further poetic word-play.
    Linda Varsell Smith has published 8 poetry books�two books on free-access websites on forms. She taught poetry and creative writing at LBCC and Calyx editor for 31 years. Former president of Oregon Poetry Association and current president of Portland PEN Women.

Ticket Sales: Grass Roots sells tickets for local music events. Please call or stop by the store to see what's currently available.

 

 

Thursday, April 3, 7-8:30 p.m.

Corvallis-Benton County Public Library

645 NW Monroe Ave, Corvallis, OR 97330

Diane Hammond
Friday's Harbor Orcas in Captivity

With the release of the controversial documentary Blackfish, killer whale captivity has become a hot-button topic. Novelist Diane Hammond will give a slide presentation about her experiences as killer whale Keiko's press secretary in the late 1990's and how it inspired her latest novel, Friday's Harbor.

Books will be available for purchase from Grass Roots Books & Music at this event.

Wed., April 16, 7:30 p.m.

121 The Valley Library

Oregon State University Corvallis, Oregon

Steve McQuiddy

Here on the Edge

Twenty years in the making and packed with original research, Steve McQuiddy�s Here on the Edge is the definitive history of the Fine Arts Group at Waldport during World War II, documenting how their pacifist actions resonated far beyond the borders of the camp. This reading will appeal to readers interested in peace studies, World War II history, influences on the 1960s generation, and in the rich social and cultural history of the West Coast.

Books will be available for purchase from Grass Roots Books & Music at this event.

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News

World Book Night Update

We didn�t forget about you! The World Book Night (WBN) coordinators are working around the clock to organize book drop-offs and contact lists for more than 6,000 cities and towns across the U.S. When your books arrive, you�ll be the first to know! We are excited to get this year�s WBN underway and hold events for book givers to get together and share their plans and experiences.

One such event, the Book Giver Reception, will be a casual event held on Tuesday, April 15, from 4:30-6 p.m. at Grass Roots. You can drop-in and meet other Book Givers and pick-up your giver box. After you hand out your books during WBN on April 23, we hope to have you all back at Grass Roots for another event where you can discuss your WBN experience (details forthcoming).

Third Annual Community Poetry Night

Celebrate National Poetry Month with Grass Roots during an Open Mic event in the bookstore on Wednesday, April 30, 6:30-8:30 p.m. Local poets and poetry fans are invited to read their own work, or a favorite poem by someone else. Everyone is welcome to sit back and enjoy the variety of talent without reading. Participants will be asked to sign up before the event, but everyone is welcome to read, time permitting. Please plan on limiting your reading to 5 minutes. To register, please stop by Grass Roots Books & Music, call at 541-754-7668, or send an email to [email protected].

Book Awards

 

The Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards recognize books that have made important contributions to our understanding of racism and our appreciation of the rich diversity of human cultures. For over 79 years, the distinguished books earning Anisfield-Wolf prizes have opened and challenged our minds. This year�s winners include A Constellation of Vital Phenomena by Anthony Marra, The Big Smoke by Adrian Matejka, and My Promised Land by Ari Shavit. Visit their website to see the complete list.

 

Pen/Faulkner Award for 2014 goes to Karen Joy Fowler for We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves. Check out the Pen/Faulkner website for details about Ms. Fowler and the other finalists.

 
This Week's Puzzle



Solve this week's jigsaw.
 
Reading Group Selection

Tuesday, May 6, 6:30-8:00 p.m.

This Boy�s Life: A Memoir

Tobias Wolff

Adam will be leading our April reading group discussion of This Boy�s Life by Tobias Wolff.

This winner of the PEN/Faulkner Award for fiction writes a memoir that brings to life the stuff of boyhood�from paper routes to whiskey, fistfights to friendship and betrayal�and captures as well America in the fifties. Separated by divorce from his father and brother, Toby and his mother are constantly on the move, yet they develop an extraordinarily close, almost telepathic relationship. As Toby fights for identity and self-respect against the unrelenting hostility of a new stepfather, his experiences are at once poignant and comical, and Wolff does a masterful job of re-creating the frustrations and cruelties of adolescence.

Stay tuned for more information on Tobias Wolff receiving the Stone Award for Lifetime Literary Achievement through Oregon State University�s School of Writing, Literature, and Film this May!

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Publisher: Grove Press

ISBN: 9780802136688

Paperback

Regular price: $15.95 US

On sale for $13.56 until May 5.

 

 

On Our Nightstands

Ne�

Alive at the Center: Contemporary Poems from the Pacific Northwest (Pacific Poetry Project)

Various Editors

What better way to kick-off National Poetry Month than to start with a compilation of Pacific Northwest poets? Alive at the Center is divided into three sections, each featuring poets of a different city: Portland, Seattle, and Vancouver, British Columbia. Each section is a journey into the past and present; every page dripping with life and distinct perspective of this place we call home. This is a beautiful anthology of familiar sights and sounds�reminders of special and sometimes peculiar things we�ve take for granted or failed to notice. It even features local favorites of Corvallis including: Jennifer Richter, Clemens Starck, and Donna Henderson.

Paperback, $18.95

Publisher: Ooligan Press; ISBN: 9781932010497

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Linda

The Lost Battles: Leonardo, Michelangelo, and the Artistic Duel That Defined the Renaissance

Jonathan Jones

A rich time in Renaissance Florence is so well defined and documented in this engaging book that one feels like you are in the midst of the events of the day. In the early 1500s, both Leonardo and Michelangelo were commissioned to paint murals of two separate Florentine battles in the Great Council Hall. This purposeful competition was politically set up by the head of state to prove who was "the greatest artist in the world." Jones was able to draw on Leonardo's notebooks, Michelangelo's poems, and government records to make it possible to understand this intense cultural period.

Paperback, $17.00

Publisher: Vintage Books; ISBN: 9780307741783

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Jenny

Vampires in the Lemon Grove: And Other Stories

Karen Russell

I've admired Karen Russell's writing since I first read her short story "Haunting Olivia" in the New Yorker. Her unapologetic embrace of contemporary fabulism breathes a lot of fresh air into the general fiction world, and Vampires in the Lemon Grove is no exception. The title story and "The New Veterans" are my two favorites in the collection for their mixture of human longing/regret blended seamlessly with vampire routine and protean tattoo art. Russell takes the basics of the human heart and lights it with a magical candle.

Paperback, $14.95

Publisher: Vintage Books; ISBN: 9780307947475

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