Canadian mystery writer Maureen Jennings, author of the popular Detective Murdoch series, discusses No Known Grave, the last in her trilogy of WWII mysteries featuring small-town detective inspector Tom Tyler. Signing.
Deepak Singh‘s memoir Chasing America: Of Lollipops, Night Clubs and Ferocious Dogs is an anthropological view of his journey from urban India to rural America. Describing encounters tinged with both racism and understanding, he offers insights into the world of working class Indian immigrants. Singh is a freelance journalist who has worked for the BBC World Service and regularly contributes to PRI’s The World.
Signing to follow.
Local Authors Brunch is a panel discussion over brunch with several local writers, including Susan Wineberg (Historic Ann Arbor: An Architectural Guide), Dina Shtull (Why the Rabbi Played Clarinet in the Sauna),Judith Elkin (The Jews of Latin America), P’ninah & Karl Kanai (Kanooo Zoo), Robin Goldberg (The Sound of Seeds), and Eric Keller (Dogs I Have Known: Brooklyn Dogs and Dogs I have Known: Artists, Poets, and Philosophers).
Journalist Gail Sheehy discusses Daring, My Passages, her new memoir about her experiences as a groundbreaking “girl” journalist in the 1960s.
Oliver Horowitz discusses An American Caddie in St. Andrew’s: Growing Up, Girls, and Looping on the Old Course, his coming-of-age memoir about his experience as a Harvard student working as a caddie at the venerable Scottish golf course.
Jeff Kass reads from his latest Dzanc Books poetry collection, My Beautiful Hook-Nosed Beauty Queen Strut Wave, alongside emerging poet Eli Denning, who’s debut collection is now out on Red Beard Press.
Kass is the author of Knuckleheads, a finalist for Foreword Reviews Best Short Fiction Collection of 2011, and several chapbooks. He currently teaches Creative Writing and Tenth Grade English at Pioneer High School in Ann Arbor and directs the Literary Arts Program at Ann Arbor’s Teen Center, The Neutral Zone, where he founded and continues to direct The VOLUME Youth Poetry Project; The VOLUME Summer Institute; The Ann Arbor Youth Poetry Slam; Poetry Night in Ann Arbor; Red Beard Press; and the performance poetry troupe Ann Arbor Wordworks. He was the Ann Arbor Grand Slam Poetry Champion in 1999 and 2000 and the runner-up in 2001 as well as the Champion at the inaugural Ann Arbor Book Festival Poetry Slam in 2004. He currently serves as a member of the Board of Directors for the Ann Arbor Book Festival.
Fielding Graduate University (Santa Barbara) Institute for Social Innovation fellow Zieva Konvisser discusses Living Beyond Terrorism: Israeli Stories of Hope and Healing, her collection of stories by ordinary people who became victims of terrorist attacks in Israel.
U-M lecturer Julie Babcock launches her debut poetry collection, Autoplay, released by local micro-press MG Press.
Babcock is a Pushcart Prize nominee and recipient of grants and fellowships from the Indiana Arts Commission and the Vermont Studio Center. Her poems have appeared in various journals and anthologies including The Iowa Review, Hayden’s Ferry Review, and Plume. She lived the first twenty years of her life in Ohio, then she made a circle around the Midwest and currently teaches at U-M.
Israeli-American novelist and essayist Ayelet Waldman discusses Love and Treasure, her new novel, set in Salzburg in 1945, about a Jewish American army officer charged with guarding a captured train filled with unspeakable riches.
Children’s book author and illustrator Chris Raschka has received many awards and recognitions for his work. In 1992, he won the Best Books of the Year citation, Publisher’s Weekly, the Notable Children’s Book citation, American Library Association (ALA), and the Pick of the Lists citation, American Booksellers Association, all for Charlie Parker Played Be Bop. In 1994, he received the Caldecott Honor Book Award, and he was the ALA and U.S. winner of the UNICEF-Ezra Jack Keats award, both for Yo! Yes? Raschka was awarded the Caldecott Medal in 2006 for The Hello, Goodbye Window, and a second Caldecott Medal in 2012 for A Ball for Daisy, his first wordless book. The New York Times describes him as “a master of spare, rhythmic language and lively, intriguing illustration.” Today Raschka has over fifty children’s books to his credit.
