Literati is delighted to welcome James Kakalios in support of his new book, The Physics of Everyday Things: The Extraordinary Science Behind an Ordinary Day.
Physics professor, bestselling author, and dynamic storyteller James Kakalios reveals the mind-bending science behind the seemingly basic things that keep our daily lives running, from our smart phones and digital “clouds” to x-ray machines and hybrid vehicles.
Most of us are clueless when it comes to the physics that makes our modern world so convenient. What’s the simple science behind motion sensors, touch screens, and toasters? How do we glide through tolls using an E-Z Pass, or find our way to new places using GPS? In The Physics of Everyday Things, James Kakalios takes us on an amazing journey into the subatomic marvels that underlie so much of what we use and take for granted.
Breaking down the world of things into a single day, Kakalios engages our curiosity about how our refrigerators keep food cool, how a plane manages to remain airborne, and how our wrist fitness monitors keep track of our steps. Each explanation is coupled with a story revealing the interplay of the astonishing invisible forces that surround us. Through this “narrative physics,” The Physics of Everyday Things demonstrates that—far from the abstractions conjured by terms like the Higgs Boson, black holes, and gravity waves—sophisticated science is also quite practical. With his signature clarity and inventiveness, Kakalios ignites our imaginations and enthralls us with the principles that make up our lives.
Literati is pleased to welcome Laura Hulthen Thomas in support of her debut collection, States of Motion.
Newton’s Laws of Motion describe the relationship between a body and its response to the forces acting upon it. For the men and women in States of Motion, imbalance is a way of life. Set in Michigan small towns both real and fictional, the stories in Laura Hulthen Thomas’s collection take place against a backdrop of economic turmoil and the domestic cost of the war on terror. As familiar places, privilege, and faith disappear, what remains leaves these broken characters wondering what hope is left for them. These stories follow blue collars and white, cops and immigrants, and mothers and sons as they defend a world that is quickly vanishing.
The eight stories in States of Motion follow tough, quixotic characters struggling to reinvent themselves even as they cling to what they’ve lost. A grieving father embraces his town’s suspicions of him as the sole suspect in his daughter’s disappearance. A driving instructor struggles to care for his abusive mother between training lessons with two flirtatious teens. A behavioral researcher studying the fear response must face her own fears when her childhood attacker returns to ask for her forgiveness. Conditioned by their traumatic pasts to be both sympathetic and numb to suffering, the characters in these stories clutch at a chance to find peace on the other side of terror. From the isolated roadways of Michigan’s countryside to the research labs of a major university, the way forward is both one last hope and a deep-seated fear.
Laura Hulthen Thomas’s short fiction and essays have appeared in a number of journals and anthologies, including The Cimarron Review, Nimrod International Journal, Epiphany, and Witness. She received her MFA in fiction writing from Warren Wilson College. She currently heads the undergraduate creative writing program at the University of Michigan’s Residential College, where she teaches fiction and creative nonfiction.
Literati is pleased to welcome Gina Sorell in support of her debut novel, Mothers and Other Strangers, a Literati staff pick.
My father proposed to my mother at gunpoint when she was nineteen, and knowing that she was already pregnant with a dead man’s child, she accepted. Thus begins this riveting story of a woman’s quest to understand her recently deceased mother, a glamorous, cruel narcissist who left her only child, Elsie, an inheritance of debts and mysteries. While coping with threats that she suspects are coming from the cult-like spiritual program her mother belonged to, Elsie works to unravel the message her dying mother left for her, a quest that ultimately takes her to the South African family homestead she never knew existed.
Born in South Africa and raised in Canada, Gina Sorell now resides in Toronto, and lives in a world of words. Some of those words are: writer, namer, creative director, artist, daughter, sister, wife and mother. After two decades as a working actor of stage and screen in NYC, LA, and Toronto, Gina decided to return to her first love–writing, and graduated with distinction from UCLA Extension Writers’ Program. Gina likes to balance out the long solitary hours of novel writing, with her work as a Creative Director of Eat My Words, a SF based branding firm, where she collaborates all day long with innovators and entrepreneurs whose identity she establishes with only one word, their name.
Literati is delighted to welcome Josh Malerman back to the store in support of his new novel, Black Mad Wheel.
From the author of the hit literary horror debut Bird Box (“Hitchcockian.” —USA Today) comes a chilling novel about a group of musicians conscripted by the US government to track down the source of a strange and debilitating sound.
The Danes—the band known as the “Darlings of Detroit”—are washed up and desperate for inspiration, eager to once again have a number one hit. That is, until an agent from the US Army approaches them. Will they travel to an African desert and track down the source of a mysterious and malevolent sound? Under the guidance of their front man, Philip Tonka, the Danes embark on a harrowing journey through the scorching desert—a trip that takes Tonka into the heart of an ominous and twisted conspiracy.
Meanwhile, in a nondescript Midwestern hospital, a nurse named Ellen tends to a patient recovering from a near-fatal accident. The circumstances that led to his injuries are mysterious—and his body heals at a remarkable rate. Ellen will do the impossible for this enigmatic patient, who reveals more about his accident with each passing day.
Part Heart of Darkness, part Lost, Josh Malerman’s breathtaking new novel plunges us into the depths of psychological horror, where you can’t always believe everything you hear.
Josh Malerman is the acclaimed author of Bird Box, as well as the lead singer and songwriter for the rock band The High Strung. He lives in Michigan.
Reading by this Grand Valley State University creative writing professor, a widely published poet and former Grand Rapids Press assistant sports editor whose most recent collection is Ha Ha Ha Thump. The program begins with open mike readings.
7-8:30 p.m., Sweetwaters Coffee & Tea, 123 W. Washington. Free. 994-6663
Readings by Joliet Junior College English professor Bill Yarrow, a widely published poet who edits the Blue Fifth Review, and Zilka Joseph, a local poet known for her vividly figured explorations of the natural world whose latest collection is Sharp Blue Search of Flame. Followed by a poetry and short fiction open mike.
Literati is pleased to welcome Toby Altman and Katie Hartsock in support of their most recent publications.
Toby Altman is the author of Arcadia, Indiana (Plays Inverse, 2017) as well as five previous chapbooks, including Security Theater (Present Tense Pamphlets, 2016). His poems can or will be found in Crazyhorse, Jubilat, Lana Turner, and other journals. He is currently completing a PhD in Poetry and Poetics at Northwestern University.
Katie Hartsock‘s debut poetry collection, Bed of Impatiens, was published by Able Muse Press. She is the author of two poetry chapbooks: Hotels, Motels, and Extended Stays, published by Toadlily Press in their 2014 Quartet Series, and Veritas Caput (Passim Editions, 2015). Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Beloit Poetry Journal, Crab Orchard Review, DIAGRAM, Hanging Loose, H_NGM_N, Massachusetts Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, Midwestern Gothic, and elsewhere.
2-4 p.m., Ann Arbor District Library Freespace (3rd floor), 343 S. Fifth Ave. Free. 971-5763.
Literati Bookstore is pleased to welcome acclaimed filmmaker Whit Stillman, in conversation with Literati bookseller Sam Krowchenko, in support of Love & Friendship: In Which Jane Austen’s Lady Susan Vernon Is Entirely Vindicated.
A sharp comedy of manners, and a fiendishly funny treat for Jane Austen and Whit Stillman fans alike Impossibly beautiful, disarmingly witty, and completely self-absorbed: Meet Lady Susan Vernon, both the heart and the thorn of Love & Friendship. Recently widowed with a daughter who’s coming of age as quickly as their funds are dwindling, Lady Susan makes it her mission to find them wealthy husbands–and fast. But when her attempts to secure their futures result only in the wrath of a prominent conquest’s wife and the title of ‘most accomplished coquette in England’, Lady Susan must rethink her strategy. Unannounced, she arrives at her brother-in-law’s country estate. Here she intends to take refuge – in no less than luxury, of course – from the colorful rumors trailing her, while finding another avenue to ‘I do’. Before the scandalizing gossip can run its course, though, romantic triangles ensue.
“A postmodern confection [that’s] very, very funny.”–Penelope Green, New York Times
“In the ever-booming Austen spinoff industry, where paeans to Mr. Darcy are the norm, rewriting a work of the master’s in the guise of one of her detractors makes for an eccentrically cheeky tribute.”–Alexandra Schwartz, New Yorker
“A merry comedy of pride, prejudice, and duplicity…. Silly, sly, eccentric characters and brisk chatter make for a diverting romp.”–Kirkus Reviews
“Lady Susan is finally getting some long overdue respect.”–Alexandra Alter, New York Times
Whit Stillman–winner of France’s Prix Fitzgerald for his prior novel–is the writer-director of five films, including Metropolitan, Barcelona, The Last Days of Disco, Damsels in Distress, and Love & Friendship, a mendacious representation of this story. At university, he was an editor of the Harvard Crimson, and he later worked in book publishing and journalism. His first novel, The Last Days of Disco, With Cocktails at Petrossian Afterwards, was also derived from a film story.
Sam Krowchenko is the host of Literati Bookstore’s podcast Shelf Talking. His work has appeared in Salon, Full Stop, and The Michigan Quartely Review. He is an MFA candidate at the Helen Zell Writers’ Program.
Literati is pleased to welcome Courtney Maum back to Ann Arbor in support of her second novel, Touch. Courtney will be joined in conversation by Callie Collins, a member of the Helen Zell Writers’ Program and co-director of independent press A Strange Object.
About Touch: Sloane Jacobsen was the foreseer of “the swipe,” among many other successful premonitions, and global fashion, lifestyle, and tech companies pay to hear her opinions on the future of everything from clothes to gadgets, food and families. Sloane’s recent forecasts on the family are definitive and unwavering: the world is over-populated, and with unemployment, college costs, and food prices all on the rise, having children is an indulgence. These predictions are also what brings her from Paris to New York City to work for the tech-giant, Mammoth, as their in-house trend forecaster for six months.
But not far into her contract, she begins to sense the undeniable signs of a movement against electronics that will see people embracing compassion, empathy, and “in-personism” again. She’s struggling with the fact that her predictions are hopelessly out of sync with her employers’ mission when her partner, the French “neo-sensualist” Roman Bellard, reveals that he is about to publish an op-ed on the death of penetrative sex. Still, Sloane becomes convinced that her instincts are the right ones, and goes on a quest to bring compassion and humanism to others, while finally allowing the love and connectedness she’s long been denying herself.
With the same mixture of wit and sincerity that won her debut novel so many fans, Touch is a poignant reminder to keep our heads up and our hearts open in our modern lives. It is a thoughtful, of-the-moment exploration of real-life concerns—that is truly another “book for everyone” (as the Washington Post said of her first) —and also explores prescient issues of technology, family, and artificial intelligence in a sophisticated and entertaining way.
“Touch is so smart that even its comic absurdities quiver with wisdom, as an anti-mom and a neo-sensualist confirm our suspicion that the lives of trendsetters aren’t quite what they appear to be. Courtney Maum’s writing is sharp and complex—prepare to be touched by this novel is ways you might not expect.”—Elizabeth McKenzie, author of The Portable Veblen
“Our modern world is at once hyper-connected and hyper-alienating, and in this magical/terrible time, Courtney Maum’s latest novel offers us a balm, a solution, a call to action, or, at the very least, time away from our smartphones to read a compelling, perceptive, and moving story about the state of human intimacy and love in our contemporary era. Touch is at once wry and sincere, funny and serious, and you won’t be able to put it down.”—Edan Lepucki, author of California
“What begins as a satirical romp through the fields of trend forecasting and technology in Courtney Maum’s Touch deepens into a trenchant and wise portrait of what it means to be fully human at a time when the culture is trying its hardest to make us only partially so.”—Teddy Wayne, author of Loner and The Love Song of Johnny Valentine
Courtney Maum is the author of the celebrated novel I Am Having So Much Fun Here Without You and her short fiction, book reviews, and essays on the writing life have been widely published in outlets such as The New York Times, Tin House, Electric Literature, and Buzzfeed. She has also co-written films that have debuted at Sundance and won awards at Cannes. At various points in her life, she has been a trend forecaster herself, a fashion publicist, and a party promoter for Corona Extra. She currently works as a product namer for M·A·C cosmetics from her home in Litchfield County, CT, where she lives with her husband and daughter.
