Laura Kasischke’s most recent book, from which she will read, brings new poems together with work from her previous nine collections of poetry, published over the last twenty-five years. The citation for the National Book Critics Circle Award, which she received in 2011, reads: “No poet alive has worked harder to depict the contemporary American life course: she has shown herself, in sharply vivid poems, as a girl, as a wayward teen, as a young adult, as a passionate and worried mother with a baby, a child, and now a teenaged son…And no poet now at work does better than Kasischke in finding ways to depict not just how we feel about life stages and the people in them but also how we change as those stages go by…Kasischke stands for many among us.” Her collection of new and selected poems gathers together the breadth of this vision, and Kasischke will offer readings from both her earliest and most recent work.
For questions, contact Julie Sparkman at jmallard@umich.edu
Literati is excited to welcome author Richard Retyi who will be discussing his debut book The Book of Ann Arbor: An Extremely Serious History Book. Rich will discuss his book—one of the inaugural releases from the Ann Arbor District Library’s Fifth Avenue Press—as well as reading one of the 41 stories from the book, with photos, music, and details that just wouldn’t fit on the page. He’s also open to answering questions from the audience, no matter how shockingly personal in nature.
About The Book of Ann Arbor:
A suicide submarine parade. Ann Arbor’s top 10 astronauts. Shakey Jake, the Embassy Hotel, and train/building collisions. The birth of Iggy Pop. Nazis getting punched. Visits from heads of state, from presidents to a dictator. The Music Mobile, the Naked Mile and a round-the-world flight. Plus, a few tales of murder, because it happens here too. These are a few of the stories that make up The Book of Ann Arbor.
Richard Retyi is the communications and marketing manager at the Ann Arbor District Library and part of the Ann Arbor Stories podcast.
Literati is excited to welcome sportswriter Angelique Chengelis who will be sharing and discussing her new book, Michigan Man: Jim Harbaugh and the Rebirth of Wolverine Football.
About Michigan Man:
All eyes and ears turned toward Ann Arbor in late 2014 when it was announced that Jim Harbaugh would be returning to the Big House as the new head coach of Michigan football. Now, Angelique Chengelis, longtime chronicler of the Wolverines for the Detroit News, gives the inside story on how exactly Harbaugh restored the Michigan program to national title contender status. Learn how he instilled a new culture and rankled rivals with outspokenness, creative tactics, and relentless recruiting. Get the behind-the-scenes story on how and why Harbaugh chose to come back to the university he led to glory as its starting quarterback in the early 1980s. Follow along as Jabrill Peppers, Jake Butt, and others develop into true stars. Michigan Man is a comeback tale, an examination of the rapid turnaround from a five-win team in 2014 to squads that earned 10 wins plus trips to the Citrus and Orange Bowls in 2015 and 2016 respectively. Featuring extensive interviews with Harbaugh himself, this is a book Wolverines faithful and football fans in general will not want to miss.
Angelique Chengelis is a sportswriter for the Detroit News. Michigan football has been her primary beat since 1992, but she has covered countless sporting events including Super Bowls, U.S. Opens, PGA Championships, Ryder Cups, Stanley Cup Finals, NBA Finals, Indianapolis 500, Daytona 500, and NCAA men’s and women’s basketball tournaments. She has also been a contributor to ESPN’s NASCAR coverage as part of the NASCAR Now show. She lives in Detroit, Michigan
We are thrilled to welcome professors Philip J. Deloria and Alexander I. Olson to Literati Bookstore to discuss their latest book, American Studies: A User’s Guide.
About American Studies: A User’s Guide
American Studies has long been a home for adventurous students seeking to understand the culture and politics of the United States. This welcoming spirit has found appeal around the world, but at the heart of the field is an identity crisis. Nearly every effort to articulate an American Studies methodology has been rejected for fear of losing intellectual flexibility and freedom. But what if these fears are misplaced? Providing a fresh look at American Studies in practice, this book contends that a shared set of “rules” can offer a springboard to creativity. American Studies: A User’s Guide offers readers a critical introduction to the history and methods of the field as well as useful strategies for interpretation, curation, analysis, and theory
Philip J. Deloria is Carroll Smith-Rosenberg Collegiate Professor of American Culture and History at the University of Michigan. He is a former president of the American Studies Association.
Alexander I. Olson is Assistant Professor in the Mahurin Honors College at Western Kentucky University.
Brooklyn-based chefs Liz Alpern and Jeffrey Yoskowitz, co-owners of the Gifilteria, a restaurant specializing in reimagined Ashkenazi cuisine (including their signature artisanal gefilte fish), host a meal showcasing the Eastern European Jewish food featured in their cookbook The Gefilte Manifesto: New Recipes for Old World Jewish Foods. Alpern studied under the “queen of American Jewish cooking,” U-M grad Joan Nathan. The menu includes root vegetable latkes with apple-pear sauce and an Ashkenazi-inspired version of kimchi, crispy chicken with tsimmes (an Ashkenazi root vegetable stew), and more. Vegetarian option available. Also, a candle-lighting ceremony to commemorate the 1st night of Hannukah.
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6-9 p.m., EMU Student Center Ballroom B, 900 Oakwood, Ypsilanti. $36. Preregistration required by Dec. 5. at 487-6692 or at tinyurl.com/y8c59kc5.
Zingerman’s co-founder Ari Weinzweig interviews Italian fine food importer Rolando Beramendi about his new cookbook, Autentico: Cooking Italian, the Authentic Way.Tastings of some of Zingerman’s Italian pantry items.
6:30-8:30 p.m., Zingerman’s Deli, 422 Detroit St. $55 (includes one autographed copy of the book and a 20% coupon for the deli). Reservations required. 663-3354.
Local short story writer Alex Kourvo and young adult novelist Bethany Neal discuss the complicated relationship between plot and character development. For adult and teen (grade 6 & up) fiction and nonfiction writers. Also, Kourvo and Neal host an open house for writers to connect with one another and/or work on their projects at 7 p.m. on Jan. 29.
7-8:45 p.m., AADL Westgate Branch. Free. 327-8301
Jessica Shattuck is the award-winning author of The Hazards of Good Breeding, which was a New York Times Notable Book and finalist for the PEN/Winship Award, and Perfect Life. Her writing has appeared in the New York Times, New Yorker, Glamour, Mother Jones, Wired, and The Believer, among other publications. A graduate of Harvard University, she received her MFA from Columbia University. She lives with her husband and three children in Brookline, Massachusetts.
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.
Join our triple header on Sunday, January 13 at 2, when we welcome book club favorite and RC creative writing alumna Carrie Smith, who has a new Claire Codella novel out, Unholy City; C.M. Gleason, who is joining the mystery community with her first mystery Murder in the Lincoln White House; and popular teacher and poetry slammer, Jeff Kass, whose first mystery Takedown was just published by the new press at the Ann Arbor District Library.
Yale Law School constitutional law professor James Forman Jr., a former Washington, D.C., public defender, discusses his book. In 1997, Forman founded the Maya Angelou Public Charter School, an alternative school for dropouts and youth who had previously been arrested. Signing.
4-5:30 p.m., 1225 South Hall, 701 S. State. Free. 764-4705.
