Sunday, April 1
4:30 p.m.
Tupelo Hassman
Girlchild
Farrar, Straus, & Giroux
Fierce and darkly funny, Girlchild tells the story of Rory Dawn Hendrix, the least likely of Girl Scouts, a smart survivor growing up in a Reno trailer park filled with lively and destructive fellow residents. Told in brief, hard-hitting chapters formed around various documents including notes from the welfare department, newspaper clippings, personal letters, report cards, and a Supreme Court case summary, Girlchild is an indelible coming of age story praised by Publishers Weekly for its "powerful writing and unflinching clarity."
"This amazing debut spills over with love but is still absolutely unflinching and real. That is no easy combo to pull off but Tupelo Hassman does it repeatedly with precision and grace." — Aimee Bender
Wednesday, April 4
7:30 p.m.
Wendy McClure
The Wilder Life: My Adventures in the Lost World of Little House on the Prairie
Riverhead
Like millions of American women, when Wendy McClure was a girl, she longed for the life represented in Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House on the Prairie series. In The Wilder Life, McClure's heartfelt and hilarious new book, she describes her adult quest to find the lost world of Laura Ingalls Wilder once and for all. The result is an incredibly funny first-person account of obsessive reading and a story about what happens when we reconnect with our childhood touchstones. McClure is a columnist for Bust magazine and author of the memoir I'm Not the New Me. Her work has appeared in the New York Times Magazine and on This American Life.
Thursday, April 5
7:30 p.m.
Jessica Maria Tuccelli
Glow
Viking
In the autumn of 1941, Amelia J. McGee, a young woman of Cherokee and Scotch-Irish descent and an outspoken pamphleteer for the NAACP, hastily sends her daughter, Ella, alone on a bus home to Georgia in the middle of the night—a desperate measure that proves calamitous when the child encounters two drifters and is left for dead on the side of the road. Ella awakens in the homestead of Willie Mae Cotton, a wise root doctor and former slave, and her partner, Mary-Mary Freeborn. As Ella heals, the secrets of her lineage are revealed. Tackling issues of race and lineage in the vein of Edward P. Jones's The Known World or Amy Greene's Bloodroot, Tuccelli's Glow is a luminous debut novel full of ghosts both real and imagined.
Thursday, April 12
7:30 p.m.
Michelle Gamble-Risley
California Girl Chronicles: Brea and the City of Plastic
3L Publishing
The California Girl Chronicles reveals the sometimes tragically misguided but often humorous professional and romantic adventures of aspiring filmmaker Brea Harper: smart, ambitious, sexually empowered, and spray tanned. Forced to work in the demoralizing world of "bikini hell" to make ends meet, Brea pursues her dreams of being a filmmaker, despite the constant distraction of her conflicting romantic conquests.
Monday, April 9 through Sunday, April 15
Fiction Sale
For this week, all fiction titles in the store: adult, YA, and middle school, hardcover and paperback, are on sale for 20% off.
Friday, April 13
7:30 p.m.
Mingmei Yip
Song of the Silk Road
Kensington Books
Mingmei Yip is an author, musician, and artist whose work has been published in the United States and China. Her most recent novel, Song of the Silk Road, details a romantic adventure on China's fabled route, with the lure of a three million dollar reward. It was praised by Publishers Weekly for being, "At once modern and traditional…Surprising and often funny…Part epic, part coming-of-age story, part modern fairy tale."
Wednesday, April 18
10:30 a.m.
Storytime Special Guest: Toneal Jackson
Four Girls: A Lot of Choices
PublishAmerica
Joining Miss Linda for our regular storytime this morning will be local author Toneal Jackson. In her new children's book, Jackson uses a rhyming text to show us the fun, challenges, and rewards of raising four daughters. In 2011, Jackson was named a best new author at the National Black Book Expo and in February, her work was displayed in the Celebrating Authors exhibit at the Chicago Children's Museum.
Wednesday, April 18
7:30 to 8:30 p.m.
World Book Night Launch Party
Join us for pizza and refreshments as we celebrate the commitment and hard work of our volunteer "Book Givers" who will be giving away books on World Book Night, April 23. Joining the party will be local authors reading passages from their favorite books. Tonight is an opportunity for pre-registered "Book Givers" to pick up their books and meet other Givers. For more information about World Book Night, see the description in our calendar under April 23.
Thursday, April 19
7:30 p.m.
Poetry Reading
Featuring Word Press authors Christina Pugh, Nina Corwin, Elinor Cramer, and Stella Vinitchi Radulescu
Tonight's reading features poets who have all published work with Word Press, and Ohio-based poetry publisher. Nina Corwin is the author of two books of poetry, The Uncertainty of Maps and Conversations with Friendly Demons and Tainted Saints. A Pushcart nominee, her work has appeared in many journals. Elinor Cramer's first poetry collection, She is a Pupa, Soft and White, was published by Word Press in 2011. She is also author of the chapbook, Canal Walls Engineered So Carefully They Still Hold Water. Christina Pugh is author of the poetry collections Restoration and Rotary (winner of the Word Press First Book Prize). Her third book, Grains of the Voice, is forthcoming in 2013 from Northwestern University Press. Stella Vinitchi Radulescu holds a Ph.D. in French Language and Literature. She is a poet and translator with several books of poetry published in the United States, Romania, and France.
Saturday, April 21
7:30 p.m.
Sappho's Salon: A Provocative Night of Lesbian Diversions
Featuring Anne Elizabeth Moore and Yasmin Nair
$7-$10 sliding scale includes food and wine
Tonight's installment of our popular salon night for lesbians and their friends features two of Chicago's most important queer writers, activists, and social critics. Co-editor and publisher of the now-defunct Punk Planet,Anne Elizabeth Moore is the author of Unmarketable: Brandalism, Copyfighting, Mocketing, and the Erosion of Integrity. She has written for Bitch, The Progressive, The Onion, Feministing, and In These Times, among others. A teacher at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Moore also works with young women in Cambodia on independent media projects. Her most recent book, Cambodian Grrrl, is the first in a series on independent culture, globalization, and women's rights. Yasmin Nair's writing and organizing addresses issues like neoliberalism and inequality, queer politics and theory, sex trafficking, the art world, and the immigration crisis. She is co-founder of the collective Against Equality and an active member of the grassroots organization Gender JUST. Her writing has appeared in The Progressive, Make/Shift, Bitch, The Bilerico Project, and Maximum Rock 'n' Roll. Proceeds benefit the artists and the Women's Voices Fund.
Sunday, April 22
4:00 p.m.
A Long Walk Home, Inc. Presents:
We Are Girl/Friends! Art on Community Violence, Justice, and Healing by Chicago Teen Girls
Join us for a special event featuring many of the teenaged contributors to the new anthology We Are Girl/Friends! Showcasing original artwork, creative writing, and digital photography, We Are Girl/Friends! was born out of ALWH's Girl/Friends Leadership Institute, a year-long program that empowers adolescent girls to use the arts to become youth leaders in the movement to end violence against girls and women. The result is a unique combination of art and writing by African-American teens that is truly worth celebrating.
Monday, April 23
World Book Night
World Book Night is a program designed to spread the joy of reading by putting free books into the hands of people who might not normally have much access to them. Tonight 25,000 book lovers across the country will each be giving away 20 free copies of a book they love. It's expected that as many as half a million books will be given out tonight! Women & Children First is acting as a book pick-up site; the books are all donated by publishers, and the participating authors waive their royalties. For more information about World Book Night, go to www.us.worldbooknight.org/ .
Wednesday, April 25
7:30 p.m.
Poetry Reading
Gregg Shapiro
Gregg Shapiro: 77
Souvenir Spoon Books
With special guests David Trinidad and Eva Marguerite Olsgard
We're delighted to host the launch of Chicago poet Gregg Shapiro's newest poetry collection. Gregg Shapiro: 77, a collection of autobiographical poems featuring each year in the decade of the 70s, charts the poet's life from adolescence to coming into his own as a gay man on the cusp of a new decade. Joining Shapiro are poets David Trinidad and Eva Marie Olsgard. David Trinidad is author and editor of several poetry collections and collaborations, including the 2012 Lambda Literary Award finalists Dear Prudence: New and Selected Poems andA Fast Life: The Collected Poems of Tim Dlugos. Eva Marguerite Olsgard is a writer, artist, and activist currently enrolled in the M.F.A. in Web Design and New Media program at the Academy of Art University, and author of the chapbook, extended relative.
Thursday, April 26
7:00 p.m.
Poetry Reading
City of the Big Shoulders: An Anthology of Chicago Poetry
University of Iowa Press
Featuring contributors Erika Mikkalo, Michael Austin, Larry Janowski, Nina Corwin, Christina Pugh, Julie Parson Nesbitt, Marty McConnell, and Ann Hudson
Chicago has served as touchstone and muse to generations of writers and artists defined by their relationship to the city's history, lore, landmarks, joys and sorrows, pride and shame. In this new collection, 100 poets combine voices, styles, viewpoints, cultures, and aesthetics as multifaceted and energetic as the city itself. Tonight, numerous contributors come together to celebrate this new collection and the city that inspired it.
Save the dates:
Saturday, May 5 — Sunday, May 6
Chicago Green Festival
Navy Pier
Women & Children First is happy to once again be the official bookseller at the Chicago Green Festival, a symposium bringing together hundreds of presenters and exhibitors exploring pathways to environmentally responsible and sustainable living. For more information on the Chicago Green Festival, visithttp://www.greenfestivals.org/chicago/
Wednesday, May 16
Alison Bechdel
Are You My Mother?
Bechdel's highly anticipated sequel to her bestselling graphic memoir, Fun Home, examines the artist's relationship with her critical mother and the impact on Bechdel's sense of self-worth. In a starred review,Publishers Weekly praises Are You My Mother? as "A fiercely honest work about the field of combat that is family." Details about this event will be in our May events schedule.
For information about events contact the bookstore at 773-769-9299.
