Central Multnomah Library (pictured here) is hosting many readings and lectures this winter with authors Kevin Renner, Joe Sacco, and Richard Meltzer.

Snowstorms and downpours, winter has arrived in full force and what better way to get out of the rain and fight off the winter blues than to attend some local literary events. Here is a list of readings, exhibits, and guest speakers going on in upcoming weeks around town. (I’m sure that I’ve left some out so please leave any that you know of in the comments!) In addition to this list, we will soon post events for our spring 2012 title A Very Minor Prophet by James Bernard Frost. Stay tuned!

“The Envious Tooth of Time”: Early Printed Works from the PSU Library Special Collections
When: January 13 – March 23, 2011
Where: Millar Library, 1st Floor Elevator Lobby on PSU Campus
Summary: This exhibition highlights original printed works from the Portland State University Library Special Collections, ranging from the fifteenth through eighteenth centuries.

First Wednesday Guest Speaker- Ed Edmo
When: Wednesday, February 1, at 7:00pm
Where: Oswego Heritage House, 398 10th St., Lake Oswego, OR 97034
Summary: Come hear Ed Edmo, a Shoshone-Bannock poet, playwright, performer, traditional storyteller, tour guide and lecturer, talk about Pacific NW Indian culture and storytelling throughout history.

Writers Talking – Kevin Renner
When: Saturday, February 4, 1-2:30pm
Where: Central Library, Multnomah County Library, U.S. Bank Room, space is limited.
Summary: Kevin Renner speaks about his recently published book. The event will be a lecture with a reading and discussion.

The Moth Mainstage-Walk the Line: Stories of Balancing Acts
When: Tuesday, February 7, 7:30pm
Where: Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall
Fee: Tickets range between $25 – $60 order at ticketmaster.com
Summary: One of the most loved radio shows returns to Portland for another round of true! Featuring storyteller Lisa Lampanelli and event host Mike Daisey.

Molly Gloss Presentation: “The Community of the Book: Where Writers and Readers Meet on the Page”
When: February 11, 10:00am
Where: Oswego Heritage House, 398 10th St., Lake Oswego, OR 97034
Summary: Portland author Molly Gloss will talk about how her work has been shaped by the books she has read throughout her life; and by her readers, who collaborate in storytelling whenever they open one of her novels.

Writers Talking – Joe Sacco
When: Saturday, February 18, 2-4 p.m.
Where: Central Library, Multnomah County Library, U.S. Bank Room
Note: Space is limited. Free tickets for seating will be available 30 minutes prior to the program.
Summary: Joe Sacco’s most recent book is Footnotes in Gaza. The event will be a lecture with a reading and discussion.

An Evening with Poet Ger Killeen and Author Brian Doyle
When: February 22, at 7:00 p.m.
Where: Streff Gallery in the Shoen Library at Marylhurst University, 17600 Pacific Hwy # 43
Summary: Poet and Gaelic teacher Ger Killeen joins Mink River author Brian Doyle for an evening of reading from their works.

NW Author Series: The Essential Elements of Storytelling with Bill Johnson
When: Sunday, February 26, 3:30-5:30pm
Where: Oak Room – Wilsonville Public Library, 8200 SW Wilsonville Road, Wilsonville, Oregon 97070
Fee: $5 dollars at the door
Summary: In this presentation, Bill Johnson will discuss the essential elements of storytelling.

NW Author Series: How to Write Biography with Pamela Smith Hill
When: Sunday, March 18, 3:30-5:30pm
Where: Oak Room – Wilsonville Public Library, 8200 SW Wilsonville Road, Wilsonville, Oregon 97070
Fee: $5 dollars at the door
Summary: Biographer Pamela Smith Hill will discuss practical tips for writing biographies and share ideas to help you research fiction or nonfiction and write with confidence.

And please don’t forget Powell’s monthly author readings, book groups, and literary events.

Hawthorne intern Olivia Croom using her iPad at the office.

The line between e-readers and tablets is beginning to blur. The main difference between them is the screen display technology. Many e-readers, like the Amazon Kindle and Barnes & Noble Nook, use an e-ink display, which mimics the look of ink on paper. Tablet screens, like the Apple iPad or Samsung Galaxy Tab, are back-lit like computer screens. I think the move towards tablets is the first sign of the decline of strictly e-reader devices.

Main Street recently published an article that predicts e-readers will become extinct in the next eight years as manufacturers work on combining e-ink technology with current tablet screens. This way a user can have an “authentic” e-reading experience but still enjoy the capabilities of a tablet.

I own an iPad, almost two years old now, the kind that can access WiFi but does not have a cellular signal, and I hate reading on it. However, I do just about everything else on it. I check Facebook and Twitter, take notes for class with an application that syncs them to my phone and laptop, use iMessage, and shop online with my iPad. All that said, I still haven’t opened my Kindle app, which allows me to read e-books.

I did read two books on it when I first got it. They were riddled with formatting mistakes — text jumped strangely from page to page and chapter titles got mixed up in the body. This is a common problem with e-books; they aren’t given the strict design standards of print books, maybe because they don’t feel as “real” as a printed book or maybe because they’re still evolving.

Amazon should be especially concerned about e-book readability and design. The Amazon Kindle Fire sells for $3 less than it costs to make. According to CEO Jeff Bezos, “‘We want the hardware device to be profitable and the content to be profitable,’ he said. ‘We really don’t want to subsidize one with the other.’” Still, Amazon depends on content sales for profit, not the sale of Kindle Fire’s themselves.

Genre fiction, especially romance, sells especially well in e-book format since fans tend to read these stories quickly and many are only .99 cents in the Kindle store. Author Amanda Hocking made her career selling her fantasy novels for .99 cents in the Kindle Store. This makes incidents like the release of Neal Stephenon’s Reamde especially embarrassing for publishers and Amazon. Reamde sold for $16.99 as an e-book, a high price for a digital copy, and it was so riddled with mistakes and link errors that Amazon had to yank it from the store and reload a clean copy. One customer demanded 75% of her money back. If a potential bestseller from a well-known author is subject to gross digital design mistakes, anybody’s e-book is.

To be continued…

In late October, Random Order Coffeehouse & Bakery hosted a release party for a newcomer to the Portland literary scene: Cavalcade Literary Magazine. Comprised of fiction, poetry, and photography, the magazine hosts an eclectic mix of voices. It’s powerful, quirky, and poignant.

Putting together a journal has been Cutter Williams’ dream for quite some time. While working part-time at Random Order, sitting on his English degree for a while, Cutter decided to make that dream a reality. He wanted to publish a literary journal, but he didn’t want it to be just a few copies hastily thrown together. He wanted his journal to stand out and he wanted the work to be of literary merit.

Cutter took a self-publishing class at the Independent Publishing Resource Center, taught by Michael D’Alessandro to learn about lit. journal production. He says that Michael was instrumental and that, “The journal should be a testament to that.”

Cutter also had a great deal of help from his friend and co-worker, Jacob Sexton. A graduate student in the Book Publishing Program at PSU, Jacob offered to help edit Cavalcade. Cutter sought advice from Jacob with the layout, asking him questions about InDesign. They spent enough time together working on the journal that eventually Cutter realized he had a partner. “He is essentially half of the publication, in that he helped out immensely with the design and editing.”

Cutter Williams (left) and Jacob Sexton.

Cutter loves the word cavalcade and sees Cavalcade Literary Magazine as supporting a procession of literature in print, as opposed to electronic publishing. While many publishers offer their books in e-versions Cutter stands behind the printed form. He believes that printed books cannot be matched by e-books.

When Cutter began putting the journal together he quickly learned that many of his close friends were good writers. The dream was getting closer to reality. “In this first issue, I reached out to everyone, with a few exceptions. From that, all the work that was given to me was promised to me and not sent elsewhere.”

Most literary journals receive a considerable number of submissions on a daily basis, and Cutter is aware of how taxing it can be to sift through all of them. He is also aware of how easily a submission can be tossed aside. “A great piece of literature that has a couple of grammatical errors may be thrown out after someone reads the first paragraph, just because there is already noticeable editing to embark upon, and a thousand other stories and poems to read.” With the work from his friends, Cutter saw a quality that he felt needed to be published. It was says Cutter, “an opportunity to showcase the work of people closest to me, and they put faith in me to back it up with a well-designed book and exposure.”

The crowd that gathered at the Cavalcade reading was big. (I stood just inside the door of Random Order, leaning in to hear what I could of a few poets reading.) In attendance was a circle of people out to support a friend and his dream. It was a community.

Cutter plans to publish Cavalcade bi-annually. The next issue should be out in the early months of 2012. Keep an eye out for it and check out their website: www.cavalcadelitmag.com.

Real life doesn’t end when the credits roll or the last page turns. There is always the slow, quiet drive home from the movie theater as we try to realign our own expectations with the temporary thrill of a good story. We did not just save the world from aliens or overcome all odds to find our soul mate. Instead we are left lingering in the stillness of our own choices, the anticlimactic wake of reality.

It is in this space that author Scott Nadelson introduces us to the characters in his new collection of short stories, Aftermath. A man trying to rediscover who he is after calling off his engagement with a fiancé who cheated on him, a teenage boy coming to terms with the abandonment of his father, a married couple struggling through a trial separation—each trying to understand exactly where they are suppose to go from here.

But Nadelson finds the beauty in that struggle, that stillness. He infuses a seemingly mundane reality with such heartbreaking authenticity that the truths uncovered by his characters are both touching and discomfiting in their applicability to our own lives.

In the collection’s title story, Richard Weintraub and his wife Alana have separated after almost seven years, and the reader follows Richard between alternating desires for freedom and the comfortable life he has become accustomed to.

When he finally called to arrange a meeting, the day after he visited Dawn in Philadelphia, Alana sighed and said, “Okay. I guess so,” as if he were asking her to help with some tedious chore, taking plastic bottles to the recycling center or scrubbing mold from his shower wall. Our Versailles, he called the meeting as they were making arrangements, and instantly regretted it. It was a stupid comparison, making him the defeated German, ready to accept all blame, all responsibility. Why did he feel like the wrongdoer, the one who deserved punishment?

The lives of the characters in Nadelson’s book are not wrapped up in neat little packages. The answers do not come easy, if at all, because things just don’t happen that way. We are left to wonder, along with the characters, whether or not they have made the right decisions, not knowing what will happen next but hoping for the best.

Aftermath: Stories
by Scott Nadelson
www.scottnadelson.com
www.hawthornebooks.com

A room with a view...of books.

Yet another installment of the What We’re Reading series (here’s what we were reading in July) with all sorts of novels, cookbooks, story collections and more. Please chime in if you’ve read any of these books and also let us know what good books you’ve read lately…

Rhonda:
When I Forgot, Elina Hirvonen
The Twin, Gerbrand Bakker
The Lovers, Vendela Vida

Adam:
God is Dead, Ron Currie, Jr.
Along with many Hawthorne and freelance projects

Liz:
The Art of Fielding, Chad Harbach
Habibi, Craig Thompson
Tender, Nigel Slater
Blue Nights, Joan Didion

Olivia:
Wire to Wire, Scott Sparling
The Corrections, Jonathan Franzen
Autobiography of a Recovering Skinhead, Jody M. Roy and Frank Meeink

Sophie:
The Mind’s Eye, Oliver Sacks
Tin House Magazine

Emily:
By the North Gate, Joyce Carol Oates
The Journal of Joyce Carol Oates
Middlemarch, George Eliot
The Collected Poems of Sylvia Plath

Penelope:
Tabloid City, Pete Hamill
Aftermath, Scott Nadelson
The Blind Assassin, Margaret Atwood

The Luminist's David Rocklin is coming soon to a city near you!

David Rocklin’s The Luminist launched this Saturday, October 1st and you know what that means — lots of great author events to follow for Mr. Rocklin! Here’s the current lineup.

Coming soon to a city near you!

Sunday, 9 October 2011 :: 2.00 pm — Portland, Oregon
Wordstock Literary Festival | Oregon Convention Center, 777 NE ML King Blvd., Portland, OR 97232 T: (503) 235-7575 :: David Rocklin will read from his debut novel The Luminist.

Sunday, 9 October 2011 :: 4.30 – 5.45 pm — Portland, Oregon
Wordstock | Oregon Convention Center, 777 NE ML King Blvd., Portland, OR 97232 T: (503) 235-7575 :: David Rocklin will teach the workshop The How and Where: On Setting as Character in Fiction.

Monday, 10 October 2011 :: 7.30 – 8.30 pm — Portland, Oregon
Powell’s Books | 3747 SE Hawthorne, Portland, OR 97214. T: (503) 235-3802. :: David Rocklin reads from his debut novel, The Luminist.

Friday, 14 October 2011 :: 7.00 – 8.00 pm — Seattle, Washington
Elliott Bay Book Company | Elliott Bay Book Company, 1521 Tenth Avenue, Seattle, WA 98122. T: (206) 624-6600 :: David Rocklin reads from his debut novel, The Luminist.

Wednesday, 19 October 2011 :: 7.00 pm — Chicago, Illinois
The Book Cellar | 4736-38 North Lincoln Avenue, Chicago, IL 60625. T: (773) 293-2665 :: David Rocklin reads from his debut novel, The Luminist.

Thursday, 20 October 2011 :: 7.00 – 8.30 pm — Northbrook, Illinois
The Book Bin | 1151 Church Street, Northbrook, IL 60062. T: (847) 498-4999. :: David Rocklin will sign copies of his debut hisotrical novel, The Luminist.

Friday, 4 November 2011 :: 6.00 pm — Atlanta, Georgia
Jennifer Schwartz Gallery | Brickworks at 1000 Marietta St., Suite 112, Atlanta, GA 30318. T: (404) 885-1080 :: Fall Line Press presents a book signing and reading with novelist David Rocklin, author of The Luminist.

Tuesday, 8 November 2011 — Midgeville, Georgia
Georgia College | Midgeville, Georgia :: David Rocklin reads from The Luminist at Georgia College.

Wednesday, 7 December 2011 :: 7.00 pm — New York, New York
192 Books | 190 Tenth Avenue, New York, NY 1011. T: (212) 255-4022 :: David Rocklin reads from his debut novel, The Luminist.

Monday, 12 December 2011 :: 7.30 pm — San Francisco, California
The Make-Out Room with The Rumpus| 3225 22nd Street, San Francisco, CA 94110 :: David Rocklin will read from his debut novel, The Luminist.

The Luminist
by David Rocklin
pub. date October 1, 2011
www.davidrocklin.com
www.hawthornebooks.com

The Wordstock hot seat from the 2010 festival.

Only a few weeks away!

We love Wordstock here at Hawthorne Books. We have all sorts of events slated for this year’s festival and I’ve laid them all out for you here. Every year we have a booth at the Book Fair in the main hall and that’s where you’ll find publisher Rhonda Hughes, senior editor Adam O’Connor Rodriguez and myself for a large part of the weekend. Hawthorne Books authors will also be joining us at different times on Saturday and Sunday to chat with folks and sign books too so please come by and say “hello.” See you at Wordstock!

Wordstock readings and workshops with Hawthorne Books authors:

David Rocklin — 2pm Sunday reading with Anna Solomon; 4:30pm Sunday writing workshop the How and Where: On Setting as Character in Fiction.
Scott Nadelson — 1pm Saturday reading with Rahul Mehta; 3pm Saturday workshop In the Beginning: Crafting Compelling Story Openings.
Lidia Yuknavitch — 12pm Saturday panel My Censor Myself with Ben Moorad, Kerry Cohen and Lynn Connor; 11am Sunday panel What’s with America’s Sexual/Literary Hang-up with Steve Almond, Cheryl Strayed and Viva Las Vegas; 4pm Sunday reading with Lisa Wells.
Monica Drake — 1pm Sunday screening and talk about Georgie’s Big Break with Andy Mingo, Brian Lindstrom.
&
Rhonda Hughes, Hawthorne Books publisher — 11am Saturday panel How to Win Over Agents and Editors.
Liz Crain, Hawthorne Books editor — 2pm Saturday panel Every Book is a Start Up.

Wordstock blog posts with Hawthorne Books authors:

Scott Nadelson’s guest blog post and Q&A.
David Rocklin’s guest blog post and Q&A.

Wordstock 2011
October 6-8 at the Oregon Convention Center
www.wordstockfestival.com

Scott Nadelson’s short story collection Aftermath is due to spread its wings in just TEN days! Its pub. date is next Thursday, September 1st and with that comes all sorts of great book events throughout the Pacific Northwest. Below is the current lineup. Please be in touch if you’d like to set a reading or anything else for this one.

Friday, 09 September 2011 :: 7.00 – 9.00 pm — Portland, Oregon
Broadway Books| 1714 NE Broadway, Portland, OR 97232 T: 503-284-1726 :: Please join us for Scott Nadelson’s book launch party for Aftermath.

Wednesday, 14 September 2011 :: 4.30 – 6.00 pm — Salem, Oregon
Willamette University | Hatfield Library, 900 State Street, Salem, Oregon 97301 T: 503-370-6300 :: Scott Nadelson reads from his collection, Aftermath.

Wednesday, 21 September 2011 :: 7.30 – 8.30 pm — Portland, Oregon
The Press Club | 2621 SE Clinton, Portland, OR 97202. T: (503) 233-5656. :: Mountain Writers Series at The Press Club. Scott Nadelson and Lidia Yuknavitch read from their work.

Saturday, 08 October 2011 :: 1.00 pm — Portland, Oregon
Wordstock | 777 NE ML King Blvd., Portland, OR 97232. T: (503) 235-7575. :: Scott Nadelson will read from his collection, Aftermath.

Saturday, 08 October 2011 :: 3.00 – 4.15 pm — Portland, Oregon
Wordstock | 777 NE ML King Blvd., Portland, OR 97232. T: (503) 235-7575. :: Scott Nadelson will teach a workshop titled Compelling Story Openings.

Saturday, 08 October 2011 — Portland, Oregon
Wordstock | Oregon Convention Center :: Scott Nadelson reads from his collection, Aftermath.

Monday, 14 November 2011 :: 7.30 – 8.30 pm — Portland, Oregon
Powell’s Books | 3747 Southeast Hawthorne Blvd, Portland, OR 97214 T: (503) 228-4651 :: Scott Nadelson reads from his collection, Aftermath.

Friday, 18 November 2011 :: 7.00 – 8.00 pm — Corvallis, Oregon
Oregon State University Library | Oregon State University Corvallis, OR 97331 541-737-1000 :: Scott Nadelson reads from his new collection, Aftermath.

Aftermath: Stories
by Scott Nadelson
pub. date September 1, 2011
www.scottnadelson.com
www.hawthornebooks.com

Lots of mss getting printed these days at Hawthorne for forthcoming titles!

Yet another installment of the What We’re Reading series (here’s what we were reading in the winter) with some nice summer reads. Please chime in if you’ve read any of these books and also let us know what pages you’ve been turning lately…

Rhonda:
The Sisters Brothers, Patrick DeWitte
Balthus: A Biography, Nicholas Fox Weber
The New Yorker
2012 and 2013 Hawthorne Books titles

Adam:
Deliverance, James Dickey
Drift and Swerve, Samuel Ligon
A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again, David Foster Wallace
What We Talk About When We Talk About Love, Raymond Carver
Paris Review Book for Planes, Trains, Elevators, and Waiting Rooms
Dora: A Head Case, Lidia Yuknavitch (forthcoming summer 2012)

Liz:
Freedom, Jonathan Franzen
Lean on Pete, Willy Vlautin
Spoon Fed, Kim Severson
Lucky Peach, McSweeney’s new quarterly food journal

In celebration of Hawthorne Books' tenth anniversary ALL Hawthorne titles are only $10 from now until August 1st!

A lot of you received our summer newsletter last week. (If you didn’t and want to receive future newsletters sign up here.) Those of you who got the newsletter already know about this great promotion that we’re doing in celebration of Hawthorne Books’ tenth anniversary — all books are just $10 until August 1st.

We’ve been busy bees getting summer reads packages together for this $10 promotion for the past several days and we’d love to keep the momentum up so if there’s a backlist Hawthorne title that you’ve always wanted to read or a newer Hawthorne Book that’s been on your mind — now’s the time!

Not only are ALL of our books only $10 until August 1st we’re taking care of shipping costs too. So if you pony up $50 you’ll get five new Hawthorne Books reads — no postage! Get them while they’re $10 and help us celebrate ten years of supporting literary arts and important writers, ten years of a vibrant Portland small press, ten years of Hawthorne Books!

Thank you for supporting Hawthorne Books! We couldn’t do it without you!