Let the joyous news be spread: Seattle is officially the second U.S. City (after Iowa City) to be declared a UNESCO City of Literature– one of 28 internationally recognized cities. Edinburgh, Scotland was the first city to get the designation in 2004. The UNESCO designation of literary cities is part of a wider network of …
I thought about it like a day when you eagerly carve out the entire afternoon, plant yourself in a comfy chair with a flask of coffee, turn off all the distractions, and sink into that book you’ve been waiting to read. Last Sunday, I packed a bottle of water, suited up in comfy clothes, and planted …
Over the past few months we’ve kept you up to date on efforts, lead by local author Ryan Boudinot, to establish Seattle as an official City of Literature. Read original contributions from Seattle correspondent Kristianne Huntsberger, Boudinot and NWBL columnist James Crossley to follow the path to Monday’s Seattle City Council’s unanimous decision to officially …
The Nightcapper event at Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association’s fall tradeshow in Portland in October hosted a variety of exciting new authors. There I bumped into Chris and Kyle Bolton, the sibling team behind Smash: Trial by Fire, the first book in the superhero graphic novel series for young readers, aged 7 to 12. The book …
Speaking to Maged Zaher just before the Stranger Genius Award Ceremony commenced at the Moore Theatre, I asked whether he felt nervous. Not exactly nervous, he said. He already knew Neal Stephenson was a genius. Paul Constant, book editor for the Stranger, explained that the two writers had hit it off after the Literature showcase …
Ryan Boudinot pioneered the idea in June at Elliott Bay Book Company’s 40th anniversary, and each successive meeting has clarified Seattle’s bid to become a UNESCO City of Literature. By the time Seattlites rallying behind the cause gathered on September 23 at the Seattle Public Library, it even boasted a board, on which Boudinot is …
“A poet, a novelist and a festival; it sounds like the set up for a joke,” said Christopher Frizzelle, editor of Seattle’s alternative weekly, the Stranger. What the poet, Maged Zaher; the novelist, Neal Stephenson and the festival, APRIL (Authors, Publishers, and Readers of Independent Literature) have in common and what brought each on stage …
Peter Rock is the author of Alex Award-winning novel, My Abandonment, as well as The Bewildered, The Ambidextrist, This Is the Place, Carnival Wolves, and a story collection, The Unsettling. He lives in Portland with his family. Rock’s most recent novel, The Shelter Cycle, fearlessly addresses the complexities of coming to terms with a fringe faith from childhood as the two main …
The crowd was packed tightly into the reading room at Elliott Bay Book Company Monday night to celebrate PNBA Book Award winners Sherman Alexie and G. Willow Wilson. The authors read from their award-winning books, Wilson from her novel Alif the Unseen and Alexie from Blasphemy, his collection of new and favorite stories. They finished the evening …
There are places in the world where confessing to be journalist could put your life in danger or make you, in the least, a social pariah. To know that Gabriel, the main character of Peter Mountford’s novel A Young Man’s Guide to Late Capitalism finds it safer to pose as a journalist than admit he is …
