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Browse: Home / Maria Semple

Maria Semple

May

7

2026

Bestseller Spotlight: This list is FIRE

On Wednesdays, the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association Bestseller List is published. Every week, we love to see what books have been most popular in independent bookstores around our region. As we peruse the list, we look for something special to showcase. Then we present this weekly feature: Thursday Themes. Let’s fan the flames of excitement for these bestselling …

Apr

21

2026

Maria Semple’s Seattle Visits for “Go Gentle”

It was a @mariasemple weekend for her old Seattle friends: watching her on stage @townhall_seattle trading zingers with @whoiskenjennings on Saturday night and hosting a book-signing visit at the store and doing some visiting with friends on Sunday. Her new novel, Go Gentle, is a heartful hoot, the kind of book for which the adjective “madcap” was invented—we’ve been trading our …

Feb

24

2026

WA Authors are Staff Picks at Riverstone Books in Pittsburgh, PA

Many booksellers from the Pacific Northwest are in Pittsburgh for the annual American Booksellers Association Winter Institute. Some participants got to tour independent bookstores. When we go to bookstores in different parts of the country and the world, we love to spot PNW authors and illustrators on the shelves. At Riverstone Books in the Squirrel …

May

5

2020

“Indie Bookstores Are Poised to Take Market Share from Amazon”

From The Stranger, May 1, 2020 by by Christopher Frizzelle  Indie bookstores in Seattle like Elliott Bay Book Company, University Book Store, Third Place Books, Queen Anne Book Company, and others have sold books through their websites for years. But these stores are so deeply embedded into the character of their neighborhoods, and so deeply associated with in-store events and in-person relationships …

Sep

6

2019

Where'd You Go Bernadette audiobook

Behind the Audiobook:
Where’d You Go, Bernadette

From the Libro.fm blog It’s strange to call someone on the phone—someone you’ve never met—after listening to them speak for ten hours. It’s even stranger when that person turns out to be as wry as the main character in the book they narrated. We spoke with Kathleen Wilhoite, a singer and actress who played Liz …

Sep

18

2018

Hugo House open house event image

Hugo House Open House September 22, 2018

Lovers of literature in Seattle: celebrate the new home of Hugo House, “a place for writers,” on Saturday, September 22 from 5:00- 8:00 pm. The new space is at 1634 Eleventh Avenue, on the corner of Eleventh and East Olive — “10,000 square feet designed by and for writers and readers.” Hugo House invites the public …

Dec

9

2016

Maria Semple

Maria Semple on NPR and onstage at King’s Books

I love when a local author I admire is everywhere I look. This week, it’s been that way with Maria Semple. She kept popping up in my twitter and facebook feeds because she’s been so dang busy! She was on NPR. She was at King’s Books. Somehow she worked some Hermione time-turner-type magic and had …

Oct

14

2016

Semple Seahawks jersey

Today Will Be Different by Maria Semple

If people walked around with authors’ names on their jerseys there would be almost as many “SEMPLE”s here as “SHERMAN”s and “WILSON”s, and the stadiumful of Where’d You Go, Bernadette? fans (me included) will feel right at home in her new book, the story of a smart, snarky, somewhat unhinged woman careening through her adopted …

Sep

28

2016

Stephanie Appell

Bank on Booksellers Fundraiser Features PNW Talent

Authors, illustrators, and famous booklovers from around the country have rallied to create original, one-of-a-kind piggy banks you can bid on to support booksellers in hardship. The fundraiser goes through this Friday, September 30. From the Binc Foundation and Nashville’s Parnassus Books: Parnassus Books and the Binc Foundation are dedicated to helping book people across …

Apr

18

2014

World Book Night April 23, 2014

Next week, volunteers will take to the street on Wednesday April 23— with books. Over 25,000 official World Book Night givers will distribute free books to people in their communities– giving books to people “who don’t regularly read.” At shelters, at movie theaters, at malls, at hospitals, at homeless shelters, at grocery stores, and more, …

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