Local middle-school student Abby Westfield reviews books for young readers. 
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Upcoming Events
GARY SHTEYNGART will read from
Super Sad True Love Story
Saturday, August 7th at 7 PM
The author of two critically acclaimed novels, The Russian Debutante's Handbook and Absurdistan, will read from his hilarious and heartfelt new novel - a deliciously dark tale of America's dysfunctional future, and the timeless and tender feelings that just might save it.
Thirty-nine-year-old Lenny Abramov works at an operation called Post-Human Services, which attempts to provide immortality for its super-rich clientele. Lenny's from a different century: he loves books (known as "printed, bound media artifacts") at a time when everyone else finds them annoying, and he really loves Eunice Park, an impossibly cute and cruel 24-year-old Korean American who just graduated from college with a major in Images and a minor in Assertiveness. She teaches Lenny (who she refers to as an "ancient dork") effective new ways to brush his teeth and makes him buy a cottony nonflammable wardrobe. Meanwhile, the country is devastated by a credit crisis, riots break out in New York City, and the streets are lined with National Guard tanks. Undeterred, Lenny is going to convince his fickle new love that in a time without standards or stability, in a world where people can determine a dating prospect's "hotness" and "sustainability" with the click of a button, in a society where the privileged may live forever but the unfortunate will die all too soon, there is still value in being a real human being.
"A rich commentary on the obsessions and catastrophes of the information age and a heartbreaker worthy of its title, this is Shteyngart's best yet." — Kirkus Reviews
MARY ROACH will discuss
Packing for Mars
Tuesday, August 24th at 7 PM
Popular science writer and bestselling author of Bonk and Stiff entertainingly addresses numerous questions about life in outer space. With her trademark humor and lucidity, Roach explores not the thrills and agonies of space travel, but "the stuff in between—the small comedies and everyday victories." Like bowel movements in zero gravity, for example. She talks with astronauts about what it's like to share a confined space with another person for days on end ("irrational antagonisms" are mentioned, as are fist fights), and learns about the cross-cultural issues that arose when Russians, Canadians and Americans shared a space station. She asks: what happens when you can't walk for a year? Have sex? Smell flowers? What if you vomit in your helmet during a space walk? Is it possible for the human body to survive a bailout at 17,000 miles per hour?
To answer these questions, space agencies set up a host of quizzical and startlingly bizarre space simulations, proving that it's possible to preview space without ever leaving Earth.
"A delightful, illuminating grab bag of space-flight curiosities." — Kirkus Reviews