National Book Critics Circle link for calendar

Chicago begins its Publishers Row book events next week, then June 8 see the Future of the Book NBCC panel in Kansas City--Johnson County Resource Library. June 22 is another NBCC panel at NYU bookstore: With: Literary agents Julie Just & Betsy Lerner; O Magazine book editor Sara Nelson; Brooklyn Rail editor John Reed ; NY Times Book Review editor Sam Tanenhaus; author David Goodwillie & Scribner’s editor Paul Whitlach. Moderated by Susan Shapiro.  http://bookcritics.org/calendar/

National Book Critics Circle Event in KC June 8, 7 pm

Join 4 members of the NBCC for a lively discussion of the future of the book in American Culture. by 2020, will the printed version still be going strong? Or will it have largely succumbed to electronic texts, audiobook downloads, and videos downloads? The event takes place at the Johnson County Central Resource Library 9875 West 87th Street
Overland Park, KS 66212.

Panelists include Denise Low, Mark Luce and Steve Weinberg, with moderator John Mark Eberhart. For information contact John Mark Eberhart at 913-826-4408

WRITING NEWS: EVENTS NOV. 30-DEC. 4, 2010

• Nov. 30  Reading by Kevin Rabas and Cheryl Unruh, Lawrence Public Library and co-sponsored by The Raven Book Store. Poet and jazz musician Kevin Rabas co-directs the creative writing program at Emporia State University and is co-editor of Flint Hills Review. His second book of poetry, Lisa’s Flying Electric Piano, was chosen as a 2009 Kansas Notable Book. Award-winning author Unruh’s essays on subjects that Kansans know and love—nature and landscape, weather, seasons, small towns and fond memories of childhood—have been collected into a book, also titled Flyover People. If you too appreciate “life on the ground in a rectangular state,” you will enjoy this book. Unruh is originally from Pawnee Rock, graduated from KU, and now lives in Emporia.
• Dec. 1 Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde panel, Johnson County Library, KC, 9875 87th St., 7pm with Robert Butler, film critic for KC Star; Jennifer Phegley, University of Missouri-Kansas City; Robert Trussell, theater critic for KC Star; and Ann Volin, Rockhurst University. Moderator John Mark Eberhart
• Dec. 2 Holiday Big Tent Reading Megan Kaminski (poet), Kelsey Murrell (playwright), Kevin Frost (playwright), Alexis Smith (poet). 7 pm at the Raven Bookstore. See: www.ravenbookstore.com/
• DEC. 3 Dec. 3 Imagination & Place anthology release and reading, Writer's Place in Kansas City, 7 pm Independent arts group since 1999 presents third anthology: Imagination & Place: Seasonings. The theme is spices of life in relation to place. These spices may be herbal or chemical; they may evoke time and cycles. www.imaginationandplace.org & www.writersplace.org
• DEC. 4 Poetry reading by Serina Hearn & Denise Low. 6 pm. Contact deniselow9@hotmail.com for details. Hearn and Low release new books by Woodley Memorial Press of Washburn University. Hearn’s Atlas of Our Birth, a KC Star Notable Book, is her second book. Low’ Ghost Stories of the New West gathers poetry about heritage and frontier history. Here is a poem by Serina Allison Hearn:

 ANGEL

I found her impaled
In midnight’s grey bandages
of mortality,
a garden
pitchfork emerges
from her head,
carpenter nails pounded in deep
paralyze her wings, arms;
and a saw blade -
that miracle of technology
forty-fives below the heart:
keeps her from singing the world anew
as the great Roman road of progress
continues to pave over the memories
of the fallen; their ancient wisdom,
customs, landscapes shattered,
a butterfly, under the hammer
of construction.