MELANIE’S “THE SLIPPERY YEAR” GARNERS STELLAR NEW YORK TIMES AND NEW YORKER BOOK BENCH REVIEWS – DON’T MISS THE BOOK LAUNCH ON AUGUST 12-13
We're in for a new spate of Grotto books this late summer and fall, and the accolades are already coming in. Hot off the press is Melanie’s profile in the July 30th New York Times (see link below). And Andrea Walker reviewed Melanie's book in the online New Yorker Book Bench, stating, “By the end of the book I felt like I had just spent several hours knocking back drinks with an especially funny friend. Which is some of my highest praise.” (As Grottoite Caroline Paul remarked, “I like the way the reviewer starts her review all crotchety and at the end wants to have a drink with Melanie. Wait in line, girl. We all want a drink with Melanie.”)
Recently in Readings & Events
Mina Dresden Gallery honors ZYZZYVA editor Howard Junker with an exhibition featuring small works on paper done in black and white by artists who have appeared in the journal during its first 24 years.
June 20 – July 18, 2009
Opening reception: Saturday, 20 June, 6-8 pm
Mina Dresden Gallery, 312 Valencia at 14th st., San Francisco 94103
Gallery open by appointment. 415-863-8312. www.minadresden.com
The Big Ugly Review is the featured journal at the upcoming Babylon Salon Winter Reading on Saturday, December 6th at 7 p.m. The performance will be held at Cantina, 580 Sutter Street. (just off Union Square). As always, this rollicking reading and performance series promises great literature and fine cocktails. Poet and essayist Lola Haskins headlines the evening, and April Sinclair will read from her work in the current issue of Big Ugly. For more information, please visit www.babylonsalon.com. Admission is free!
On Saturday, October 11, the annual Litquake festival goes out with a bang. The final night is devoted to Litcrawl, the literary equivalent of drinking from the firehose: dozens of readings in a host of venues, all more or less within strolling distance of each other. Go to litquake.org to peruse the full schedule, and while you're planning your path remember us!
We've had a Grotto event on the Litcrawl program for several years now, and we always look forward to it. This year it'll serve as an intimate coda, a small-scale bookend for the larger Grotto Nights event the previous Saturday. This time around the host is Jason Roberts, and the all-Grotto lineup includes Po Bronson, Chris Colin, Rodes Fishburne, Stephanie Losee, Janis Cooke Newman and Todd Oppenheimer.
Rumor has it that this will be an "off the page" evening: the readers will be sharing behind-the-scenes stories about what DOESN'T make it to the page, and why. Expect unprinted sex scenes, tales of editorial clashes and angst between the lines. At the Elbo Room (647 Valencia Street), starting at 7:15. It's free, but you'll have to be over 21.
For more information, see http://www.litquake.org/the-festival/lit-crawl-2008/
Hope to see you there!
Tickets are going FAST! Don't Miss a Special LITQUAKE GROTTO NIGHTS on OCTOBER 4 - A NIGHT OF INTIMACY AT THE GROTTO |
Grotto Nights is Back with “INTIMACY" -- a special LITQUAKE multi-media extravaganza of tight genes, body fluids, and misplaced affections. The evening will feature authors Mary Roach reading from her latest, “Bonk,” plus David Ewing Duncan, Elizabeth Bernstein, Stephen Elliott, Laura Fraser, and Jennifer Traig. Also highlighted will be the work of filmmakers Caveh Zahedi [“I Am A Sex Addict”] and Jay Rosenblatt [“I Used To Be A Filmmaker.”] The evening also features an animated film by the Forbidden Fruit Collective, an audio documentary by Jennifer Durban and art by JD Beltran, Emily Korson, and Jan Blythe. Finally, you’re in for a very special treat with an original music, sound, and video performance by an ensemble that includes composer Marc Capelle, jazz vocalist Faye Carol, and hydrogeologist Michael J. Taffet.
Come and get under the covers with us for an evening of creative hanky panky.
TIME/PLACE: SATURDAY OCTOBER 4, AT THE JEWISH COMMUNITY CENTER, 3200 CALIFORNIA STREET, SAN FRANCISCO, CA 94118, (415) 292-1200. EVENT STARTS AT 8:00, WITH A RECEPTION FOLLOWING THE PROGRAM.
Tickets are going fast! Doors open at 7:30. $20 for JCCSF and Litquake members, $22 for general public.
No-Host Bar/21+. After the event there will be a special party for the audience and performers.
For more information, see http://www.jccsf.org/content_
About Grotto Nights
From 2001 to 2005 the eclectic evenings of literature, film, art and marching bands at Grotto Nights were a mini-San Francisco institution, as were the parties that followed them. But the footlights went out when the event outgrew its space at the Main Library and the writers of the Grotto had to move to new venues. This year, we’re back for a special Grotto Nights at Litquake, and room for everyone at the Jewish Community Center!
The reading at Keter Salon scheduled for August 20th has been cancelled (see August GrottoNotes for details). Sorry for any inconvenience.
The Grotto is pleased to host a new art reception, featuring the paintings of Shirley Hazlett. The reception will be June 5th, 6-9 p.m. The Southern Wine Group, importers of boutique and artisanal wines from Argentina and Chile, will be pouring.
Shirley Hazlett is a contemporary painter who will be showing fluid, grid-based paintings, referencing the land, horizon, and sky. Shirley's paintings have been exhibited at the California Museum for Women, History and the Arts, the Center for Contemporary Art, Sacramento, and the San Francisco ArtInstitute, where she currently is completing an MFA in Art, painting.
Join us June 5th for the art reception!
George Birimisa, Diane DiPrima, and Steve Susoyev will be reading from Return to the Caffe Cino, a collection of plays originally performed at the Manhattan club credited with launching the Off-Off-Broadway theater movement. Birimisa, now 83, was the first openly gay playwright to receive a Rockefeller Grant and wrote many groundbreaking works, including Daddy Violet, Georgie Porgie, and Looking For Mr. America.
From the book:
"[Caffe Cino] was a coffee-house, a theatre, a brothel, a temple, a flophouse, a dope-ring, a launching pad, an insane asylum, a safe-house, and a sleeper cell for an unnamed revolution..."
Tuesday, Apr 22, 7:30 pm @ Different Light Bookstore, Castro bet 17th & 18th.
Saturday, April 19, 7pm at The Makeout Room- 3225 22nd Street, San Francisco, (415) 647 2888
Mark Schapiro, author of Exposed: The Toxic Chemistry of Everyday Products and What's at Stake for American Power is launching a radio documentary he co-produced/reported with American Radio Works. It's out today: Check out CIR's website: www.centerforinvestigativereporting.org. Airs on KQED on April 25 and 29...meantime it's up on the web...Mark holed up here to write his book and is threatening to come for lunch...
