Welcome to Malvern Books!
Malvern Books is now closed. Malvern Books was a bookstore and community space in Austin, Texas. We specialized in visionary literature and poetry from independent publishers, with a focus on lesser-known and emerging voices.
An Update from the Manager of Malvern Books
Dear Friends,
We’ve had a wonderful time sharing our favorite books with you over the past nine years, and it’s been an honor to celebrate the work of so many brilliant writers through our readings and events.
Malvern Books is the realization of Joe Bratcher’s vision—Joe dreamt of a bookstore that would carry the books he loved, mostly poetry and fiction from small, independent presses. He wanted to promote writers and translators of books from other countries, while also championing the work of local writers.
When Joe first talked to me about opening Malvern Books, I must admit I was skeptical. I didn’t think we’d find an audience. It was 2012 and everyone was saying that bookstores were dead, Kindle and online shopping were the future. I anticipated many quiet sales days, with Joe and I just sitting there, looking at each other. He told me if that’s how it ended up, well, at least we’d have a chance to chat—and since we always seemed to laugh a lot when we talked, it sounded like a good way to spend some time. And so from then on, whenever we’d have a really slow sales day, with just a few people coming in, we’d look at each other and say, “We’re living the dream!” and we’d laugh.
But back to opening… in early 2013, with the help of our amazing architect, contractor, and interior designer, we created the space that Joe had in mind. We started posting on social media thanks to Tracey, our wonderful digital media manager and first Malvern hire. And we were so grateful to the many enthusiastic writers and readers who expressed their excitement at the imminent arrival of Malvern Books. From the very beginning it felt like we were building a community.
We opened our doors in October 2013, and we were shocked by how many people came by. You showed up and you loved what we had to offer! You constantly surprised and humbled us with your kind words and helpful suggestions. People from out of town would visit the store because a local friend had told them they had to come by, and we received much appreciated shout-outs from the Austin Chronicle and numerous other newspapers and journals.
And then 2020 hit—but even with the pandemic, we had loyal customers who came by for curbside pick ups, signed up for individual shopping appointments, and participated in our Zoom book clubs and events. If we didn’t say it enough, THANK YOU!
All along the way, we were lucky enough to have truly wonderful staff members who loved the books we carried and who helped us build the store we have now. Their work has been invaluable and we could not have done this without them.
On July 28th of this year, we lost Joe. I can’t tell you how hard it has been to try and carry on in this space without him. Our little Malvern world has not been the same since, and, as much as we love this store and our amazing customers, Malvern Books simply cannot continue without our Joe.
Malvern Books will be closing on December 31st, 2022. It has been a wonderful nine years and we thank each and every one of our cherished customers, friends, staff, and suppliers for helping us along the way.
As we move forward, we’ll be sharing our plans with you for sales and specials. For now, we just wanted to let you know this was coming. We hope you all continue to seek out works in translation and books published by small presses—there is so much great stuff out there—and that you continue to support our local independent bookstores, like our dear friends at BookWoman, among others. But, most importantly, we hope to see you in the store sometime soon, to say goodbye and to thank you, both for being the readers that you are and because you have come with us on this incredibly fulfilling journey in Joe’s world.
With heartfelt thanks and wishing you all the best,
Becky Garcia,
Manager, Malvern Books
We’re delighted to be hosting a reading to celebrate the launch of Small Packages, the debut anthology of stories, poetry and prose from Austin’s Writers Workshop. Readers include poets Kara Bell, Laurie Cosbey and A.M. Lewin, novelist Ron Seybold, plus Holly Lorka, Karen Hoffman, Merry Klonower, Hadley Hill, and Emily Weaver.
Welcome to Malvern Books’ Club: Reading Classics from New York Review Books, hosted (on most occasions) by Malvern’s own curmudgeon-in-chief, Dr. Joe. Everyone is invited to join us for what we’re sure will be a series of irreverent and insightful conversations.
Our December selection is Rock Crystal by Adalbert Stifter (translated from the German by Elizabeth Mayer and Marianne Moore), a Christmas story of almost unendurable suspense. Thomas Mann claimed Rock Crystal has “one of the most extraordinary, the most enigmatic, the most secretly daring and the most strangely gripping narrators in world literature.”
Two children—Conrad and his little sister, Sanna—set out from their village high up in the Alps to visit their grandparents in the neighboring valley. It is the day before Christmas but the weather is mild, though of course night falls early in December and the children are warned not to linger. The grandparents welcome the children with presents and pack them off with kisses. Then snow begins to fall, ever more thickly and steadily. Undaunted, the children press on, only to take a wrong turn. The snow rises higher and higher, time passes: it is deep night when the sky clears and Conrad and Sanna discover themselves out on a glacier, terrifying and beautiful, the heart of the void.
The NYRB Classics series started in 1999 with the publication of A High Wind in Jamaica and by the end of this year over 400 titles will be in print—so we have plenty of excellent reading material to choose from. The series includes nineteenth-century and experimental novels, reportage and belles lettres, established classics and cult favorites, and literature high, low, unsuspected, and unheard of. Literature in translation also constitutes a major part of the NYRB Classics series, including new translations of canonical figures such as Euripides, Aeschylus, Dante, Balzac, Nietzsche, and Chekhov, as well as fresh translations of Stefan Zweig, Robert Walser, Alberto Moravia, and Curzio Malaparte, among others.
How it works:
Stop by Malvern Books to sign up and you’ll receive a 10% discount off the title! Read the book and then come to the meeting prepared with either a question or specific passage to discuss with the group. We’ll look forward to seeing you on December 3rd.
Join us for a meeting of the Boomertime Book Club!
The Boomertime Book Club aims to read all types of books, fiction and nonfiction. We select the book to be read at a meeting and then discuss it at the next meeting. We meet monthly. We limit attendance at each meeting to no more than twelve in order to encourage participation by all. Attendance is first come, first served. We encourage guests and encourage new membership within the Meetup Boomertime social group. For more information, please email Greg Smith at greg02390239@gmail.com.
Boomertime is a Meetup group for babyboomers (ages 50+). Its purpose is to provide opportunities for Austin adults to have fun and meet new people. Boomertime is a group where individuals can make friends and can plan events around their special interests for all to participate in. Boomers dance, hike, read, talk, laugh, and engage in many more activities.
Join us in celebrating the launch of Mike Lala’s Exit Theater, which won the 2016 Colorado Prize for Poetry. With readings from Mike Lala and Rebecca Liu.
Selected by Tyrone Williams for the 2016 Colorado Prize for Poetry, Exit Theater casts classical elegy, with dazzling formal innovation, into a staggering work of contemporary, political polyphony. Through monologues, performance scripts, and poems of exquisite prosody, Mike Lala examines the human figure—as subject and object, enemy and ally—in the context of a progressively defigured and hostile world. Catullus, Shakespeare, Cy Twombly, and Lydia Delectorskaya echo across engagements with Israeli generals, accused terrorists, State Department employees, nuclear scientists, Saturday Night Live actors, war criminals, malware, and a host of mythic, literary, and half-extant spectral characters. Amid the cacophony, Lala implicates every actor, including himself, in a web of shared culpability vis-à-vis consumerism, representation, speaking, writing, and making art against the backdrop of the endless, open wars of a post–Cold War, post-2001 era. Exit Theater is a debut of and against its time—a book about war, art, and what it means to make art in a time of war.
This is a remarkable book—sprawling, generous, angry, delicate. Through borrowed language and staged dialogues, Exit Theater asks how individual experiences of violence combine with myth to create the collective present, where we peer out from the ‘gun cabinet.’ A gun cabinet is a scary place from which to act as friend, to act as lover, to talk to family ghosts. Lala’s book tears open the velvet cushioning. —Cathy Wagner
Mike Lala (b. 1987, Lubbock, TX) is a poet who works with text, recorded sound, and, occasionally, images. His first book, Exit Theater, was selected by Tyrone Williams for the 2016 Colorado Prize for Poetry. Current work can be found in Boston Review, Fence, The Brooklyn Rail, Denver Quarterly, Jubilat, The Awl, and VOLT, as well as a number of chapbooks, most recently In the Gun Cabinet (TAR 2016) and Twenty-Four Exits (Present Tense Pamphlets 2016). He lives in New York. (Author photo credit: Kate Enman.)
Rebecca Liu is the recipient of fellowships from the Michener Center for Writers and the Stadler Center for Poetry. Her recent poems can be found in Boston Review, VOLT, Web Conjunctions, The Awl, Phantom Limb and Gulf Coast.
The Finnegans Wake Reading Group of Austin is a monthly get-together to dive into the depths of James Joyce’s greatest, weirdest, and most notorious masterpiece.
The process is to take turns reading aloud from the text, which allows its musicality to flow forth. Then we all discuss our interpretations and the many meanings and themes contained within the selection we’ve read.
We’ll read 2 or 3 pages of the book, depending on how many people are there and how much time we spend discussing the content.
This event is FREE and open to everyone. NO PRIOR KNOWLEDGE of Joyce or Finnegans Wake is required, just have an open mind—and be prepared to read aloud in front of strangers.
For more information, please visit the reading group’s website.
A representation of the book’s structure by Bauhaus artist Laszlo Moholy-Nagy.
“We read all types, we take all types. Aim to keep things light and fun.” Hosted by Jon Meador. Please visit Austin Book Club for more information.
Join us for a poetry reading and birthday cake to celebrate the late, great poet laureate of Hyde Park, Albert Huffstickler, featuring readings by Annie Harnett, David Jewell, David Thornberry, Larry Thoren, Mark Smith, and Master of Ceremonies W. Joe Hoppe.
Albert Huffstickler (December 17, 1927 – February 25, 2002) was born in Laredo, Texas, but he lived in Austin in his later years, and became a local literary legend. You could usually find him in a café in Hyde Park, decked out in suspenders, smoking, drinking coffee, and working on a poem. (Rumor has it he wrote a poem a day, and his impressive publication record—four full-length collections, plus hundreds of poems published in chapbooks and journals—lends veracity to the story.) He was a two-time winner of the Austin Book Awards, and in 1989 the state legislature formally honored him for his contribution to Texas poetry. In May 2013 a new Hyde Park green space at the corner of 38th and Duval Streets was named Huffstickler Green in his honor. Huff was a friend and inspiration to many, and everyone who knew him talks of his kindness, his honesty, and his passionate support for local literature. Austin Community College English professor W. Joe Hoppe, who will be reading tonight, describes his friend and mentor as “a great encourager of poetry.”
In association with VSA Texas (The State Organization on Arts and Disability) and the Pen2Paper Creative Writing Contest (a project of the Coalition of Texans with Disabilities), we’re delighted to present an inclusive (mic-less) open mic for writers and musicians. Join us for this fun and friendly afternoon suitable for performers of all ages and abilities.
Footage from previous Lion & Pirate open mic events can be seen here: http://bit.ly/1m7v4L8.
Welcome to Malvern Books’ Club: Reading Classics from New York Review Books, hosted (on most occasions) by Malvern’s own curmudgeon-in-chief, Dr. Joe. Everyone is invited to join us for what we’re sure will be a series of irreverent and insightful conversations.
Our January selection is Loving by Henry Green. Set in the vast hereditary house of an aristocratic Anglo-Irish family, Loving explores the deeply precarious nature of ordinary life against the background of the larger world at war.
Loving is a classic upstairs-downstairs story, with the emphasis on downstairs…Green’s generosity towards even the most scheming and rascally of them offers a lesson you never forget.
—Richard Lacayo, Time
The NYRB Classics series started in 1999 with the publication of A High Wind in Jamaica and by the end of this year over 400 titles will be in print—so we have plenty of excellent reading material to choose from. The series includes nineteenth-century and experimental novels, reportage and belles lettres, established classics and cult favorites, and literature high, low, unsuspected, and unheard of. Literature in translation also constitutes a major part of the NYRB Classics series, including new translations of canonical figures such as Euripides, Aeschylus, Dante, Balzac, Nietzsche, and Chekhov, as well as fresh translations of Stefan Zweig, Robert Walser, Alberto Moravia, and Curzio Malaparte, among others.
How it works:
Stop by Malvern Books to sign up and you’ll receive a 10% discount off the title! Read the book and then come to the meeting prepared with either a question or specific passage to discuss with the group. We’ll look forward to seeing you on January 7th.
“We read all types, we take all types. Aim to keep things light and fun.” Hosted by Jon Meador. Please visit Austin Book Club for more information.
The Finnegans Wake Reading Group of Austin is a monthly get-together to dive into the depths of James Joyce’s greatest, weirdest, and most notorious masterpiece.
The process is to take turns reading aloud from the text, which allows its musicality to flow forth. Then we all discuss our interpretations and the many meanings and themes contained within the selection we’ve read.
We’ll read 2 or 3 pages of the book, depending on how many people are there and how much time we spend discussing the content.
This event is FREE and open to everyone. NO PRIOR KNOWLEDGE of Joyce or Finnegans Wake is required, just have an open mind—and be prepared to read aloud in front of strangers.
For more information, please visit the reading group’s website.
A representation of the book’s structure by Bauhaus artist Laszlo Moholy-Nagy.
In association with VSA Texas (The State Organization on Arts and Disability) and the Pen2Paper Creative Writing Contest (a project of the Coalition of Texans with Disabilities), we’re delighted to present an inclusive (mic-less) open mic for writers and musicians.
This month we’re proud to be welcoming our Veteran Writers as featured guests in this special edition of our Lion & Pirate Open Mic! Join us for this fun and friendly evening suitable for performers of all ages and abilities.
Footage from previous Lion & Pirate open mic events can be seen here: http://bit.ly/1m7v4L8.
Welcome to Malvern Books’ Club: Reading Classics from New York Review Books, hosted (on most occasions) by Malvern’s own curmudgeon-in-chief, Dr. Joe. Everyone is invited to join us for what we’re sure will be a series of irreverent and insightful conversations.
Our February selection is Sunflower by Gyula Krúdy, translated from the Hungarian by John Bátki. In Sunflower, a young woman leaves the city and returns to her country estate to escape the memory of her desperate love for an unscrupulous charmer. The plot twists and turns; elemental myth mingles with sheer farce: Krúdy brilliantly illuminates the shifting contours of the landscape of desire.
Krudy writes of imaginary people, of imaginary events, in dream-like settings; but the spiritual essence of his persons and of their places is stunningly real, it reverberates in our minds and strikes at our hearts.
— John Lukacs, The New Yorker
The NYRB Classics series started in 1999 with the publication of A High Wind in Jamaica and by the end of this year over 400 titles will be in print—so we have plenty of excellent reading material to choose from. The series includes nineteenth-century and experimental novels, reportage and belles lettres, established classics and cult favorites, and literature high, low, unsuspected, and unheard of. Literature in translation also constitutes a major part of the NYRB Classics series, including new translations of canonical figures such as Euripides, Aeschylus, Dante, Balzac, Nietzsche, and Chekhov, as well as fresh translations of Stefan Zweig, Robert Walser, Alberto Moravia, and Curzio Malaparte, among others.
How it works:
Stop by Malvern Books to sign up and you’ll receive a 10% discount off the title! Read the book and then come to the meeting prepared with either a question or specific passage to discuss with the group. We’ll look forward to seeing you on February 4th.
Join us for a meeting of the Boomertime Book Club! This month they will be reading Seabiscuit: An American Legend by Laura Hillenbrand.
The Boomertime Book Club aims to read all types of books, fiction and nonfiction. We select the book to be read at a meeting and then discuss it at the next meeting. We meet monthly. We limit attendance at each meeting to no more than twelve in order to encourage participation by all. Attendance is first come, first served. We encourage guests and encourage new membership within the Meetup Boomertime social group. For more information, please email Greg Smith at greg02390239@gmail.com.
Boomertime is a Meetup group for babyboomers (ages 50+). Its purpose is to provide opportunities for Austin adults to have fun and meet new people. Boomertime is a group where individuals can make friends and can plan events around their special interests for all to participate in. Boomers dance, hike, read, talk, laugh, and engage in many more activities.
“We read all types, we take all types. Aim to keep things light and fun.” Hosted by Jon Meador. Please visit Austin Book Club for more information.
In association with VSA Texas (The State Organization on Arts and Disability) and the Pen2Paper Creative Writing Contest (a project of the Coalition of Texans with Disabilities), we’re delighted to present an inclusive (mic-less) open mic for writers and musicians. Join us in celebrating the third birthday of this fun and friendly evening suitable for performers of all ages and abilities.
Footage from previous Lion & Pirate open mic events can be seen here: http://bit.ly/1m7v4L8.
The Finnegans Wake Reading Group of Austin is a monthly get-together to dive into the depths of James Joyce’s greatest, weirdest, and most notorious masterpiece.
The process is to take turns reading aloud from the text, which allows its musicality to flow forth. Then we all discuss our interpretations and the many meanings and themes contained within the selection we’ve read.
We’ll read 2 or 3 pages of the book, depending on how many people are there and how much time we spend discussing the content.
This event is FREE and open to everyone. NO PRIOR KNOWLEDGE of Joyce or Finnegans Wake is required, just have an open mind—and be prepared to read aloud in front of strangers.
For more information, please visit the reading group’s website.
A representation of the book’s structure by Bauhaus artist Laszlo Moholy-Nagy.
Welcome to Malvern Books’ Club: Reading Classics from New York Review Books, hosted (on most occasions) by Malvern’s own curmudgeon-in-chief, Dr. Joe. Everyone is invited to join us for what we’re sure will be a series of irreverent and insightful conversations.
Our March selection is The Expendable Man by Dorothy B. Hughes. First published in 1963, The Expendable Man upends the conventions of the wrong-man narrative to deliver a story that engages readers even as it implicates them in the greatest of all American crimes.
The Expendable Man is one of the great trick novels of crime fiction. Yet to call it that is to belittle it. Its trick is no clever, superimposed bit of literary legerdemain: it is integral to the whole conception of the book. . . . A fine achievement. —H.R.F. Keating, Crime and Mystery: The 100 Best Books
The NYRB Classics series started in 1999 with the publication of A High Wind in Jamaica and by the end of this year over 400 titles will be in print—so we have plenty of excellent reading material to choose from. The series includes nineteenth-century and experimental novels, reportage and belles lettres, established classics and cult favorites, and literature high, low, unsuspected, and unheard of. Literature in translation also constitutes a major part of the NYRB Classics series, including new translations of canonical figures such as Euripides, Aeschylus, Dante, Balzac, Nietzsche, and Chekhov, as well as fresh translations of Stefan Zweig, Robert Walser, Alberto Moravia, and Curzio Malaparte, among others.
How it works:
Stop by Malvern Books to sign up and you’ll receive a 10% discount off the title! Read the book and then come to the meeting prepared with either a question or specific passage to discuss with the group. We’ll look forward to seeing you on March 4th.
In association with VSA Texas (The State Organization on Arts and Disability) and the Pen2Paper Creative Writing Contest (a project of the Coalition of Texans with Disabilities), we’re delighted to present an inclusive (mic-less) open mic for writers and musicians. Join us for a fun and friendly evening suitable for performers of all ages and abilities.
Footage from previous Lion & Pirate open mic events can be seen here: http://bit.ly/1m7v4L8.
“We read all types, we take all types. Aim to keep things light and fun.” Hosted by Jon Meador. Please visit Austin Book Club for more information.
The Finnegans Wake Reading Group of Austin is a monthly get-together to dive into the depths of James Joyce’s greatest, weirdest, and most notorious masterpiece.
The process is to take turns reading aloud from the text, which allows its musicality to flow forth. Then we all discuss our interpretations and the many meanings and themes contained within the selection we’ve read.
We’ll read 2 or 3 pages of the book, depending on how many people are there and how much time we spend discussing the content.
This event is FREE and open to everyone. NO PRIOR KNOWLEDGE of Joyce or Finnegans Wake is required, just have an open mind—and be prepared to read aloud in front of strangers.
For more information, please visit the reading group’s website.
A representation of the book’s structure by Bauhaus artist Laszlo Moholy-Nagy.
You’re already familiar with our NYRB Classics Bookclub, in which we read and discuss classic works of fiction… now we’d like to invite you to join The Other Book Club, a brand-new reading group for those of you interested in exploring works from the “Other” section of our store.
Our recently expanded “Other” collection includes ever so eclectic essays, plays, creative non-fiction, memoirs and more. Featuring books like Patrick Leigh Fermor’s travels through the Greek islands and the political tracts of Simone Weil—and let’s not forget Oskar Panizza’s blasphemous essay on the history of the pig!—our non-fiction section is as unusual as the rest of our store.
Our first book will be Patti Smith’s Woolgathering, a small and sublime memoir of her childhood and a moving exploration of her beginnings as an artist.
Capturing moments of her adult life, Smith pares down her prose to a state of vivid impressionism, so enigmatic that even ordinary acts take on spiritual weight. —The Guardian
How it works:
Stop by Malvern Books to sign up and you’ll receive a 10% discount off the title! Read the book and then come to the meeting prepared with either a question or specific passage to discuss with the group. We’ll look forward to seeing you on Saturday, March 18th, at 12pm for the inaugural meeting of The Other Book Club.
Join us in celebrating the launch of local poetry press INF Press. Poets Jenna Martin Opperman and Andrea Eames will be reading from their newly released poetry collections, the initial offerings of INF Press.
Jenna Martin Opperman has a BA in English Literature from The University of Texas at Austin and an MFA in Poetry from New England College. Despite being published in a wide variety of poetry journals and magazines, she prefers the thrill and terror of performing before a live audience. She works and plays with the printed word every day as an English teacher, as the owner of Red Planet Audiobooks, and as the co-founder of INF Press. Her poetry comes from a place of ferocity, of playfulness, of emotional urgency, and of hope. She loves whisky, revelation, and naps.
Praise for Shattering is Gradual by Jenna Martin Opperman:
This highly-polished, cerebral collection spans years of writing, and is an achievement both elegant and emotional. Love, heartbreak and self-realization are major themes, described with wry, often funny, always balanced poignancy.
Andrea Eames is a poet and novelist living in Austin after eight years in New Zealand and seventeen in Zimbabwe. She has released two critically acclaimed novels so far, both published by Harvill Secker (an imprint of Penguin Random House UK) and set in Zimbabwe: The Cry of the Go-Away Bird (2011) and The White Shadow (2012). The White Shadow was shortlisted for the 2012 Dylan Thomas Prize. Her first poetry collection, The Making of Stones, was released in March 2016 and her second, New Monsters, was released in February 2017. Andrea aims to be vulnerable, vivid, and honest in her poetry and prose.
Praise for New Monsters by Andrea Eames:
New Monsters is not for the timid. A study in the feminine as much as the poet, Eames’ new collection is fearless, revealing women in our full, unfettered beauty. Within these pages, we are ravenous and angry, raw and polished, simultaneously ourselves and our search for something larger—much like the collection itself.
Welcome to Malvern Books’ Club: Reading Classics from New York Review Books, hosted (on most occasions) by Malvern’s own curmudgeon-in-chief, Dr. Joe. Everyone is invited to join us for what we’re sure will be a series of irreverent and insightful conversations.
Our April selection is Lolly Willowes by Sylvia Townsend Warner. In Lolly Willowes, Warner’s first novel, she tells of an aging spinster’s struggle to break way from her controlling family—a classic story that she treats with cool feminist intelligence, while adding a dimension of the supernatural and strange.
Sylvia Townsend Warner’s brilliantly varied and self-possessed literary production never quite won her the flaming place in the heavens of repute that she deserved. . . . This is the witty, eerie, tender but firm life history of a middle-class Englishwoman who politely declines to make the expected connection with the opposite sex and becomes a witch instead. —John Updike
The NYRB Classics series started in 1999 with the publication of A High Wind in Jamaica and by the end of this year over 400 titles will be in print—so we have plenty of excellent reading material to choose from. The series includes nineteenth-century and experimental novels, reportage and belles lettres, established classics and cult favorites, and literature high, low, unsuspected, and unheard of. Literature in translation also constitutes a major part of the NYRB Classics series, including new translations of canonical figures such as Euripides, Aeschylus, Dante, Balzac, Nietzsche, and Chekhov, as well as fresh translations of Stefan Zweig, Robert Walser, Alberto Moravia, and Curzio Malaparte, among others.
How it works:
Stop by Malvern Books to sign up and you’ll receive a 10% discount off the title! Read the book and then come to the meeting prepared with either a question or specific passage to discuss with the group. We’ll look forward to seeing you on April 1st.
In association with VSA Texas (The State Organization on Arts and Disability) and the Pen2Paper Creative Writing Contest (a project of the Coalition of Texans with Disabilities), we’re delighted to present an inclusive (mic-less) open mic for writers and musicians. Join us for a fun and friendly evening suitable for performers of all ages and abilities.
This month, as well as our Open Mic, we have a special guest, Austin artist and author David Borden. We’ll be celebrating the release of And Yet We Rise, David’s graphic novel on life as a caregiver to a significantly disabled child. Meditative, humorous, and raw, And Yet We Rise dares to dive into the hidden world of parenting a medically fragile child with significant, multiple disabilities. This graphic novel explores the beauty and heartbreak with frankness and humanity.
David Borden is an artist and award winning writer living in Austin, Texas with his wife and daughter. He’s held various jobs in education: director of art programming at a non-profit for persons with disabilities, ESL and GED instructor, and college administrator. Once, long ago, he even sold everything and moved to Morocco for five years. He is often described as unconventional, irreverent, and indomitable. His daughter Savannah taught him to laugh loudly, face every day with courage, and dare to dream.
Footage from previous Lion & Pirate open mic events can be seen here: http://bit.ly/1m7v4L8.
Join us in celebrating the launch of Michael Anania’s poetry collection, Continuous Showings.
With Anania’s familiar, quick movement from perception to the precise but often kinetic image and his extraordinary musicality, Continuous Showings explores a wide range of continuities, from the persistence of tribal culture and language in Mexico to the experience of a fifties movie with Sinatra and Doris Day, from Newton’s alchemical encounter with the New World to the coincidence of science and Dadaism in Paris in 1922, from lute music to jazz. The collection’s final section, the award-winning “Omaha Appendices,” returns to the setting of Anania’s early poetry and fiction to examine the tragicomedy of Italian-American life in the Midwest.
Michael Anania is a poet, essayist, and fiction writer. His published work includes twelve collections of poetry, among them Selected Poems (l994), In Natural Light (1999) and Heat Lines (2006). His work is widely anthologized and has been translated into Italian, German, French, Spanish and Czech. He has also published a novel, The Red Menace, and a collection of essays, In Plain Sight. He has received a number of awards and fellowships, including the Charles Angoff Award and the Aniello Lauri Award for poems in this collection.
Anania was poetry editor of Audit, a quarterly, founder and co-editor of Audit/Poetry, poetry and literary editor of The Swallow Press, poetry editor of Partisan Review and a contributing editor to Tri-Quarterly and has served as an advisory editor to a number of other magazines and presses. He is Professor Emeritus of English at the University of Illinois at Chicago and a member of the faculty in writing at Northwestern University. He also taught at SUNY at Buffalo and the University of Chicago. He lives in Austin, Texas, and on Lake Michigan.
Join us in celebrating the launch of new books from poets Andrew Wessels, James Meetze, and Kelli Anne Noftle, with readings from Andrew, James, and Kelli, plus special guest John Fry. Andrew will be reading from A Turkish Dictionary; James will read from Phantom Hour; and Kelli will read from Adam Cannot Be Adam.
Andrew Wessels currently splits his time between Los Angeles and Istanbul, where he teaches at Koç University. He has previously lived in Houston, Cambridge, and Las Vegas. He has held fellowships from Poets & Writers and the Black Mountain Institute. His first book is A Turkish Dictionary from 1913 Press. Semi Circle, a chapbook of his translations of the Turkish poet Nurduran Duman, was published by Goodmorning Menagerie in 2016. His poems and translations can be found in VOLT, Witness, Tammy Journal, Faultline, and Colorado Review, among others. He is the NOS Series editor at Les Figues Press and a founding editor of The Offending Adam.
James Meetze [Metz] is the author of three books, including Phantom Hour and Dayglo, which was selected by Terrance Hayes for the 2010 Sawtooth Poetry Prize, both published by Ahsahta Press. He is editor, with Simon Pettet, of Other Flowers: Uncollected Poems by James Schuyler (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2010). James lives in San Diego, where he is a professor of creative writing and film studies at Ashford University.
Kelli Anne Noftle is a poet, musician, and business manager who currently lives in San Diego with her husband and their 50-year-old Sulcata tortoise, Bong Rip. Her first collection of poems, I Was There For Your Somniloquy, was selected by Rae Armantrout for the 2010 Omnidawn Book Prize. Her new book of poems, Adam Cannot Be Adam, is now out from Omnidawn Publishing.
John Fry is the author of the chapbook silt will swirl (NewBorder, 2012). His poems have appeared or are forthcoming in Colorado Review, West Branch, Water~Stone Review, and The Laurel Review, among others. He is a graduate of the MFA program at Texas State University. He serves as a poetry editor for Newfound Journal, and he is an assistant instructor and PhD student at the University of Texas at Austin.
Join us for a meeting of the Boomertime Book Club! This month they will be reading I Am Malala by Malala Yousafzai.
The Boomertime Book Club aims to read all types of books, fiction and nonfiction. We select the book to be read at a meeting and then discuss it at the next meeting. We meet monthly. We limit attendance at each meeting to no more than twelve in order to encourage participation by all. Attendance is first come, first served. We encourage guests and encourage new membership within the Meetup Boomertime social group. For more information, please email Greg Smith at greg02390239@gmail.com.
Boomertime is a Meetup group for babyboomers (ages 50+). Its purpose is to provide opportunities for Austin adults to have fun and meet new people. Boomertime is a group where individuals can make friends and can plan events around their special interests for all to participate in. Boomers dance, hike, read, talk, laugh, and engage in many more activities.
Join us in celebrating the launch of Schadenfreude, A Love Story by Rebecca Schuman. We’ll enjoy readings from Rebecca and Susan Signe Morrison.
Schadenfreude is the story of a teenage Jewish intellectual who falls in love—in love with a boy (who breaks her heart), a language (that’s nearly impossible to master), a culture (that’s nihilistic, but punctual), and a landscape (that’s breathtaking when there’s not a wall in the way). At once a snapshot of a young woman finding herself, and a country slowly starting to stitch itself back together after nearly a century of war (both hot and cold), Schadenfreude, A Love Story is an exhilarating, hilarious, and yes, maybe even heartfelt memoir proving that sometimes the truest loves play hard to get.
Rebecca Schuman is a St. Louis-based writer and translator who contributes regularly to The Awl, The Hairpin, Slate, the Atlantic, and other publications. She holds an MFA in fiction writing from The New School and a PhD in German from the University of California-Irvine. SCHADENFREUDE, A LOVE STORY is her first work of commercial nonfiction.
Living in Austin, Texas and Professor of English at Texas State University, Susan Signe Morrison lived in Germany during the 1980s and taught in the former East Germany. Her Stasi file has some unusual (and false) assertions. She will read selections from her published works on historical and legendary Germanic women.
You’re already familiar with our NYRB Classics Bookclub, in which we read and discuss classic works of fiction… now we’d like to invite you to join The Other Book Club, a reading group for those of you interested in exploring works from the “Other” section of our store.
Our recently expanded “Other” collection includes ever so eclectic essays, plays, creative non-fiction, memoirs and more. Featuring books like Patrick Leigh Fermor’s travels through the Greek islands and the political tracts of Simone Weil—and let’s not forget Oskar Panizza’s blasphemous essay on the history of the pig!—our non-fiction section is as unusual as the rest of our store.
April’s book will be Maggie Nelson’s Bluets, a collection of short lyric essays that explore personal suffering and the limitations of vision and love.
Bluets reaches far beyond the constraints of its subject, resulting in a series of delicately associative numbered paragraphs investigating a broken romantic relationship, a friend’s chronic nerve pain, the writing process itself, and the deceptive elements of perception and color. The result not only defies easy categorization, but also leans toward Walter Benjamin’s famous declaration that all great works of literature either dissolve a genre or invent one. —Rob Schlegel, Jacket
How it works:
Stop by Malvern Books to sign up and you’ll receive a 10% discount off the title! Read the book and then come to the meeting prepared with either a question or specific passage to discuss with the group. We’ll look forward to seeing you on Saturday, April 15th, at 12pm!
“We read all types, we take all types. Aim to keep things light and fun.” Hosted by Jon Meador. Please visit Austin Book Club for more information.
Join us in celebrating the launch of Tomás Q. Morín’s new poetry collection, Patient Zero (Copper Canyon Press). With readings from Tomás and Elena Passarello.
Tomás Q. Morín’s Patient Zero is full of life and its undeniable hungers. Claws, fins, mouths, and feathers populate a fanciful world: a man in a crowded market becomes a tree of butterflies, a mountain gives a feline yawn, grocery bags contain “milk for bones — salt for blood.” Meanwhile at the edge of the fantastic, realism beckons: the buzzard stalks the tortoise, heartbreak sickens the living, and each beginning contains an end.
Tomás Q. Morín is the author of Patient Zero and A Larger Country. He translated Pablo Neruda’s The Heights of Macchu Picchu and with Mari L’Esperance co-edited Coming Close: Forty Essays on Philip Levine. He teaches at Texas State University and in the low residency MFA program of Vermont College of Fine Arts.
Elena Passarello is the author of two collections of essays, Let Me Clear My Throat and Animals Strike Curious Poses. Her essays on performance, pop, culture, and the natural world have recently appeared in Oxford American, Virginia Quarterly Review, Paris Review Daily, and elsewhere. The recipient of the 2015 Whiting Award in nonfiction, she teaches at Oregon State University.
The Finnegans Wake Reading Group of Austin is a monthly get-together to dive into the depths of James Joyce’s greatest, weirdest, and most notorious masterpiece.
The process is to take turns reading aloud from the text, which allows its musicality to flow forth. Then we all discuss our interpretations and the many meanings and themes contained within the selection we’ve read.
We’ll read 2 or 3 pages of the book, depending on how many people are there and how much time we spend discussing the content.
This event is FREE and open to everyone. NO PRIOR KNOWLEDGE of Joyce or Finnegans Wake is required, just have an open mind—and be prepared to read aloud in front of strangers.
For more information, please visit the reading group’s website.
A representation of the book’s structure by Bauhaus artist Laszlo Moholy-Nagy.
Join us in celebrating the release of the Spring 2017 edition of Austin Community College’s journal, The Rio Review, which showcases poetry, prose, and artworks by students. During the event, students featured in this issue will share their fiction, nonfiction, and poetry with us.
Join us for a celebration hosted by Pterodáctilo, the bilingual journal and blog run by graduate students in UT Austin’s department of Spanish and Portuguese. This bilingual event will feature poetry readings… and tamales!
Readers include Ignacio Carvajal, Nicolas Emilfork, and Jim Trainer, and there will be music from Chulita Vinyl Club.
Welcome to Malvern Books’ Club: Reading Classics from New York Review Books, hosted (on most occasions) by Malvern’s own curmudgeon-in-chief, Dr. Joe. Everyone is invited to join us for what we’re sure will be a series of irreverent and insightful conversations.
Our May selection is The Unknown Masterpiece by Honoré de Balzac, the story of a painter who, depending on one’s perspective, is either an abject failure or a transcendental genius—or both. The story has served as an inspiration to artists as various as Cézanne, Henry James, Picasso, and New Wave director Jacques Rivette. Please note: The Unknown Masterpiece appears, as Balzac intended, with Gambara, a tragic novella about a musician undone by his dreams—we’ll be reading and discussing both works!
The hero of The Unknown Masterpiece, Frenhofer, is one of Balzac’s archetypal artists…. —The Washington Post
The greatest novelist of the nineteenth century and perhaps of all time. —The New York Times
The NYRB Classics series started in 1999 with the publication of A High Wind in Jamaica and by the end of this year over 400 titles will be in print—so we have plenty of excellent reading material to choose from. The series includes nineteenth-century and experimental novels, reportage and belles lettres, established classics and cult favorites, and literature high, low, unsuspected, and unheard of. Literature in translation also constitutes a major part of the NYRB Classics series, including new translations of canonical figures such as Euripides, Aeschylus, Dante, Balzac, Nietzsche, and Chekhov, as well as fresh translations of Stefan Zweig, Robert Walser, Alberto Moravia, and Curzio Malaparte, among others.
How it works:
Stop by Malvern Books to sign up and you’ll receive a 10% discount off the title! Read the book and then come to the meeting prepared with either a question or specific passage to discuss with the group. We’ll look forward to seeing you on May 6th.
Come celebrate the release of Analecta 43! We’ll be distributing copies of the journal, chatting about literature and art, eating snacks, and listening to some of the contributors read their work.
Join Hothouse Literary Journal for a reading from its spring publication. There will be copies of the free journal to pick up, a reading from some of the published writers, light refreshments, and conversation. Bring your friends! All are welcome.
Hothouse Literary Journal is the official journal for the UT English Department. They publish poetry, nonfiction, and fiction stories from multiple genres every year.
Join us for the launch of Chen Chen’s debut poetry collection, When I Grow Up I Want to Be a List of Further Possibilities, winner of the A. Poulin, Jr. Poetry Prize. With readings from Chen Chen, Jennifer Whalen, Tomás Morin, and Katelin Kelly.
What does Millennial poetry look like? One answer might be this wild debut from Chen Chen. He seems to run at the mouth, free-associating wildly, switching between lingo and ‘higher’ forms of diction. Nothing’s out of bounds or off limits, no culture too ‘pop’ to find its place in poetry . . . nor anything too silly to point the way toward serious aims. And yet this is a deeply serious and moving book about Chinese-American experience, young love, poetry, family, and the family one makes amongst friends. —NPR Books
Chen Chen is the author of When I Grow Up I Want to Be a List of Further Possibilities, winner of the A. Poulin, Jr. Poetry Prize and out now from BOA Editions. His work has appeared in two chapbooks and in publications such as Poetry, The New York Times Magazine, and The Best American Poetry. He has been featured on the PBS Newshour and Out.com. A Kundiman and Lambda Literary fellow, he is currently pursuing a PhD in English and Creative Writing at Texas Tech University.
Jennifer Whalen’s poems can be found or are forthcoming in Gulf Coast, Southern Indiana Review, Fugue, New South, Grist, and elsewhere. She was the 2015-2016 L.D. & LaVerne Harrell Clark House writer-in-residence at Texas State University. Residing in San Marcos, Texas, she currently teaches college writing.
Tomás Q. Morín is the author of Patient Zero and A Larger Country. He translated Pablo Neruda’s The Heights of Macchu Picchu and with Mari L’Esperance co-edited Coming Close: Forty Essays on Philip Levine. He teaches at Texas State University and in the low residency MFA program of Vermont College of Fine Arts.
Katelin Kelly was born in Lexington, Kentucky. She migrated to Austin three years ago where she earned her MFA in Poetry at The New Writers Project. A Pushcart Prize nominee, Katelin serves as the Managing Editor for Bat City Review. Her work can be found in Sonora Review, Misadventures Magazine, Wounwapi Literary Journal, and Narrative.
“We read all types, we take all types. Aim to keep things light and fun.” Hosted by Jon Meador. Please visit Austin Book Club for more information.
This all-women reading features writers from the Revolution Writing Workshop led by Abe Louise Young. Join us for poetry and prose about mothering, queer and straight parenting, being mothered and unmothered, sex, Mother Earth, and more! Readers include: Rebecca Whitehurst, Kandice Farmer, Robin Bradford, Abe Louise Young, Marcela Contreras, Angeliska Polachek, and Jamie Harris.
Join us for a meeting of the Boomertime Book Club! This month they will be reading A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole.
The Boomertime Book Club aims to read all types of books, fiction and nonfiction. We select the book to be read at a meeting and then discuss it at the next meeting. We meet monthly. We limit attendance at each meeting to no more than twelve in order to encourage participation by all. Attendance is first come, first served. We encourage guests and encourage new membership within the Meetup Boomertime social group. For more information, please email Greg Smith at greg02390239@gmail.com.
Boomertime is a Meetup group for babyboomers (ages 50+). Its purpose is to provide opportunities for Austin adults to have fun and meet new people. Boomertime is a group where individuals can make friends and can plan events around their special interests for all to participate in. Boomers dance, hike, read, talk, laugh, and engage in many more activities.
The Finnegans Wake Reading Group of Austin is a monthly get-together to dive into the depths of James Joyce’s greatest, weirdest, and most notorious masterpiece.
The process is to take turns reading aloud from the text, which allows its musicality to flow forth. Then we all discuss our interpretations and the many meanings and themes contained within the selection we’ve read.
We’ll read 2 or 3 pages of the book, depending on how many people are there and how much time we spend discussing the content.
This event is FREE and open to everyone. NO PRIOR KNOWLEDGE of Joyce or Finnegans Wake is required, just have an open mind—and be prepared to read aloud in front of strangers.
For more information, please visit the reading group’s website.
A representation of the book’s structure by Bauhaus artist Laszlo Moholy-Nagy.
You’re already familiar with our NYRB Classics Bookclub, in which we read and discuss classic works of fiction… now we’d like to invite you to join The Other Book Club, a reading group for those of you interested in exploring works from the “Other” section of our store.
Our recently expanded “Other” collection includes ever so eclectic essays, plays, creative non-fiction, memoirs and more. Featuring books like Patrick Leigh Fermor’s travels through the Greek islands and the political tracts of Simone Weil—and let’s not forget Oskar Panizza’s blasphemous essay on the history of the pig!—our non-fiction section is as unusual as the rest of our store.
May’s book will be Ray Bradbury: The Last Interview, a collection that includes Bradbury’s last talk, as well as interviews from earlier in his career.
Ray Bradbury was long the most influential sci-fi writer in the world, the poetic and visionary author of such classics as Fahrenheit 451 and The Illustrated Man. But he also lived a fascinating life outside the parameters of sci-fi, and was a masterful raconteur of his own story, as he reveals in this wide-ranging and in-depth final interview.
How it works:
Stop by Malvern Books to sign up and you’ll receive a 10% discount off the title! Read the book and then come to the meeting prepared with either a question or specific passage to discuss with the group. We’ll look forward to seeing you on Saturday, May 20th, at 12pm!
In association with VSA Texas (The State Organization on Arts and Disability) and the Pen2Paper Creative Writing Contest (a project of the Coalition of Texans with Disabilities), we’re delighted to present an inclusive (mic-less) open mic for writers and musicians. Join us for a fun and friendly evening suitable for performers of all ages and abilities.
This month, as well as our Open Mic, we have a special guest, author and brain injury survivor Joseph Huerta.
Born and raised in Corpus Christi, Joseph Huerta is a graduate of the Plan II Program and the School of Law at the University of Texas, Austin. His memoir, Broken Brain: Surviving a Traumatic Brain Injury, was published in 2014 and chronicled his firsthand experience of his near-fatal brain injury and subsequent recovery. La Roja is Huerta’s debut novel.
La Roja is a suspenseful, coming-of-age narrative set in McAllen, South Texas, along the Mexican border. This captivating novel explores the complexity of this distinct landscape—both its culture, religion, and illicit drug activity—through the unexpected romance of two high school students, Paco and Nancy. The author tells the whimsical story of the couple’s first meeting and subsequent courtship, and later the challenging collision of their beliefs. A recent immigrant who has fled the dangerous drug-trade activities of her extended family in Laredo, Texas, Nancy is a loyal follower of Santa Muerta, the Catholic folk saint. Paco is a dedicated altar server at the Catholic Church and is being groomed by his mentors to enter the seminary after graduation. No surprisingly, these plans take a turn after he meets Nancy.
Footage from previous Lion & Pirate open mic events can be seen here: http://bit.ly/1m7v4L8.
Join us in celebrating the launch of Intent (published by Hedgehog & Fox, an imprint of Warner Literary Group), the debut poetry collection from Austin-based actor and writer Christia Madacsi Hoffman. With readings from Christia, Erica Parfit, Joe Brundidge, and Margaret Burns.
Inspired by a friend’s daily photography series, Christia Madacsi Hoffman set an intention to write a minimum of two lines of verse per day for 365 days. Four years and thousands of lines later, the result is her debut collection of poetry, Intent. Throughout, Hoffman reveals an accessible and insightful poetic voice as she explores the universal themes of place, beauty, youth and family. Her moving reflections remind us there is depth in our everyday experiences and significance in our intentions.
Christia Madacsi Hoffman grew up along the banks of the Mystic River in Mystic, Connecticut. A longtime Austin, Texas resident, Hoffman’s work has appeared in the Texas Observer and the annual anthology of the Austin International Poetry Festival. Through her company, CenterLight Media, Hoffman works as a marketing and editorial writer, graphic designer and actor. Her early career adventures included antique furniture restoration and leading treks in the high Himalaya.
As the daughter of a travel writer, Erica Parfit (above left) learned to love the way words fit together. With the loss of her mother at a young age, she also came to understand the importance of self-expression through writing and music. Following a hiatus in which she became a mom to two boys, Erica returned to the written word as a songwriter, poet, and memoirist. She credits writing with allowing her to maintain a sense of humor and perspective in this wild and wonderful world.
Joe Brundidge (above center) is an author, host, and public speaker living in Austin, Texas. He has hosted a number of open mic events for almost 20 years, including Spoken & Heard at Kick Butt Coffee, an event he curates. He also served as the Director of the Austin International Poetry Festival for three years, from 2012-2015.
Margaret Burns (above right) has an MA in Creative Writing from UT and has been writing short fiction and rapping about her life to unsuspecting children and audiences for a while now. Margaret is a midwife, a yoga teacher, and a mother. Her life mission includes queso.
Join us in celebrating the launch of Jessica Reisman’s new novel, Substrate Phantoms.
Substrate Phantoms presents immemorial human acts in variations as strange as any 21st-century reader could imagine, but always in contexts emotionally resonant. I think it an out-and-out breakthrough, with mystical and sociological roots trailing back to Arthur C. Clarke’s Childhood’s End and Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Left Hand of Darkness. Indeed, true aficionados of humane hard SF will applaud Ms. Reisman for bequeathing them this beautiful tale of a heretofore uncreated tomorrow. —Michael Bishop, author of A Funeral for the Eyes of Fire
Jessica Reisman’s stories have appeared in numerous magazines and anthologies, among them the World Fantasy Award-nominated Cross Plains Universe. Her story “Threads” won the South East Science Fiction Achievement award. Her far future science fiction adventure SUBSTRATE PHANTOMS, from Resurrection House Books, is out in May 2017 and her story “Bourbon, Sugar, Grace” will appear on Tor.com in June 2017.
Please join us for a celebratory reading by the writers of S. Kirk Walsh’s nine-month fiction workshop (Sept-June). Short excerpts from novels and short stories will be read.
Participating writers include Dena Afrasiabi, Nicole Beckley, Candace Buford, Elena Carey, Matt Clements, Megan Coxe, Jack Kaulfus, Matt Holmes, Katherine Moore, Alejandro Puyana, Victoria Rossi, Karen Valby, Julie Wernersbach, James Young, and Stefani Zellmer. This talented group of writers features published fiction and nonfiction writers, book critics, and MFA graduates. For the past nine months, they have participated in an intensive fiction workshop, drafting and revising novels and short stories throughout the year. Please join us in celebrating their inspiring work and distinctive voices with this end-of-the-workshop reading. Refreshments and sweets will be served.
Welcome to Malvern Books’ Club: Reading Classics from New York Review Books, hosted (on most occasions) by Malvern’s own curmudgeon-in-chief, Dr. Joe. Everyone is invited to join us for what we’re sure will be a series of irreverent and insightful conversations.
Our June selection is Hill by Jean Giono, a novel set deep in Provence a century ago, where wildness presses in from all sides and humans and the natural world are locked in a life-and-death struggle.
In Hill [Giono] . . . decided to show the peasants of his region of Provence in all their particularity—and also to show the beauty and terror of nature in its raw state, stripped of its classical allusions. —Edmund White, The New York Review of Books
The NYRB Classics series started in 1999 with the publication of A High Wind in Jamaica and by the end of this year over 400 titles will be in print—so we have plenty of excellent reading material to choose from. The series includes nineteenth-century and experimental novels, reportage and belles lettres, established classics and cult favorites, and literature high, low, unsuspected, and unheard of. Literature in translation also constitutes a major part of the NYRB Classics series, including new translations of canonical figures such as Euripides, Aeschylus, Dante, Balzac, Nietzsche, and Chekhov, as well as fresh translations of Stefan Zweig, Robert Walser, Alberto Moravia, and Curzio Malaparte, among others.
How it works:
Stop by Malvern Books to sign up and you’ll receive a 10% discount off the title! Read the book and then come to the meeting prepared with either a question or specific passage to discuss with the group. We’ll look forward to seeing you on June 3rd.
“We read all types, we take all types. Aim to keep things light and fun.” Hosted by Jon Meador. Please visit Austin Book Club for more information.
The Finnegans Wake Reading Group of Austin is a monthly get-together to dive into the depths of James Joyce’s greatest, weirdest, and most notorious masterpiece.
The process is to take turns reading aloud from the text, which allows its musicality to flow forth. Then we all discuss our interpretations and the many meanings and themes contained within the selection we’ve read.
We’ll read 2 or 3 pages of the book, depending on how many people are there and how much time we spend discussing the content.
This event is FREE and open to everyone. NO PRIOR KNOWLEDGE of Joyce or Finnegans Wake is required, just have an open mind—and be prepared to read aloud in front of strangers.
For more information, please visit the reading group’s website.
A representation of the book’s structure by Bauhaus artist Laszlo Moholy-Nagy.
You’re already familiar with our NYRB Classics Bookclub, in which we read and discuss classic works of fiction… now we’d like to invite you to join The Other Book Club, a reading group for those of you interested in exploring works from the “Other” section of our store.
Our recently expanded “Other” collection includes ever so eclectic essays, plays, creative non-fiction, memoirs and more. Featuring books like Patrick Leigh Fermor’s travels through the Greek islands and the political tracts of Simone Weil—and let’s not forget Oskar Panizza’s blasphemous essay on the history of the pig!—our non-fiction section is as unusual as the rest of our store.
June’s book will be the essay collection Animals Strike Curious Poses by Elena Passarello. Beginning with Yuka, a 39,000 year old mummified woolly mammoth recently found in the Siberian permafrost, each of the 16 essays in Animals Strike Curious Poses investigates a different famous animal named and immortalized by humans. Modeled loosely after a medieval bestiary, these witty, playful, whipsmart essays traverse history, myth, science, and more, bringing each beast vibrantly to life.
Passarello treats her subjects with dextrous care, weaving narratives together in a way that investigates, honors, and complicates her subjects. . . . Passarello has created a consistently original, thoroughly researched, altogether fascinating compendium. —Booklist, starred review
How it works:
Stop by Malvern Books to sign up and you’ll receive a 10% discount off the title! Read the book and then come to the meeting prepared with either a question or specific passage to discuss with the group. We’ll look forward to seeing you on Saturday, June 24th, at 1pm!
In association with VSA Texas (The State Organization on Arts and Disability) and the Pen2Paper Creative Writing Contest (a project of the Coalition of Texans with Disabilities), we’re delighted to present an inclusive (mic-less) open mic for writers and musicians. Join us for a fun and friendly evening suitable for performers of all ages and abilities.
Footage from previous Lion & Pirate open mic events can be seen here: http://bit.ly/1m7v4L8.
Join us in celebrating the launch of The Adventures of Juice Box and Shame, the next installment in Liv Hadden’s The Shamed Series—and this new release features comic book illustrations by St. Louis artist Mo Malone. This event will also feature live music from Lexi and the Bleached Roses.
Li Nguyen, aka Juice Box, has never really had a friend. That is, until he meets the ultra cool, super mysterious Shame. Though Juice Box feels certain this is his new BFF, Shame’s dark past and nefarious entanglements get them both into serious, life-threatening trouble. It doesn’t help that Shame inadvertently pissed off one of the baddest crime bosses in Baltimore, Anna Nguyen (aka Laoban), who also happens to be Juice Box’s cousin. Shame stirred up trouble with a rival game, putting Anna and her crew in a precarious situation. Torn between his love for Anna and his new, exciting friendship with Shame, Juice Box must choose where his loyalties lie.
Liv Hadden (above left) has her roots in Burlington, Vermont and currently resides in Georgetown, Texas with her partner and two dogs, Madison and Samuel, where she is an active member of Writer’s League of Texas. Her 2016 release In the Mind of Revenge received high praise from Blue Ink Reviews, Writer’s Digest, Kirkus Reviews, indieBRAG and five stars from Foreword Clarion Review. Incredibly inspired by artistic expression, Hadden immerses herself in creative endeavors on a daily basis. She finds great joy in getting lost in writing and seeing others fully express themselves through their greatest artistic passions.
Mo Malone has been making art since she was a kid. Offered a tattoo apprenticeship while obtaining a B.F.A. in Sculpture from Virginia Commonwealth University, Malone briefly diverted from tattooing to be an elementary and middle school teacher, an experience she greatly enjoyed, but ultimately came back to her artistic roots. She has tattooed at Rick’s Tattoo in Arlington, Virginia (where she got her start), Iron Age Studio in St. Louis, Missouri and Triple Crown Tattoo in Austin, Texas where she met Hadden. A lover of travel, her craft has taken her all over the world, to include a dozens of tattoo conferences spanning from New York to Moscow. You can now find Malone back in St. Louis at Ragtime Tattoo. She has recently joined Evil Prints to expand into screen-printing, and when she’s not working her magic in the art world, you can find her feeding her adventurous spirit BMXing at her local skate park or wandering the Missouri Botanical Garden.
Join us in celebrating the launch of Joe Giordano’s second novel, Appointment with ISIL, An Anthony Provati Thriller. Joe will be joined by author Walt Gragg, who will be reading from his recently released novel The Red Line.
Joe Giordano was born in Brooklyn. He and his wife, Jane, have lived in Greece, Brazil, Belgium and the Netherlands. They now live in Texas with their shih tzu, Sophia. Joe’s stories have appeared in more than one-hundred magazines including The Monarch Review, The Saturday Evening Post, decomP, The Summerset Review, and Shenandoah. His novel, Birds of Passage, An Italian Immigrant Coming of Age Story, was published by Harvard Square Editions in October 2015. His second novel, Appointment with ISIL, An Anthony Provati Thriller, will be published by HSE on June 15, 2017.
Walt Gragg lives in the Austin, Texas area with his wife, children, and grandchildren. He is a retired attorney. Prior to law school, he spent a number of years in the military. His time with the Army involved many interesting assignments including three years in the middle of the Cold War at United States European Command Headquarters in Germany where the idea for The Red Line took shape. In this assignment he was privy to many of the elements of the actual American plan in place at the time for the conduct of the defense of Germany. While there, he also participated in a number of war games that became the basis for many of the novel’s events.
Welcome to Malvern Books’ Club: Reading Classics from New York Review Books, hosted (on most occasions) by Malvern’s own curmudgeon-in-chief, Dr. Joe. Everyone is invited to join us for what we’re sure will be a series of irreverent and insightful conversations.
Our July selection is Nancy Mitford’s Voltaire in Love. Mitford’s account of Voltaire’s fifteen-year relationship with the Marquise du Châtelet—the renowned mathematician who introduced Isaac Newton’s revolutionary new physics to France—is a spirited romp in the company of two extraordinary individuals as well as an erudite guide to French high society during the Enlightenment.
In this substantial but wonderfully gay and gossipy book, Miss Mitford details with a zest that is wholly engaging the idyllic moments and the hectic hours that marked the long association of these enormously intelligent lovers. —The New Yorker
The NYRB Classics series started in 1999 with the publication of A High Wind in Jamaica and by the end of this year over 400 titles will be in print—so we have plenty of excellent reading material to choose from. The series includes nineteenth-century and experimental novels, reportage and belles lettres, established classics and cult favorites, and literature high, low, unsuspected, and unheard of. Literature in translation also constitutes a major part of the NYRB Classics series, including new translations of canonical figures such as Euripides, Aeschylus, Dante, Balzac, Nietzsche, and Chekhov, as well as fresh translations of Stefan Zweig, Robert Walser, Alberto Moravia, and Curzio Malaparte, among others.
How it works:
Stop by Malvern Books to sign up and you’ll receive a 10% discount off the title! Read the book and then come to the meeting prepared with either a question or specific passage to discuss with the group. We’ll look forward to seeing you on July 1st.
“We read all types, we take all types. Aim to keep things light and fun.” Hosted by Jon Meador. Please visit Austin Book Club for more information.
Join us for a meeting of the Boomertime Book Club! This month the members are reading a book of their choice that focuses on the hippie culture of the 1960s (The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe is a popular pick).
The Boomertime Book Club aims to read all types of books, fiction and nonfiction. We select the book to be read at a meeting and then discuss it at the next meeting. We meet monthly. We limit attendance at each meeting to no more than twelve in order to encourage participation by all. Attendance is first come, first served. We encourage guests and encourage new membership within the Meetup Boomertime social group. For more information, please email Greg Smith at greg02390239@gmail.com.
Boomertime is a Meetup group for babyboomers (ages 50+). Its purpose is to provide opportunities for Austin adults to have fun and meet new people. Boomertime is a group where individuals can make friends and can plan events around their special interests for all to participate in. Boomers dance, hike, read, talk, laugh, and engage in many more activities.
Join us in celebrating the launch of the debut issue of Kallisto Gaia Press’ literary journal, The Ocotillo Review, which features over 100 pages of literary genius by award-winning writers from around the world and superb new pieces by writers from underserved communities. Several poets and writers will read excerpts of their work from this debut edition, including Marilyn Duncan, Zoë Faye Stindt, Howard Hatfield, Carol Moczygemba, Jennifer Preiss, Benjamin Pehr, Elijah Allred, Charles Darnell, and Griselda Castillo. Editors from the journal will also share their favorite pieces and conduct a Q & A.
You’re already familiar with our NYRB Classics Bookclub, in which we read and discuss classic works of fiction… now we’d like to invite you to join The Other Book Club, a reading group for those of you interested in exploring works from the “Other” section of our store.
Our recently expanded “Other” collection includes ever so eclectic essays, plays, creative non-fiction, memoirs and more. Featuring books like Patrick Leigh Fermor’s travels through the Greek islands and the political tracts of Simone Weil—and let’s not forget Oskar Panizza’s blasphemous essay on the history of the pig!—our non-fiction section is as unusual as the rest of our store.
July’s book will be How to Travel without Seeing: Dispatches from the New Latin America by Andrés Neuman. Lamenting not having more time to get to know each of the nineteen countries he visits after winning the prestigious Premio Alfaguara, Andrés Neuman begins to suspect that world travel consists mostly of “not seeing.” But then he realizes that the fleeting nature of his trip provides him with a unique opportunity: touring and comparing every country of Latin America in a single stroke. Neuman writes on the move, generating a kinetic work that is at once puckish and poetic, aphoristic and brimming with curiosity. Even so-called non-places—airports, hotels, taxis—are turned into powerful symbols full of meaning. A dual Argentine-Spanish citizen, he incisively explores cultural identity and nationality, immigration and globalization, history and language, and turbulent current events.
Neuman has a gift . . . The literature of the twenty-first century will belong to Neuman and a few of his blood brothers.”
—Roberto Bolaño
How it works:
Stop by Malvern Books to sign up and you’ll receive a 10% discount off the title! Read the book and then come to the meeting prepared with either a question or specific passage to discuss with the group. We’ll look forward to seeing you on Saturday, July 15th, at 1pm!
Join us in celebrating the launch of Dylan Krieger’s Giving Godhead (Delete Press). With readings from Dylan, Cindy Huyser, Debangana Banerjeem, and Vincent Cellucci.
Dylan Krieger is a transistor radio picking up alien frequencies in south Louisiana. She lives in the back of a little brick house with a feline reincarnation of Catherine the Great, sings harmonies incessantly to any song she hears, and sunlights as a trade mag editor. She earned her BA in English and philosophy from the University of Notre Dame in 2012 and her MFA in creative writing from Louisiana State University in 2015. She is the author of Giving Godhead and dreamland trash (Saint Julian Press, forthcoming). Her more recent projects include an irreverent reimagining of philosophical thought experiments and an autobiographical meditation on the tenets of the Church of Euthanasia. Her poems have appeared or are forthcoming in several print and online literary journals, including Seneca Review, Midwest Review, Quarterly West, Xavier Review, Phoebe, So and So, Tenderloin, Coup d’Etat, and Maintenant.
Cindy Huyser’s chapbook, Burning Number Five: Power Plant Poems, was named co-winner of the 2014 Blue Horse Press Poetry Chapbook contest. Her work has been nominated for the Best of the Net award and the Pushcart Prize, and has recently appeared in Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review, San Pedro River Review, Red River Review, The Enigmatist, Watermelon Isotope, and in Bearing The Mask: Southwestern Persona Poems (Dos Gatos Press), which she edited with Scott Wiggerman of Dos Gatos Press.
Debangana Banerjee was born and raised in Santiniketan, West Bengal, India and lived there until she came to Baton Rouge in 2006. She received her second Master of Fine Arts in printmaking from Louisiana State University in August 2010. There, she worked with poet Vincent Cellucci, who wrote An Easy Place / To Die (CityLit Press, 2011) and edited Fuck Poems an exceptional anthology (Lavender Ink, 2012). Come back river, a bilingual Bengali-English translation, is a chapbook collaboration of the two available from Finishing Line Press. They are working on completing a full-length book of translations this summer and will be reading some of their new work.
The Finnegans Wake Reading Group of Austin is a monthly get-together to dive into the depths of James Joyce’s greatest, weirdest, and most notorious masterpiece.
The process is to take turns reading aloud from the text, which allows its musicality to flow forth. Then we all discuss our interpretations and the many meanings and themes contained within the selection we’ve read.
We’ll read 2 or 3 pages of the book, depending on how many people are there and how much time we spend discussing the content.
This event is FREE and open to everyone. NO PRIOR KNOWLEDGE of Joyce or Finnegans Wake is required, just have an open mind—and be prepared to read aloud in front of strangers.
For more information, please visit the reading group’s website.
A representation of the book’s structure by Bauhaus artist Laszlo Moholy-Nagy.
In association with VSA Texas (The State Organization on Arts and Disability) and the Pen2Paper Creative Writing Contest (a project of the Coalition of Texans with Disabilities), we’re delighted to present an inclusive (mic-less) open mic for writers and musicians. Join us for a fun and friendly evening suitable for performers of all ages and abilities.
Footage from previous Lion & Pirate open mic events can be seen here: http://bit.ly/1m7v4L8.
Welcome to Malvern Books’ Club: Reading Classics from New York Review Books, hosted (on most occasions) by Malvern’s own curmudgeon-in-chief, Dr. Joe. Everyone is invited to join us for what we’re sure will be a series of irreverent and insightful conversations.
Our August selection is Umberto Saba’s Ernesto. A classic of gay literature, Ernesto is the tender and complex tale of sexual awakening by one of Italy’s most admired poets.
This little miracle of a book tackles the weightiest themes—the unthinking cruelty of youth, the shock of adulthood, the humanizing force of love—with the humor and lightness of touch that are the surest sign of mastery. For all its modesty and charm, the novel’s profound, unassuming beauty has a force and finally a grandeur that come from the source of all great art. — Garth Greenwell, author of What Belongs to You
The NYRB Classics series started in 1999 with the publication of A High Wind in Jamaica and by the end of this year over 400 titles will be in print—so we have plenty of excellent reading material to choose from. The series includes nineteenth-century and experimental novels, reportage and belles lettres, established classics and cult favorites, and literature high, low, unsuspected, and unheard of. Literature in translation also constitutes a major part of the NYRB Classics series, including new translations of canonical figures such as Euripides, Aeschylus, Dante, Balzac, Nietzsche, and Chekhov, as well as fresh translations of Stefan Zweig, Robert Walser, Alberto Moravia, and Curzio Malaparte, among others.
How it works:
Stop by Malvern Books to sign up and you’ll receive a 10% discount off the title! Read the book and then come to the meeting prepared with either a question or specific passage to discuss with the group. We’ll look forward to seeing you on August 5th.
Join us in celebrating the launch of Claude Lalumière’s fourth book, Venera Dreams: A Weird Entertainment, a work of speculative fiction that Portal/World SF Blog called “bizarre, fascinating, hilarious.”
Venera Dreams is a mosaic novel, a surreal history of a fictional and fantastical European city-state, inspired in part by Venice, The Arabian Nights, and the architecture of Antoni Gaudí. It is divided in three sections. The first, “The Lure of Vermilion,” describes the impact of Venera’s lure on various characters. The second section, “Adventures in Times Past,” ranges from the Roman Empire’s invasion of Venera and intrigue involving a Veneran spy at the court of the Chinese Zhengde Emperor during the Renaissance to a tale of Salvador Dalí’s ties to Venera and a metafictional exploration of Scheherazade’s relationship to Venera. The final section, “The Secret Histories of Magus Amore,” returns to the present to resolve the mysteries of Venera.
Claude Lalumière is the author of three previous books: Objects of Worship (CZP 2009), The Door to Lost Pages (CZP 2011), and Nocturnes and Other Nocturnes (Infinity Plus 2013). He has edited or co-edited 14 anthologies in various genres. Originally from Montreal, he’s currently headquartered in Ottawa.
“We read all types, we take all types. Aim to keep things light and fun.” Hosted by Jon Meador. Please visit Austin Book Club for more information.
The Finnegans Wake Reading Group of Austin is a monthly get-together to dive into the depths of James Joyce’s greatest, weirdest, and most notorious masterpiece.
The process is to take turns reading aloud from the text, which allows its musicality to flow forth. Then we all discuss our interpretations and the many meanings and themes contained within the selection we’ve read.
We’ll read 2 or 3 pages of the book, depending on how many people are there and how much time we spend discussing the content.
This event is FREE and open to everyone. NO PRIOR KNOWLEDGE of Joyce or Finnegans Wake is required, just have an open mind—and be prepared to read aloud in front of strangers.
For more information, please visit the reading group’s website.
A representation of the book’s structure by Bauhaus artist Laszlo Moholy-Nagy.
Join us in celebrating the launch of Ching-In Chen’s new poetry collection, recombinant. With readings from Ching-In Chen, mónica teresa ortiz, and Jesus Valles.
Ching-In Chen’s recombinant is an innovative and powerful collection about genealogy, migration, survival, gender, memory, and ecology. The poems unearth and recombine fragments from museum artifacts, laws, census data, and historical archives with lyric reflections and open-heart composition strategies. By the end, you will feel haunted by the ghosts and ancestors who have continued their journey in the vessel of the poet’s tongue. —Craig Santos Perez
Ching-In Chen is the author of The Heart’s Traffic (Arktoi Books) and recombinant (Kelsey Street Press) and co-editor of The Revolution Starts at Home: Confronting Intimate Violence Within Activist Communities (South End Press; AK Press) and Here is a Pen: an Anthology of West Coast Kundiman Poets (Achiote Press). A Kundiman, Lambda, Watering Hole and Callaloo Fellow, they are part of the Macondo and Voices of Our Nations Arts Foundation writing communities. A senior editor of The Conversant, they serve on the Executive Board of Thinking Its Presence: Race, Advocacy, and Solidarity in the Arts. They are an Assistant Professor in Poetry at Sam Houston State University and poetry editor of the Texas Review.
mónica teresa ortiz was born and raised in Texas. Her work has appeared in Pilgrimage Magazine, Borderlands, the Texas Observer, Black Girl Dangerous, and elsewhere. A two-time Andres Montoya Letras Latinas Poetry Prize finalist, ortiz is the poetry editor for Raspa Magazine, a queer Latino literary art journal.
Jesus I. Valles is a queer, Mexican immigrant, educator, storyteller, and performer based in Austin, Texas. Jesus has been yelling about things for over a decade and doesn’t see that ending any time soon. Jesus was a finalist for the Write Bloody 2016 poetry contest and will soon be featured in The Shade journal. As a writer and storyteller, Jesus has presented work at Greetings, From Queer Mountain!, The Megaphone Show, The Encyclopedia Show, and The Austin Storytelling Slam. As an actor, Jesus works with multiple companies including Teatro Vivo, Lucky Chaos Theatre, and Scottish Rite Theater, and The Vortex (where they are a proud company member). Jesus is continuing work on a poetry manuscript tentatively called UnDocuments, which will have its first reading and workshop at The Vortex in September of 2017.
You’re already familiar with our NYRB Classics Bookclub, in which we read and discuss classic works of fiction… now we’d like to invite you to join The Other Book Club, a reading group for those of you interested in exploring works from the “Other” section of our store.
Our recently expanded “Other” collection includes ever so eclectic essays, plays, creative non-fiction, memoirs and more. Featuring books like Patrick Leigh Fermor’s travels through the Greek islands and the political tracts of Simone Weil—and let’s not forget Oskar Panizza’s blasphemous essay on the history of the pig!—our non-fiction section is as unusual as the rest of our store.
August’s book will be Is That Kafka? 99 Finds by Reiner Stach. In the course of compiling his highly acclaimed three-volume biography of Kafka, Stach made one astounding discovery after another: unexpected photographs, excerpts from letters, inconsistencies in handwritten texts, and testimonies from Kafka’s contemporaries that shed surprising light on his personality and his writing. In Is that Kafka?, Stach has assembled 99 of his most exciting discoveries, presenting the crystal granules of the real Kafka.
A mishmash of ephemera, curiosities and confessionals, the finds range from the banal to the deeply personal, yet collectively paint as engaging and illustrative a portrait of the artist as any I’ve read.
—Pasha Malla, Globe and Mail
How it works:
Stop by Malvern Books to sign up and you’ll receive a 10% discount off the title! Read the book and then come to the meeting prepared with either a question or specific passage to discuss with the group. We’ll look forward to seeing you on Saturday, August 19th, at 1pm!
In association with VSA Texas (The State Organization on Arts and Disability) and the Pen2Paper Creative Writing Contest (a project of the Coalition of Texans with Disabilities), we’re delighted to present an inclusive (mic-less) open mic for writers and musicians. Join us for a fun and friendly evening suitable for performers of all ages and abilities.
Footage from previous Lion & Pirate open mic events can be seen here: http://bit.ly/1m7v4L8.
Join us in celebrating the recent release of Martin Perlman’s debut novel, Thinks Out Loud.
It all started as a personal blog. For more than a year, Martin Perlman published his musings two or three times a week online; social commentary, cultural references, and the like. Then it became something more. The result is the . . . debut novel, Thinks Out Loud, a story that follows a burned-out blogger who washes up in the South Pacific, and a group of characters at odds with a high-tech CEO with murky intentions. —from Queen Anne & Magnolia News
Born and raised in Atlanta, Georgia, Martin Perlman has spent his adult life out West in California, Colorado, and Washington. Influences on his psyche include repeated viewings of Rocky and Bullwinkle, repeated listenings to Tom Lehrer and Firesign Theatre, and repeated readings of the collected works of James Thurber, J. G. Ballard, and Flann O’Brien (Brian O’Nolan). (BTW Martin’s mother was born in Dallas, and her favorite song was “Yellow Rose of Texas.”) In an age of specialists, he considers himself to be one of the last of the generalists. Along the Way, Martin has been a pipe and tobacco salesclerk, a ski lift operator, a dishwasher at an Italian vegetarian restaurant, a bay leaf harvester, bookstore clerk, freshman English instructor, proofreader and stock boy for an independent publisher, harmonica player for a rock band, the only dues-paying member of an improv group, freelance writer, staffer for a weekly news and entertainment magazine, short story and humor writer, a director of communications at a health foundation, and a communications specialist at a university. (And, until funding ran out, a web content writer for a high-tech start-up that floundered during the dot com-collapse.) He lives in Seattle, Washington, with his wife, Lane, and daughter, Lila.
Join us for a meeting of the Boomertime Book Club!
The Boomertime Book Club aims to read all types of books, fiction and nonfiction. We select the book to be read at a meeting and then discuss it at the next meeting. We meet monthly. We limit attendance at each meeting to no more than twelve in order to encourage participation by all. Attendance is first come, first served. We encourage guests and encourage new membership within the Meetup Boomertime social group. For more information, please email Greg Smith at greg02390239@gmail.com.
Boomertime is a Meetup group for babyboomers (ages 50+). Its purpose is to provide opportunities for Austin adults to have fun and meet new people. Boomertime is a group where individuals can make friends and can plan events around their special interests for all to participate in. Boomers dance, hike, read, talk, laugh, and engage in many more activities.
Welcome to Malvern Books’ Club: Reading Classics from New York Review Books, hosted (on most occasions) by Malvern’s own curmudgeon-in-chief, Dr. Joe. Everyone is invited to join us for what we’re sure will be a series of irreverent and insightful conversations.
Our September selection is Chess Story by Stefan Zweig, translated from the German by Joel Rotenberg. Also known as The Royal Game, this novella is the Austrian master’s final achievement, completed in Brazilian exile. It is the only story in which Zweig looks at Nazism, and he does so with characteristic emphasis on the psychological.
Travelers by ship from New York to Buenos Aires find that on board with them is the world champion of chess, an arrogant and unfriendly man. They come together to try their skills against him and are soundly defeated. Then a mysterious passenger steps forward to advise them and their fortunes change. How he came to possess his extraordinary grasp of the game of chess and at what cost lie at the heart of Zweig’s story.
The NYRB Classics series started in 1999 with the publication of A High Wind in Jamaica and by the end of this year over 400 titles will be in print—so we have plenty of excellent reading material to choose from. The series includes nineteenth-century and experimental novels, reportage and belles lettres, established classics and cult favorites, and literature high, low, unsuspected, and unheard of. Literature in translation also constitutes a major part of the NYRB Classics series, including new translations of canonical figures such as Euripides, Aeschylus, Dante, Balzac, Nietzsche, and Chekhov, as well as fresh translations of Stefan Zweig, Robert Walser, Alberto Moravia, and Curzio Malaparte, among others.
How it works:
Stop by Malvern Books to sign up and you’ll receive a 10% discount off the title! Read the book and then come to the meeting prepared with either a question or specific passage to discuss with the group. We’ll look forward to seeing you on September 2nd.
Join us in celebrating the launch of Meghan Lamb’s novel Silk Flowers (Birds of Lace). With readings from Meghan, J.Scott Brownlee, and Bridget Brewer (left to right, below). Meghan’s portion of the reading will incorporate visuals by Jason Pappariella.
A hybrid of fabulist and minimalist fiction, Silk Flowers details a woman’s mysterious illness from the dual perspectives of wife and husband, gesturing to issues of disability and female representation, troubling the language that surrounds cultural narratives of sickness and recovery.
Meghan Lamb is the recipient of an MFA in Fiction from Washington University and the 2018 Philip Roth Residence in Creative Writing. She is the author of the novel Silk Flowers (Birds of Lace, 2017), the poetry chapbook Letter to Theresa (dancing girl press, 2016), and the novella Sacramento (Solar Luxuriance, 2014). Her work has been featured in DIAGRAM, Passages North, Redivider, The Collagist, Nat. Brut, Black Sun Lit, and elsewhere.
Bridget Brewer is a writer, illustrator, educator, and performer based out of Austin, TX. The recipient of the Frances Mason Harris Book Prize and the John Hawkes Prize in Fiction, she is the author of the chapbook Little Animal (Awst Press), and her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Tarpaulin Sky Magazine, Threadcount, DREGINALD, Black Sun Lit, and Ink Brick, among others. She holds an MFA in Literary Arts from Brown University.
J. Scott Brownlee is the author of Requiem for Used Ignition Cap, winner of the 2015 Orison Poetry Prize, 2016 Bob Rush Memorial Award for Best First Book of Poetry from the Texas Institute of Letters, and a finalist for the Writer’s League of Texas Book Award. His chapbooks have received the 2013 Button Poetry Prize, the 2014 Robert Phillips Prize, and 2015 Tree Light Books Prize, and his poems appear in The Kenyon Review, Narrative Magazine, Beloit Poetry Journal, and elsewhere. He teaches for Brooklyn Poets as a core faculty member and is a founding member of The Localists.
“We read all types, we take all types. Aim to keep things light and fun.” Hosted by Jon Meador. Please visit Austin Book Club for more information.
Join us in celebrating the launch of Prudence Arceneaux’s new chapbook, Dirt.
From the first word of this collection, “Listen,” to the last lines, “eyes begging me/ to act right just once this time,” Dirt compels by rendering what lingers and builds in the gritty, earth-bound spaces between us. Again and again, Arceneaux moves between the soil and the sky with deft, musical phrasing, asking us to pause with her in the moments of almost connection, of almost release, of almost fully living before our last breaths. —Charlotte Gullick, author of By Way of Water
C. Prudence Arceneaux, a native Texan, is a poet who has taught English and Creative Writing at Austin Community College, in Austin, TX, since 1998. She earned a BA in English/ Creative Writing from the University of New Mexico, but even before finishing the degree realized “there’s no place like home.” Upon her return to Texas, she began work on an MFA in Creative Writing, which she received from the University- formerly-known-as-Southwest- Texas-State in 1998. Her work has appeared in various journals, including Limestone, New Texas, Clark Street Review, Hazmat Review and Inkwell.
Join us in celebrating the launch of acclaimed poet Zachary Schomburg’s debut novel, Mammother. With readings from Zachary, Molly Schulman, and Josh Denslow.
Praise for Mammother:
“Like the younger sibling of Richard Brautigan’s In Watermelon Sugar, but boxier and more etched on the page. And, Schomburg’s book is still utterly its own thing, strange and wondrous.” —Aimee Bender
The people of Pie Time are suffering from God’s Finger, a mysterious plague that leaves some thing inside a death hole in each victim’s chest. Mano Medium, a grief-stricken young cigarette-factory worker in love, quits the factory to work double-time as Pie Time’s replacement barber and butcher, and holds the things found in the holes of the newly dead. However, as more people die, the bigger Mano becomes. With a large cast of characters, each struggling with their own tangled relationships to death, money, and love, Mammother is a fabulist tale of holding on and letting go in a rapidly growing world.
Zachary Schomburg is the author of four books of poetry, and is the publisher of Octopus Books. He lives in Portland, OR.
Molly Schulman is a writer and an editor. She was born in California; she grew up in New York; she lived in Georgia for a nice while; now she lives in Texas. After receiving her B.A. in Creative Writing from The New School, she worked in publishing as an in-house editor at The Friedrich Agency where she worked with authors such as Elizabeth Strout, Jane Smiley, and Ruth Ozeki. In October 2013, she left the agency to pursue her own writing, performing, and professional freelance editing and author consultation services. As an independent editor, she’s worked with authors such as Imbolo Mbue, Heather Barbieri, and Will Heinrich. She has taught writing and publishing workshops in Austin, TX at The Writing Barn and TOMS Roasting CO., and in NYC, during the Brooklyn Book Festival. In 2017, she will be the guest author and instructor at L’avventura Writing Residency at Villa Cantoni, in the Friuli region of Northeast Italy. Molly debuted her one woman show, a poetry-based storytelling performance called One of Six—a story about growing up with many siblings, in many houses—at the City of Savannah Center for Cultural Affairs in May 2014. She has been published in literary journals such as Sink Review, Burningword, Eleven-and-Half, and Release, and she guest-edited the Summer 2015 issue of Five Quarterly. Most recently, she was a Winter 2016 Ragdale writer-in-residence where she worked on her novel-in-progress—a multi-generational tale of brothers, sisters, and show business—called HOW TO CRY ON CUE.
Josh Denslow’s stories have appeared in Barrelhouse, Third Coast, Cutbank, Wigleaf, and Black Clock, among others. His collection Not Everyone is Special will be published in 2019 by 7.13 Books. In addition to constructing elaborate Lego sets with his three boys, he plays the drums in the band Borrisokane and edits at SmokeLong Quarterly.
Join us in celebrating the launch of Nancy Huang’s debut poetry collection, Favorite Daughter. With readings from Nancy and special guests Philip Olalo, Noor Wadi, and Jasmine Bell.
Favorite Daughter is a poetry collection trying to uproot America from inside the body, and find where China is buried underneath. Divided into four parts, Daughter explores ideas like navigating hybridity, localism, and harmony in ways that disturb commonly-held notions about broad terms like “belonging” and “cultural struggle.” A compilation of immigration stories, Chinese radio segments, Google translate entries, and dictionary remixes, Favorite Daughter shows Huang immersing herself in everything she is uncertain of.
NANCY HUANG grew up in America and China. She is a winner of the 2016 Write Bloody Poetry Chapbook contest, an Andrew Julius Gutow Academy of American Poets Prize, a Regents Arts & Humanities Award finalist, a James F. Parker Award in Poetry, a 2015 YoungArts Finalist prize, and was a winner of the Michigan Young Playwrights Festival. Her writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Vinyl, Bodega Magazine, TRACK//FOUR, Winter Tangerine Review, The Shade Journal, and others. This past summer she was the youngest attendant of the Iowa Writer’s Workshop summer graduate session. She is a VONA alum.
PHILIP OLALO is a 23-year-old Queer Fat Brown Poet based out of Austin, TX. Born in Manila, Philippines their poetry reflects their diaspora heart. They currently attend the University of Texas at Austin with plans to graduate with a degree in International Relations along with a minor in Asian Studies. To Philip, poetry is claiming the power in their voice. It is how they have learned to speak their truth. Philip’s work is for all the queer fat brown babes who’ve ever felt alone. Their current goals include being so kind in this life that they are reincarnated as a dog in the next life.
NOOR WADI is a Palestinian, Muslima poet who writes about her roots in revolution and under political oppression. She started writing poetry in high school, and back then, she had dreams of becoming a rapper when she grew up. Thankfully, the Slam Team at her undergrad, UT Dallas, gave her some direction and helped her realize that what she was writing was spoken word, and definitely not rap. Since then, she has been performing her poetry all over Texas. She is most proud of winning the title of UT Dallas Underground Poetry Circus Champion in 2014. Noor is so honored to have the opportunity to take her work to Chicago with the amazing SPITSHINE Team for CUPSI 2017. In her free time, Noor is a second-year law student at UT Austin who loves drinking bubble tea and watching Miyazaki movies.
JASMINE C. BELL is an emerging poet and artist in Austin, Texas and currently attends the University of Texas with plans to major in psychology and minor in Mandarin Chinese. In 2015 she was a member of the UT Spitshine slam poetry team that went to CUPSI, where they placed 13th nationally and won the award for “Best Writing by a Team”. In 2016 she returned to CUPSI with Spitshine where they placed 11th nationally. Jasmine also competed in Rustbelt 2016 and will represent UT again in 2017. She is Co-President of the only poetry organization on UT’s campus (Spitshine Poetry), where she leads workshops and organizes open mics. She has been published or is forthcoming in Button Poetry, Write About Now, Monstering Magazine, and Apricity Magazine. She spends her time writing, studying, drawing, singing, and eating.
You’re already familiar with our NYRB Classics Bookclub, in which we read and discuss classic works of fiction… now we’d like to invite you to join The Other Book Club, a reading group for those of you interested in exploring works from the “Other” section of our store.
Our recently expanded “Other” collection includes ever so eclectic essays, plays, creative non-fiction, memoirs and more. Featuring books like Patrick Leigh Fermor’s travels through the Greek islands and the political tracts of Simone Weil—and let’s not forget Oskar Panizza’s blasphemous essay on the history of the pig!—our non-fiction section is as unusual as the rest of our store.
September’s book will be Rivka Galchen’s Little Labors, a droll and dazzling compendium of observations, stories, lists, and brief essays about babies and literature.
Galchen writes like a wide-eyed oracle, in a state of knowing calm … In these short essays, anecdotes, and aphorisms, Galchen views motherhood in equal parts euphoria and dread, and her forays into literature, mostly Japanese, look to unravel the myth of the woman writer, but more so of the mother writer. —The Paris Review
How it works:
Stop by Malvern Books to sign up and you’ll receive a 10% discount off the title! Read the book and then come to the meeting prepared with either a question or specific passage to discuss with the group. We’ll look forward to seeing you on Saturday, September 16th, at 1pm!
In association with VSA Texas (The State Organization on Arts and Disability) and the Pen2Paper Creative Writing Contest (a project of the Coalition of Texans with Disabilities), we’re delighted to present an inclusive (mic-less) open mic for writers and musicians. Join us for a fun and friendly evening suitable for performers of all ages and abilities.
This month, as well as our Open Mic, we have a special guest, author Susan R. Nelson.
Susan R. Nelson is a published author and sought-after speaker. In her memoir, The Only Light I Saw Was in Galveston, she shares her story of survival and recovery after being shot point blank in the back of the head.
By all accounts, the gunshot to the back of her head should have been fatal. But with the bullet still lodged in her brain, Susan, age 29, would start her life over again. In her memoir, Susan shares her journey from death including the moment, while still comatose, she saw the light in the distance, and though NOT the “white light” so many speak of, still a glimmer of the possibility of help and hope. During the coming years, she would not only have to relearn the most basic of physical tasks of walking and talking and reading and writing, she would have to learn to find that light of hope again in order to rebuild her life; a life which at times appeared to be a volatile and emotional roller-coaster ride.
After a six-year struggle to find her place in the world, the native Texan returned to her home state where she now lives as a wife and mother. Susan has served on the board of various non-profit support groups and is an outspoken advocate, fundraiser, and champion for women and children who are dealing with trauma and crisis in their lives. As a survivor, Susan is involved with multiple organizations which focus on brain injury awareness, gun violence and safety, political policies, and women’s issues.
Join us in celebrating the launch of Todd Hawkins’ chapbook Ten Counties Away (Finishing Line Press, 2017). With readings from Todd, Ken Fontenot, and Judy Jensen.
Professional editor and amateur soccer coach Todd Hawkins writes and lives in Crowley, Texas. His poetry has appeared in AGNI, The Bitter Oleander, American Literary Review, Bayou Magazine, Modern Haiku, and elsewhere. In 2011, he won the Texas Poetry Calendar Award, judged by Cyrus Cassells. He holds an MA in Technical Communication, loves the blues, and nightly loses to his wife at Mortal Kombat while the kids sleep.
Ken Fontenot received an MA in German Language and Literature from the University of Texas at Austin. During the school year 1986-87 he was awarded a DAAD fellowship to study in Freiburg, Germany. Author of the novel For Mr. Raindrinker set in 1970s New Orleans and published by Slough Press, he also published three books of poems, the second of which won the Austin Book Award, the third In a Kingdom of Birds having won the 2013 Texas Institute of Letters award for best poetry book in Texas. His translations of contemporary poems from the German have appeared widely. A native New Orleanian, he lives and works in Austin, Texas.
Judy Jensen earned a MFA in creative writing from Vermont College and has received two Pushcart Prize nominations. Her poems have appeared in International Poetry Review, Borderlands, and other anthologies and journals. She was a co-founder of the KinCity reading series and is a co-founder of Float Press, letterpress printing on a 1908 Golding Jobber #6. You might know her from her long-time volunteer work at Poetry at Round Top or her supernatural ability to attract stray animals like Merle, a peacock.
Join us for an afternoon with writer Dave Oliphant, who will be reading from his new poetry collection, The Hero’s Fall I Fell For: Jazz Poems. (At the reading The Hero’s Fall and the accompanying CD will be available for free on a first-come, first-served basis.)
With these poems devoted to jazz, Dave Oliphant offers a testament to the variety and significance of the art form and its artists. These poems are an attempt to pay homage to the art of jazz and to its musicians, whose lives and performances have long been a source of pleasure, inspiration, and solace.
Dave Oliphant was born in 1939 in Fort Worth, Texas. Host Publications has published two of his collections of poetry, Memories of Texas Towns & Cities (2000) and Backtracking (2004). His Maria’s Poems (1987) won an Austin Book Award. Host has also published three books that he translated from the Spanish: Enrique Lihn’s Figures of Speech (1999); Oliver Welden’s Love Hound (2006), winner of best book of poetry at the 2007 New York Book Festival; and Nicanor Parra’s After-Dinner Declarations (2009), winner of the 2011 translation award from the Texas Institute of Letters. KD: A Jazz Biography, his verse biography of Texas trumpeter Kenny Dorham, was published in 2012 by Wings Press, and The Pilgrimage: Selected Poems, 1962-2012 appeared from Lamar University Press in 2013. The poetry collections The Cowtown Circle and María’s Book were published by Alamo Bay Press in 2014 and 2016 respectively. He was with the University of Texas at Austin for 30 years, as an editor and a senior lecturer.
The Finnegans Wake Reading Group of Austin is a monthly get-together to dive into the depths of James Joyce’s greatest, weirdest, and most notorious masterpiece.
The process is to take turns reading aloud from the text, which allows its musicality to flow forth. Then we all discuss our interpretations and the many meanings and themes contained within the selection we’ve read.
We’ll read 2 or 3 pages of the book, depending on how many people are there and how much time we spend discussing the content.
This event is FREE and open to everyone. NO PRIOR KNOWLEDGE of Joyce or Finnegans Wake is required, just have an open mind—and be prepared to read aloud in front of strangers.
For more information, please visit the reading group’s website.
A representation of the book’s structure by Bauhaus artist Laszlo Moholy-Nagy.
Join us in celebrating the launch of Christopher Carmona’s new poetry collection, 140: Twitter Poems (bilingual edition, translated by Gerald Padilla). This book is a collection of 140 poems written over 140 days, covering the space of December 1, 2015 to April 12, 2016. Each poem represents a reflection of the day it was written and speaks of the social and political fervor of the day.
Christopher Carmona is the author of The Road to Llorona Park, which won the 2016 NACCS Tejas Best Fiction Award and was listed as one of the top 8 Latinx books in 2016 by NBCNews. He was the inaugural writer-in-residence for the Langdon Review Writers Residency Program in 2015. He has three books of poetry: 140 Twitter Poems, I Have Always Been Here, and beat. He co-edited The Beatest State In The Union: An Anthology of Beat Texas Writings with Chuck Taylor and Rob Johnson and Outrage: A Protest Anthology about Injustice in a Post 9/11 World with Rossy Evelin Lima. He has also co-written Nuev@s Voces Poeticas: A Dialogue about New Chican@ Poetics. Currently, he is co-editing Outrage: Witness and Silence and is working on a bilingual series of YA novellas entitled El Rinche: The Ghost Ranger of the Rio Grande. Book One will be published in 2018 by Jade Press.
Join us in celebrating the launch of Taisia Kitaiskaia’s Ask Baba Yaga (Andrews McMeel Publishing), a collection of “otherworldly advice for everyday troubles.”
In Slavic fairy tales, the witch Baba Yaga is sought out by those with a burning need for guidance. In contemporary life, Baba Yaga—a dangerous, slippery oracle—answered earnest questions on The Hairpin for years. Ask Baba Yaga collects her most poignant and humorous exchanges along with all-new questions and answers for those seeking her mystical advice.
*** Submit a personal question to Baba Yaga for a chance to hear the crone’s advice read live at the event! Send questions about struggles with love, work, or anything else to AskBabaYaga@gmail.com. Make sure to use the subject line “Malvern Event.” ***
Taisia Kitaiskaia was born in Russia and raised in America. She is the author of Literary Witches: A Celebration of Magical Women Writers, illustrated by Katy Horan. Her poetry has been published widely. Baba Yaga lives deep in a treacherous wood; Taisia lives in Austin, Texas.
Welcome to Malvern Books’ Club: Reading Classics from New York Review Books, hosted (on most occasions) by Malvern’s own curmudgeon-in-chief, Dr. Joe. Everyone is invited to join us for what we’re sure will be a series of irreverent and insightful conversations.
Our October selection is The Green Man by Kingsley Amis, a novel that manages to be both a truly frightening ghost story and a very black comedy.
A splendid chiller, in the uncomplicated, old-fashioned sense. As one might expect from the author of Lucky Jim, The Green Man is also an extremely funny book, filled with slapstick, parody and satire. Indeed, the success of this short novel depends very much on the balance that Amis maintains between fear and laughter.
—Robert Kiely, New York Times
The NYRB Classics series started in 1999 with the publication of A High Wind in Jamaica and by the end of this year over 400 titles will be in print—so we have plenty of excellent reading material to choose from. The series includes nineteenth-century and experimental novels, reportage and belles lettres, established classics and cult favorites, and literature high, low, unsuspected, and unheard of. Literature in translation also constitutes a major part of the NYRB Classics series, including new translations of canonical figures such as Euripides, Aeschylus, Dante, Balzac, Nietzsche, and Chekhov, as well as fresh translations of Stefan Zweig, Robert Walser, Alberto Moravia, and Curzio Malaparte, among others.
How it works:
Stop by Malvern Books to sign up and you’ll receive a 10% discount off the title! Read the book and then come to the meeting prepared with either a question or specific passage to discuss with the group. We’ll look forward to seeing you on October 7th.
Everyone is welcome to attend the Austin Community College Creative Writing Department’s Literary Coffeehouse, hosted by John Herndon.
October’s featured reader ANNAR VEROLD is a Honduran-American poet and screenwriter. A former Creative Writing student at ACC and a graduate of St. Edward’s University, her work has appeared in the Spoon River Poetry Review and is forthcoming in the second Aural Literature anthology. She works for Host Publications, and is co-curator of the I Scream Social reading series.
An open mic follows, so bring poems, stories, scripts, rants, raves or midnight confessions to share, or just come to listen and enjoy.
“We read all types, we take all types. Aim to keep things light and fun.” Hosted by Jon Meador. Please visit Austin Book Club for more information.