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Torontoist Reads: Literary Events This Week
Excuse me for the lateness of this week’s listing. I’m still on Nuit Blanche time. And yes, I made it until 7am. This is an absolutely fantastic week for word nerds. And check this – if one of your friends is more into sports, you can bring them to a literary event disguised as a boxing match. For a boxing fan like me, it doesn’t get any better.
Tomorrow at noon, there’s a special launch of Alexander McCall’s The Right Attitude to Rain over at the Toronto Public Library, City Hall – 100 Queen W. It’s a fundraiser for WLC literacy projects, and for $25 you get a reading, lunch, and a tax receipt.
At 7, the Toronto Public Library’s Uptown Author Series presents Laura Penny reading from Your Call is Important to Us: The Truth About Bullshit. There’s a Q & A afterwards. It takes place at the North York Central Library – 5120 Yonge St – and is free.
Also on Tuesday, you can head out to the Gladstone for the launch of Jason Logan’s iGeneration (my review of the book, and hopefully an interview with Jason, will be up in the next couple of weeks.) It’s part of Pages’ This Is Not a Reading Series which means that it’s free. Starts at 7:30.
Reading at the Art Bar this week are Richard Harrison, Allan Safarik, and Sylvia Adams. It starts at 8pm at the Victory Café and it’s free.
On Wednesday head to Speaker’s Corner at Nathan Phillips Square for the third installment of Ed Keenan’s Tungsten Arts & Letters Society Outdoor Word & Music Adventure. Politics is this week’s theme. It starts at 6:30 and is free. And his mom bake’s cookies!
Ok. Remember Meg Tilly? Sure you do. She was in Psycho 2. Well, she’s a slash. An actress slash novelist. And her new novel – Gemma – is getting some serious buzz. She’s in town Wednesday to promote it. Head to Type Bookstore – 883 Queen W – at 7pm to catch Ms. Tilly.
Four heavyweights all appear at Harbourfront at 7:30 Wednesday night. You have Monica Ali. Bill Gaston. David Adams Richards. And Michael Redhill. All for $8. This is like a mini IFOA.
On Thursday at 7pm, Margaret Christakos reads from her latest book, Sooner, at York University, as part of the Canadian Writers-in-Person series. Head to Accolade West Building, ACW 206, York University, 4700 Keele to hear her read.
Also that night, the Toronto Women’s Bookstore hosts a launch for Bonnie Burstow’s The House on Lippincott and Children of Mary by Marusya Bociurkiw. It starts at 7 and is free.
Also that evening, Current Toronto Public Library Writer-in-Residence Rabindranath Maharaj (A Perfect Pledge) and poet and author Goran Simic (From Sarajevo with Sorrow) read at the Toronto Reference Library at 7pm with a Q & A to follow. It’s free.
The main event – terrible joke – on Thursday is the much anticipated bout to help promote and launch Craig Davidson’s new novel, The Fighter. It takes place 7:30-10:30 at Florida Jacks Boxing Club, 782 Yonge St. It’s part of This Is Not a Reading Series, making it free. Davidson (author of last year’s tremendous collection, Rust and Bone) will take on poet Michael “The Coffin Nail” Knox. The undercard features publicists Stephen “Ghost Dog” Myers versus “Diesel” David Leonard. Also, watch for my interview with Craig and a review of the book in the coming weeks (a sneak peek – I’m about 50 pages in, and it’s fucking good.)
Finally, another major event caps off the week. On Saturday, poet, photographer and filmmaker Gerard Malanga (pictured), one of Andy Warhol’s closest collaborators, will be in town to introduce the Canadian premiers of In Search of the Miraculous and Gerard Malanga’s Film Notebooks. He’ll also be reading a selection of his poetry. It takes place at Jackman Hall, AGO.