Tuesday, May 27, 7:00pm
Strand (828 Broadway at 12th St.)
Walter Mosley & Mike Farrell in Conversation

Walter Mosley and TV star Mike Farrell (“M*A*S*H,” “Desperate Housewives”)discuss literature, human rights, American politics, the upcoming election, and their new books, The Tempest Tales and Just Call Me Mike: A Journey to Actor and Activist(guesswhichperson wrote which). The discussion is moderated by Michael Ratner,, and the event is presented by The Nation, The Center for Constitutional Rights and Akashic Books.

Thursday, May 29, 7:00pm
Housing Works Used Bookstore & Café (126 Crosby Street)
Opium Magazine’s Literary Deathmatch

Bob Powers (You Are a Miserable Excuse for a Hero), Garth Risk Hallberg (representing Canteen Magazine), Aaron Garretson (representing Opium), and a Smith Magazine representative will compete for bookish domination at Housing Works Thursday. The readings are judged by Ben Greenman (New Yorker), Joel Dovev (SF’s Killing My Lobster), and The Bumby’s (A Fair and Honest Appraisal of Your Appearance). That’s a whole lot of hotness per capita, if you ask me. $10 gains you entry and a free copy of the latest Opium Magazine at this night of literary bloodsport

Monday, May 19, 7:00pm
McNally Robinson Booksellers (52 Prince St. between Lafayette and Mulberry)
Language for a New Century: Contemporary Poetry from the Middle East, Asia, and Beyond

The title of this collection of poetry is a little boring, but the subtitle and guiding principle are exciting. Edited by Ravi Shankar, Tina Chang, and Nathalie Handal, Language for a New Century is a selection of poems from fifty-nine countries and territories in the Middle East and Asia, areas that are often over-simplified and grouped together in our politics in America. They are organized thematically, not geographically, and this results in an exciting variation. Editor Ravi Shankar and the poets Timothy Liu, Sarah Gambito and Vijay Seshadri will read from their work and discuss the role of poetry abroad.

Wednesday, May 21, 7:00pm
McNally Robinson Booksellers (52 Prince St. between Lafayette and Mulberry)
Ed Park, author of Personal Days (Random House), in conversation with his Random House editor, Julia Cheiffetz

I know I already mentioned Ed Park (founding editor of The Believer magazine and publisher of New-York Ghost) once on here, but if you missed that one, you might want to go check this one out. Park’s new novel follows a group of co-workers in an office as their company comes apart. He’ll talk with his editor Julia Cheiffetz at this event. If you’re not a New York reader, then go to the New-York Ghost’s website for a complete listing of readings.

Thursday, May 22, 7:30pm
Word (126 Franklin St. in Greenpoint)
Music Writing Event

If you’re a fan of music writing, or just music, and haven’t yet heard of or read anything from Continuum’s 33 1/3 series, which features pocket-size books by well known music writers and musicians writing about key records, then it’s high time you get on it. Thursday writers from the series Matthew Stearns (Sonic Youth’s Daydream Nation), Michael Fournier (The Minutemen’s Double Nickels on the Dime), and Amanda Petrusich (Nick Drake’s Pink Moon) will read and discuss their work. The evening will be moderated by Rolling Stone’s Jenny Eliscu.

Friday, May 23, 7:00pm — 9:00pm
KGB Bar (85 E. 4th Street between 2nd and 3rd Aves.)
Drunken Boat: Launch Party, Issue # 9

Drunken Boat is an international online journal of the arts, and Friday it will be celebrating the launch of its ninth issue, which focuses on Poetics and Mis/Translation, enquiring if poetry can still matter today. There will be a multimedia performance and reading by writers and artists Sandra Beasley, Rand Richards Cooper, Sean Thomas Dougherty, Alena Hairston, Karla Kelsey, Steve Langan, Hermine Meinhard, Terese Svoboda, Peter Yumi and Jonathan Zalben.

FYI: It’s 10% off all month at Housing Works Used Bookstore & Café, so go take advantage of it.

Monday, May 5, 7:00pm
Housing Works Used Bookstore & Café (126 Crosby Street)
Art & Activism: Writers on Politics

Writers Stephen Elliott (Sex for America, Happy Baby), Nick Flynn (Another Bullshit Night in Suck City), and Janice Erlbaum (Have You Found Her) will gather at Housing Works tonight to read some of their more political work, and talk bout what it means to be a writer and an activist.

Tuesday, May 6, 7:00pm
BookCourt (163 Court Street, Brooklyn)
Fiona Maazel, Last Last Chance

There’s substance abuse, a widespread plague, and a quiet Viking. Sound good? Yeah. Maazel’s sense of humor is…unique, and her voice is too. Check out her website for the book here, and be sure to check out the movies.

The fourth annual PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature is going on from Tuesday, April 29th through Sunday, May 4th. 181 writers from 51 countries are participating in 82 events in New York. I think you should be able to find one or two that appeal to you. Go here for more information on the festival, and here for a full schedule of events.

Also this week:

Tuesday, April 29, 7:30pm
Housing Works Used Bookstore & Café (126 Crosby St.)
Circumference: A Journal of Poetry in Translation

Close out Poetry Month by attending this reading from the newest issue of Circumference, which, as the byline suggests, is a literary journal featuring poetry in translation. Brian Henry will read his reads his translations of Tomaz Salamun and Ales Steger from the Slovenian; Christina Svendsen will read translations of Kurt Schwitters from German, Jeffrey Yang will read his treanslation of Su Shi from Chinese, and Bitite Vinklers will read translations of Imants Ziedonis from Latvian. To be followed with a Q + A and signing.

Friday, May 2, 7:00pm
McNally Robinson (52 Prince Street between Lafayette and Mulberry)
Jonathan Lethem and DJ Spooky

It’s a night of music and language at McNally on Friday. Jonathan Lethem (author of Motherless Brooklyn and The Fortress of Solitude) is reading from his latest novel, his latest novel, You Don’t Love Me Yet, now out in paperback if you were waiting to read it until then. Paul D. Miller, aka DJ Spooky that Subliminal Kid, will read from Sound Unbound, a meditation on the remix.

These readings are both on Wednesday, so choose wisely or travel quickly.

Wednesday, April 23, 6:30pm
The New School, Wollman Hall, The Eugene Lang Building (65 W, 11th Street, 5th fl., enter at 66 W. 12th St.)
Cave Canem Presents: Cornelius Eady

This is a reading and book signing to celebrate the release of Hardheaded Weather, the latest collection of poems by Cornelius Eady, co-founder of Cave Canem and author of many collections including Brutal Imagination, a finalist for the 2001 National Book Award in Poetry. This is a free event but seating is first come first serve. You can learn more about Eady and hear him read “I’m A Fool to Love You” here.

Wednesday, April 23, 7:30pm
Word Books (126 Franklin St., in Greenpoint, Brooklyn)
Broken Land: Poems of Brooklyn

Broken Land is the first collection of poetry to focus exclusively on verse that celebrates Brooklyn. From the contemporary to the classic, the collection chronicles nearly two centuries of life in the borough, celebrating it’s places, people and culture. Contributors will read Wednesday at Word Books in Greenpoint, including Patricia Spears Jones, Julia Spicher Kasdorf, Michael Morse and co-editor Michael Tyrell.

It’s halfway through the month and I forgot to mention it’s National Poetry Month - sorry! Go to poets.org for more information, and/or check out FSG’s excellent blog, The Best Words in their Best Order. There are a lot more poetry readings going on this month than usual in the NYC.

Monday, April 14, 7:30pm
Greenwich Village Barnes & Noble (396 Ave of the Americas @ 8^th Street)
Marcus Reeves: Somebody Scream! Rap’s Rise to Prominence in the Aftershock of Black Power

If Jeff Chang’s Can’t Stop Won’t Stop or Nelson George’s Hip Hop America didn’t do it for you, pick up Reeves’s new history of hip hop, Somebody Scream!, which tracks hip hop from its roots in NY to now with a special focus on it’s politics and what it has meant to a post-black power generation. Reeves will be talking or reading tonight, and likely be doing a Q+A. Also, check out the TRACE insider we did with Reeves last month before his book dropped.

Tuesday, April 15, 7:00pm
Housing Works Used Bookstore & Café (126 Crosby just south of Houston)
Mark Yakich and Aaron Baker

In celebration of National Poetry Month, the Academy of American Poets hosts a night of poetry at Housing Works. Poets Mark Yakich (Unrelated Individuals Forming a Group Waiting to Cross) and Aaron Baker (Mission Work) will read from their work, followed by a Q+A and signing.

Wednesday, April 16, 6:30pm
Mercantile Library Center for Fiction (17 East 47th Street)
Beatrice.com + the Merc present Ed Park and Jane Kotapish

Among other things, Ed Park is the founding editor of The Believer, former editor of The Voice Literary Supplement and publisher of The New York Ghost. He will be reading from Personal Days, his debut novel which focuses on a New York office. Jane F. Kotapish is a native of Virginia, a current resident of Brooklyn and has danced professionally for ten years. She’ll be reading from her debut novel, Salvage.

Monday, April 7, 7:00pm
Union Square Barnes & Noble
Isabel Allende: Sum of Our Days

Isabel Allende, Chilean-American author of some seventeen books, including The House of the Spirits and City of the Beasts, will be in the B&N Union Square to read for her second memoir, Sum of Our Days.

Tuesday, April 8, 7:00pm
McNally Robinson (52 Prince St. (between Lafayette and Mulberry)
Lit Mag Series: A Public Space, with editor Brigid Hughes

McNally’s lit mag series is set up to celebrate great literary magazines, and this time up it’s A Public Space, a quarterly mag based in Brooklyn and founded by Brigid Hughes, who formerly worked as the Executive Editor of The Paris Review. This evening features authors (TBA) reading newly commissioned pieces for the magazine’s feature “If You See Something, Say Something.”

I was going to recommend a sweet music edition of Amanda Stern’s Happy Ending Reading Series on Wednesday, done in conjunction with Sufjan Stevens’ record label Asthmatic Kitty, featuring Daphne Carr, Rob Sheffield, Alec Bemis, and music from My Brightest Diamond, but Joe’s Pub’s website indicates it’s sold out. If you know of some mystical way to get in, do so, then e-mail me at shawnandrew@gmail.com.

Tuesday, April 1, 7:00pm
Union Square Barnes & Noble (33 E. 17th Street, North side of the park)
Jhumpa Lahiri: Unaccustomed Earth

I don’t like recommending readings at B&N much, but this is Jhumpa Lahiri, so I make an exception. The author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning Interpreter of Maladies and the recently adapted-for-film The Namesake has a new collection of short stories out, and she’ll be at the B&N in Union Square to read, do a Q+A, and sign books. I recommend getting there early if you want a seat (like an hour early). The last time I caught her doing a reading and discussion with Mira Nair there regarding the movie, the place was packed to the back of the top floor.

Thursday, April 3, 7:30pm
Solas Bar (232 E. 9th Street, between 3rd and 2nd Aves)
The St. Mark’s Bookshop Reading Series

St. Mark’s Bookshop has started up a reading series, and you can expect good things to come of it. Tonight’s the second inaugural night, and it features A.M. Homes (The Mistress’s Daughter), Charles Bock (Beautiful Children), and Samantha Hunt (The Invention of Everything Else). I’ve already plugged a couple of those titles, but this should be a good night.

Wednesday, March 26, 8:00pm
The Poetry Project at St. Mark’s Church (131 E. 10^th Street)
Celebration of Federico García Lorca’s Poet in New York

Reposted from the website: “Join us as we revisit Federico García Lorca’s Poet In New York, newly translated by Pablo Medina and Mark Statman and published by Grove Press. Written during Lorca’s nine months as a student at Columbia University at the beginning of the Great Depression, this is widely considered one of the most important books he ever wrote, and one of the greatest book of poems ever written about New York City.

With Ron Padgett, Jaime Manrique, Bill Zavatsky, Jane LeCroy, Pablo Medina, Mark Statman, Iraida Iturralde, Aristides Falcon and flamenco music with Roman Diaz on cajon, Carlos Revollar on guitar and other musicians tba.”

Thursday, March 27, 2008, 7:00pm
Housing Works Bookstore (126 Crosby Street)
Ledig House International Writers

Three writers from The Ledig House international writers’ residency program will read Thursday at Housing Works. Amsterdam poet Julien Holtriger, who is currently at work on an epic poem, has three volumes to his name, and his poem “Dichter” won the Amsterdam Free University Stage Prize in 2003. Mikhail Shishkin is a Russian fiction writer whose work has been published in Russian, German, French, Italian, Polish, Serbian, Chech, Bulgarian, and Chinese. Born in Turkey, Buket Uzuner writes short stories, travelogues, and novels; is a biologist and environmental scientist; and now lives in Istanbul.

Monday, March 17, 2008, 7:00pm
McNally Robinson (52 Prince St.)
AWAKE! A Reader for the Sleepless

Before you go out drinking green beer and pinching strangers on Monday, head to McNally Robinson for a reading from Brooklyn-based publisher Soft Skull Press’s new anthology for the sleepless, AWAKE! The reader contains fiction, nonfiction, poetry, comics, and more — all of which centers on the theme of insomnia. Monday night McNally will have contributors Ed Champion, Jonatham Ames, and Molly Kotteman share their work. Editor Steven Lee Beeber (The Heebie-Jeebies at CBGB’s: A Secret History of Jewish Punk) will host, and free coffee will be offered to keep you from nodding out.

Thursday, March 20, 2008, 7:00pm
Tribeca Barnes & Noble (97 Warren Street)
Blood Kin, by Ceridwen Dovey

For an allegory that explores lust and power, centers on prisoners after a political coup, and has a title like Blood Kin, Dovey’s debut novel was actually pretty funny when I saw her read awhile back as part of an emerging writers’ showcase. I recommend it.