John Barry - Roger Williams and the Creation of the American Soul, Healing Center

May 16th, 2012

New Orleans’ own John Barry will be at our Healing Center location from 7:00-8:00 P.M., Wednesday, May 16, to sign and discuss his latest book, Roger Williams and the Creation of the American Soul, a revelatory look at how Roger Williams shaped the nature of religion, political power, and individual rights in America.

For four hundred years, Americans have wrestled with and fought over two concepts that define the nature of the nation: the proper relation between church and state and between a free individual and the state. These debates began with the extraordinary thought and struggles of Roger Williams, who had an unparalleled understanding of the conflict between a government that justified itself by reason of state, i.e. national security, and its perceived will of God and the ancient rights and liberties of individuals. This is a story of power, set against Puritan America and the English Civil War. Williams*s interactions with King James, Francis Bacon, Oliver Cromwell, and his mentor Edward Coke set his course, but his fundamental ideas came to fruition in America, as Williams, though a Puritan, collided with John Winthrop’s vision of his ‘City upon a Hill.’

Acclaimed historian John M. Barry explores the development of these fundamental ideas through the story of the man who was the first to link religious freedom to individual liberty, and who created in America the first government and society on earth informed by those beliefs. The story is essential to the continuing debate over how we define the role of religion and political power in modern American life.

Tayari Jones- Silver Sparrow, Healing Center

May 17th, 2012

Join us in welcoming Tayari Jones on Thursday, May 17, 6:00-8:00 P.M., to our Healing Center location!

With the opening line of Silver Sparrow, ‘My father, James Witherspoon, is a bigamist,’ author Tayari Jones unveils a breathtaking story about a man*s deception, a family*s complicity, and two teenage girls caught in the middle. Set in a middle class neighborhood in Atlanta in the 1980s, the novel revolves around James Witherspoon*s two families, the public one and the secret one. When the daughters from each family meet and form a friendship, only one of them knows they are sisters. It is a relationship destined to explode when secrets are revealed and illusions shattered. As Jones explores the back stories of her rich yet flawed character, the father, the two mothers, the grandmother, and the uncle, she also reveals the joy, as well as the destruction, they brought to one another*s lives.

At the heart of it all are the two lives at stake, and like the best writers (think Toni Morrison with The Bluest Eye) Jones portrays the fragility of these young girls with raw authenticity as they seek love, demand attention, and try to imagine themselves as women, just not as their mothers.

Lawrence Powell - The Accidental City:Improvising New Orleans, Audubon Zoo

May 19th, 2012

The New Orleans Secular Humanist Society is hosting an event with Lawrence Powell on May 19, at 4:30 pm, in the Dominion Learning Center at Audubon Zoo. It its open to the public. Dr. Powell will be discussing and signing his new book, “Accidental City: Improvising New Orleans.”

This is the story of a city that shouldn’t exist. In the seventeenth century, what is now America’s most beguiling metropolis was nothing more than a swamp: prone to flooding, infested with snakes, battered by hurricanes. But through the intense imperial rivalries of Spain, France, and England, and the ambitious, entrepreneurial merchants and settlers from four continents who risked their lives to succeed in colonial America, this unpromising site became a crossroads for the whole Atlantic world.

Michelle Hirstius, JUJU THE GOOD VOODOO--Uptown

May 19th, 2012

On May 19, 2012, Michelle Hirstius, author of Juju the Good Voodoo, will sign her book from 11:30-1:00.

Ron Tanner - From Animal House to Our House - Uptown

May 21st, 2012

Ron Tanner will be at our Uptown location on May 21 at 6:00pm to sign and discuss his book,“From Animal House to Our House.”

A story for inspiration-seekers, old house lovers, DIYers, and American dreamers, From Animal House to Our House: A Love Story shows how Ron and Jill learned the hard way — about love and life and saving precious things from ruin. But learn they did: in 2003, they got married in the house. In 2008 This Old House magazine featured their work and then the article went viral online, becoming one of TOH’s most popular postings ever.
Ron and Jill now run a popular website about home renovation: Houselove.org

Margaret Simon, BLESSEN--Uptown

May 26th, 2012

Margaret Simon will sign her middle-grade book, Blessen, Uptown, on May 26, 2012, 11:30-1:00. Meet Blessen here and here.

Lawrence Powell - The Accidental City:Improvising New Orleans, BSJ

May 27th, 2012

Join us above Fair Grinds Coffee House on Sunday, May 27, at 4:00 pm! Lawrence Powell will be discussing and signing his latest book, “The Accidental City: Improvising New Orleans.”

This is the story of a city that shouldn’t exist. In the seventeenth century, what is now America’s most beguiling metropolis was nothing more than a swamp: prone to flooding, infested with snakes, battered by hurricanes. But through the intense imperial rivalries of Spain, France, and England, and the ambitious, entrepreneurial merchants and settlers from four continents who risked their lives to succeed in colonial America, this unpromising site became a crossroads for the whole Atlantic world.

Lawrence N. Powell, a decades-long resident and observer of New Orleans, gives us the full sweep of the city’s history from its founding through Louisiana statehood in 1812. We see the Crescent City evolve from a French village, to an African market town, to a Spanish fortress, and finally to an Anglo-American center of trade and commerce. We hear and feel the mix of peoples, religions, and languages from four continents that make the place electric—and always on the verge of unraveling. “The Accidental City” is the story of land-jobbing schemes, stock market crashes, and nonstop squabbles over status, power, and position, with enough rogues, smugglers, and self-fashioners to fill a picaresque novel.

June First Tuesday Book Club - Uptown

June 5th, 2012

We’ll meet at 5:45 on Tuesday, June 5, 2012, Uptown!

Reading My Father by Alexandra Styron
PART MEMOIR AND PART ELEGY, Reading My Father is the story of a daughter coming to know her father at last.

Jim Miller - WHERE THE WATER KEPT RISING - Uptown

June 12th, 2012

Join us in welcoming Jim Miller to our Uptown location on June 12 at 6:00 pm. He will be discussing and signing his new book, “Where the Water Kept Rising.”
After 20 years as an executive with the National Football League and three of its member clubs, Jim Miller had reached the pinnacle of professional sports. Yet an offer to become athletic director of a “mid-major” college program in New Orleans was a welcomed opportunity to slow the pace and possibly make a difference in the lives of young student-athletes. Little did he know that instead of ratcheting down a satisfying career, he was about to enter the most frustrating, exhausting and challenging time of his life.
Miller was named athletic director at the University of New Orleans on his 55th birthday, January 24, 2003. The first 32 months on the job were gratifying as he watched the hopeful faces of young athletes competing, often with more determination than distinction. The program, which did not include the golden goose of football, struggled financially but always seemed to balance its modest budget. Then on August 29, 2005, Hurricane Katrina swept over the region, sparing none but casting its more fragile institutions into perilous crisis.
“Where the Water Kept Rising” is the story of Jim Miller’s fight to save a traumatically injured program and the collateral damage suffered by its coaches and student-athletes. Initially, hopes of a quick recovery were dashed by the roiling waters of inattention and bureaucratic delays and finally by decisions ostensibly made to preserve only the academic mission. Woven throughout is the story of a young basketball player who survived the terror of the storm only to become engulfed in its aftermath.

July First Tuesday Book Club - Uptown

July 3rd, 2012

Join us at 5:45 P.M., Uptown.

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon

One of Miss Cindy (Uptown) and Mr. Matt’s (BSJ) favorites!

August First Tuesday Book Club - Uptown

August 7th, 2012

Newcomers welcome! We’ll be Uptown, 5:45 P.M.

Birdology:Adventures with Hip Hop Parrots, Cantankerous Cassowaries, Crabby Crows, Peripatetic Pigeons, Hens, Hawks, and Hummingbirds by Sy Montgomery

‘Meet the ladies: a flock of smart, affectionate, highly individualistic chickens who visit their favorite neighbors, devise different ways to hide from foxes, and mob the author like she*s a rockstar. In these pages you*ll also meet Maya and Zuni, two orphaned baby hummingbirds who hatched from eggs the size of navy beans, and who are little more than air bubbles fringed with feathers. Their lives hang precariously in the balance, but with human help, they may one day conquer the sky.’