LA-based writer Stephanie Danler’s recently-released ‘Sweetbitter’ spins the tale of a young twenty-something looking to find her way in the world after graduation. The story is told through the lens of front-of-house restaurant work, a job that proves to be both Exhilarating and exhausting for the novel’s heroine, Tess, and one that Danler experienced first-hand in her formative early twenties.
Prairie Lights
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Prairie Lights hosts a launch party for ‘Creekfinding,’ a true Iowa tale turned storybook
Several years ago — or, in storybook parlance, Once Upon a Time — a long-lost creek in northeast Iowa came back to life. It did so with the help of Mike Osterholm, who acted on a hint and a hunch to add the nearly-forgotten waterway into his efforts to return an old cornfield to the […]
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Rae Meadows to read from her ‘lovely, evocative and powerful’ novel at Prairie Lights
Rae Meadows and Dean Bakopoulos Prairie Lights Bookstore — Wednesday, Sept. 7 at 7 p.m. With deft and lyrical prose, Rae Meadows weaves a tale of love, hope and survival in her recent novel, I Will Send Rain (Henry Holt & Co.), published Aug. 9. Meadows will read from the book Wednesday, Sept. 7 at […]
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An iconic life revealed: A review of ‘Juxtapositions’
Juxtapositions photo slide show and talk Prairie Lights Bookstore — Tuesday, June 21 at 7 p.m. There is a pair of eye-catching photos near the center of a new book celebrating the work of renowned photographer Ted Polumbaum. On the left is a stark black & white photo of a visibly distressed African-American child standing […]
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Iowa City author Garth Greenwell hopes to break the ice for queer writers working in Bulgaria
Garth Greenwell’s debut novel, What Belongs to You, begins when an American high school teacher meets a young prostitute named Mitko in the bathroom basement of Bulgaria’s National Palace of Culture. The book that unspools their relationship is already poised to be one of the best of the year. It takes us through Sofia, Kentucky and a complex web of memory that makes us consider the ways all of our relationships are shaped by need and longing, both emotional and material. That longing is woven into our narrator’s very fiber and the complex country that surrounds him and the charismatic, complicated Mitko.
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Interview: Naomi Jackson on family, influence and her formative years in Barbados and Brooklyn
Mention Naomi Jackson’s name to anyone who’s been on the local literary scene for a few years and you’ll elicit an excited, “Oh!” Readings she did while…
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Technical Dystopias: An interview with Russian author Alisa Ganieva
Alisa Ganieva’s career as a fiction writer began in 2009 when her story, “Salam, Dalgat!” won Russia’s Debut Literary Prize. Written under a male pseudonym…
Posted inCommunity/News
Mobile library hits the road, seeks community support
With daily stops scheduled all around town, the Antelope Lending Library has begun its third year of slinging books and taking names in Iowa City. Several years ago, Cassandra Elton started the book lending project — a small, traveling library that makes various stops around Iowa City — with help from her friend, Beth Camp. They’re both librarians who studied together at the School of Library and Information Science at the University of Iowa…
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Review: Rebecca Dinerstein’s debut novel, ‘The Sunlit Night’
When life forces you to start afresh, do you feel afraid — or free? Rebecca Dinerstein wove that question deeply throughout her debut novel…
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Interview: Lucas Mann on his new book about his brother’s deadly heroin addiction
Lucas Mann is the author of ‘Lord Fear’ (Pantheon, 2015), a book-length essay that examines the life of his brother Josh, who died of a heroin overdose…
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Lit Scene: Review of Angela Flournoy’s debut novel, ‘The Turner House’
Writers Workshop graduate Angela Flournoy reads from her debut novel at Prairie Lights on Monday, April 27 at 7 p.m. Flourney’s book…
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Marc Rahe reads at Prairie Lights
Iowa City writer Marc Rahe will read from his new collection of poetry, On Hours, on Tuesday at 7 p.m. at Prairie Lights. His debut collection of poems, The Smaller Half, (Rescue Press, 2010) demonstrated a staccatoed spectrum, from darkness to high-pitched humor. In On Hours (Rescue Press, 2015), readers find Marc’s depth continues to delight, as does his exploration of the human experience — odd, awkward and wonderful as it may be.
