Archive for the 'mayhem' Category

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Valentine Trauma Zine Release Party & Reading With Mike McBeardo McPadden and Friends 2/22

Feb ’14
22
7:00 pm

traumazine190s legends Mike McBeardo McPadden (Happyland) and his inimitable bride, Rachel Shitass McPadden (Saucy), are returning ceremoniously to their beloved motherland, Zine City USA, with the release of Trauma Zine No. 1: Valentine’s Day.

Expanding on the concept of their popular 2012-2013 Rock Trauma reading series, quarterly Trauma Zine incorporates personal essays and original art from talents across the country to communicate an empathetically (or just pathetically) tragic theme.  And contains stickers.

So napalm another Hallmark-fabricated love (gross) day, then join us the following weekend for complimentary 70%-off Walgreen’s chocolate hearts and brief, cringe-y readings from such Valentine Trauma contributors as: Mike McBeardo McPadden (author Heavy Metal Movies, head writer Mr. Skin), Rachel McPadden (xoJane, Saucy, Self-Hate Crime), Diana Jewell (lovechild of Tura Satana & Oliver Reed), Sarah Rosenfeld (Windy City Rock), Bob Goblin (Outburst on the 66, RockStarClub, Rock Trauma alum), and Jeremy Kitchen (CPL).

May you meet your future ex-wives/husbands that fateful night and forever curse our names.

For more info: traumazine(at)gmail(dot)com

Saturday, February 22nd, 7pm – Free Event

Click here for Facebook Event Listing for this event.

David Witter reads from Chicago Magic: A History of Stagecraft & Spectacle 2/15

Feb ’14
15
7:00 pm

ChicagoMagic

In David Witter’s new book Chicago Magic: A History of Stagecraft & Spectacle (The History Press), he keeps track of the shell game of Chicago’s fascinating magic history from its vaudeville circuit to its contemporary resurgence. By the end of America’s “Golden Age of Magic,” Chicago had taken center stage in front of an American audience drawn to the craft by the likes of Harry Houdini and Howard Thurston. Cashing in on a craze that rivaled big-band mania, magic shops and clubs sprang up everywhere across the Windy City, packed in customers and put down roots. Over the last century, for example, Magic, Inc. has outfitted magicians from Harry Blackstone Sr. to Penn and Teller to David Copperfield. Magic was an integral part of Chicago’s culture, from its earliest venture into live television to the card sharps and hucksters lurking in its amusement parks and pool halls.

David Witter is a Chicago historian and author of the book Oldest Chicago. A native Chicagoan, he attended Louisa May Alcott School (the same grammar school as Marshall Brodien), Lane Technical High School, Columbia College (BA in writing) and Northeastern Illinois University (BA in secondary education). Also a freelance writer and photographer, he is a regular contributor to New City and Fra Noi. His work has appeared in the Washington Post, the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Reader, Living Blues, The Best of the Chicago Blues Annual, the Bay Area Music Magazine, the Copley News Syndicate and Lerner Newspapers.

For more info: danielle.raub(at)historypress(dot)net

Click here for Facebook event posting for this event.

Saturday, February 15th, 7pm – Free Event at Quimby’s Bookstore

Gene Gregorits Reads With Alan Hoffmann 11/8

Nov ’13
8
7:00 pm

fishhook
In Gene Gregorits’ latest, Fishhook (Monastrell Books), he takes a break from his Dog Days series, which has won him a mountain of small press support while also inviting hellish scorn since its emergence last year. Throughout this new volume’s 550 pages, we experience the notorious cult writer and well-known Facebook abuser’s oftentimes hazardous day-to-day life with both humor and a terrifying clinical detachment. Fishhook is the first book of its kind: a literary anthology comprised entirely of status updates. It works as a conceptual coffee table piece, but fans of his novels can investigate this collection as a real life companion to both Dog Days and Johnny Behind the Deuce.

The work of Gene Gregorits has been hiding in plain sight for 20 years. His first 2 books, 2002’s Sex & Guts and 2007’s Midnight Mavericks: Reports From The Underground, sold less than 50 copies each, despite heavy marketing, exceptional writing, and one-of-a-kind interviews. He finds the relentless attempts to extinguish him as a writer and force of nature amusing, particularly now that with his own imprint, Monastrell, he has finally managed to discover an intelligent and informed readership that, like him, is none too happy about the current void in American literature. His rapidly growing cult of ne’er do wells, malcontents, and highly literate reprobates seems to be largely based in Chicago, and he is very excited to meet every one of them on November 8th.
Gregorits is coming all the way from Florida for this event; he will be reading from Dog Days Volume Two, Fishhook, and his current work-in-progress, Intra-Coastal: One Year On St. Pete Beach. For more info: www.MonastrellBooks.com

“Gene Gregorits is the best and truest writer you have never heard of.” -Lisa Carver, VICE MAGAZINE

Alan Hoffman is a Chicago-based writer-performer who collaborates with musicians (including current-regular ambient accompanist Cinchel) to create dark sonic portraits about human nature. His current project is a recording for late 2013 which includes his own monologues, along with one each by director Christophe Honore and author Dennis Cooper. Alan will read a piece from this recording tonight and will be performing the show in its entirety (with several other local musicians) in the near future.” For more info: http://cinchel.com/

Friday, November 8th, 7pm – Free Event

In honor of Gregoritis’ love for Facebook, we’ll be giving away FREE GRAB BAGS to any customer who can prove that they shared that day’s event and tagged Quimby’s Bookstore. Social media: truly the gift that keeps on giving. Please note: customers must be in the store at the Gregorits in-store appearance to pick up their grab bags.

https://www.facebook.com/events/1375490519357885/?ref=5

Quimby’s Bookstore Podcast Episode #8 With Adam Parfrey & Peter Sotos Now Available

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This episode is entitled “We’re Having a Good Time With That Goat, Wish You Were Here: Decadence With Adam Parfrey and Peter Sotos.” Feral House publisher Adam Parfrey, talks about his book Ritual America: Secret Brotherhoods and Their Influence on American Society: A Visual Guide, and controversial local writer Peter Sotos talks about his book Pure Filth.

Stream or download this episode and past episodes (it’s free!) on our Podbean site at quimbys.podbean.com.

Or find us on I-Tunes!

Peter Sotos & Publisher Chip Smith Discuss Controversy in Publishing 3/23

Mar ’13
23
7:00 pm

minepsotos_lg

Marking the roughly simultaneous re-release of Peter Sotos’ Tool  and Mine, Sotos will appear at Quimby’s Bookstore with his publisher Nine-Banded Books founder, Chip Smith, to discuss the continuing role of independent publishers in curating controversial and overlooked literature.

“Peter Sotos is one of those rare writers who can say, ‘The words I write are me,’ or at least as close as anyone can come to communicating who they are in words.” –Thomas Ligotti, author of The Conspiracy against the Human Race

“For this latter-day homo sacer, wounds are not to be healed but poked and worried until they bleed. Sotos is literature’s outcast, carrying stigma like a rat carries plague.” –Mikita Brottman, author of Thirteen Girls

“…among the most important writing being done today.”
–Dennis Cooper, author of The Marbled Swarm

Peter Sotos is a Chicago-born writer whose work focuses on criminal psychology, sexual abjection, and the myriad aspects of pornography. (He was also an early member of the noise group Whitehouse.) Noted his unique literary style and his frank and insightful engagement with deeply disturbing subjects, Sotos’ writings are considered by many to stand as oblique social criticism. Sotos is the author of 11 published novels, including Index, Tick, Lordotics, Comfort and Critique, and Selfish, Little: The Annotated Lesley Ann Downey. He is also the editor of the Pure Filth, an annotated collection transcripts culled from the underground pornography of the late Jamie Gillis. Sotos’ writing has appeared in ANSWER Me!, Apocalypse Culture II, Funeral Party, and Ritual Sex.

And oh yeah, he often comes in to Quimby’s (always wearing a long coat) with records he bought around the corner at Reckless Records. One time it was a greatest hits from The Smiths, prompting us to fun of him.

For more info: ninebandedbooks.com and quimbys.com

Sat, March 23rd, 7pm – Free Event