Alan Goldsher Book Release Event forModest Mouse: A Pretty Good ReadSaturday, December 2nd, 8:00 PM
FREE
 
Alan Goldsher will read for his newest book \”MODEST MOUSE: A PRETTY GOOD READ\” The Unauthorized Biography of the Platinum Selling Indie Rock Band Modest Mouse. Unruly, antagonistic, and often downright depressing, Modest Mouse seemed like one of the most unlikely candidates for mainstream stardom. Yet the band has pulled themselves through arrests and allegations to earn platinum record sales and primetime television guest spots, and become one of indie rock\’s most surprising success stories.
 
Journalist Alan Goldsher uncovers the strange, little-known details of Modest Mouse\’s unlikely rise, chronicling the band\’s difficult decade-long career, from the bottom of the Washington State indie rock scene to the current success of their records and ongoing international tours. He also reveals the troubled background and fractured history of Isaac Brock, the difficult and often abrasive front man who has spent as much time avoiding the media as he has attempted to control it. Thoroughly researched, sharply funny, and filled with pictures and posters from every step of the band\’s career, this unauthorized bio is perfect for new and old fans looking for the band\’s little-known history.
 
Writer/musician Alan Goldsher is also the author of \”Hard Bop Academy: The Sidemen of Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers\” and the music-themed novels \”Jam\” and \”The Record Haus\”. As a bassist, Goldsher has recorded with Janet Jackson, Cypress Hill, and Naughty by Nature; toured the world with Digable Planets; and performed at the 1994 Grammy Awards. He is a regular contributor to Bass Player. Alan lives and writes in Chicago.
Visit Alan at www.AlanGoldsher.com or www.Myspace.com/aprettygoodread.
 

Saturday, November 4th, 7:30 PM
Featherproof mini-book launch party
Join us for an evening of readings with: Patrick Somerville, Anne Elizabeth Moore, Pete Coco, Jeb Gleason-Allured & Kyle Beachy.
 
Patrick Somerville is a Green Bay native, New York-educated, Chicago-residing writer of fine short fiction. His new short story collection, Trouble, has received warm reviews from smart people.
 
Anne Elizabeth Moore does a million things, including serving as associate publisher of Punk Planet Magazine and editing the Best American Comics series.
 
Pete Coco\’s short fiction has appeared in numerous places, including in Featherproof\’s mini-book series and THE2NDHAND. He once was called the Glen Danzig of fiction, and it was meant as a compliment.
 
Jeb Gleason-Allured online submissions editor at THE2NDHAND; his stories have been published in numerous magazines. He lives and writes and drinks in Chicago.
 
Kyle Beachy is a local author
 

Marjane SatrapiSaturday October 28th 7PMfree
 
In her acclaimed Persepolis books and in Embroideries, Marjane Satrapi rendered the events of her life and times in a uniquely captivating and powerful voice and vision. Now in Chicken with Plums she turns that same keen eye and ear to the heartrending story of her great-uncle, a celebrated Iranian musician who gave up his life for music and love.
 
We are in Tehran in 1958, and Nasser Ali Khan, one of Iran?s most revered tar players, discovers that his beloved instrument is irreparably damaged. Though he tries, he cannot find one to replace it, one whose sound speaks to him with the same power and passion with which his music speaks to others. In despair, he takes to his bed, renouncing the world and all its pleasures, closing the door on the demands and love of his wife and his four children. Over the course of the week that follows, his family and close friends attempt to change his mind, but Nasser Ali slips further and further into his own reveries: flashbacks and flash-forwards (with unexpected appearances by the likes of the Angel of Death and Sophia Loren) from his own childhood through his children?s futures. And as the pieces of his story slowly fall into place, we begin to understand the profundity of his decision to give up life.
 
Marjane Satrapi brings what has become her signature humor, insight, and generosity to this emotional tale of life and death, and the courage and passion both require of us. The poignant story of one man, it is also a story of stunning universality?and an altogether luminous work.
 
Marjane Satrapi was born in 1969 in Rasht, Iran. She grew up in Tehran, where she studied at the Lycee Francais before leaving for Vienna and then going to Strasbourg to study illustration. She currently lives in Paris, where she is at work on the sequel to Persepolis and where her illustrations appear regularly in newspapers and magazines. She is also the author of several children’s books.