Book Markers: 07.18.13“The Art of Steampunk”
“What is Steampunk? In three short words, Steampunk is Victorian science fiction.” So writes G.D. Falksen in his introduction to “The Art of Steampunk” by Art Donovan, just out in a revised second edition from Fox Chapel Publishing. Victorian is here meant as an evocation, referring to a heavily decorative look, an aesthetic, wholeheartedly and enthusiastically influenced by early industrialization.
Tom Clavin will discuss “The DiMaggios: Three Brothers, Their Passion for Baseball, Their Pursuit of the American Dream” on Saturday for the Amagansett Library’s Authors After Hours series.
He has been on a baseball biography tear in recent years, this book coming hard on the heels of two others about stars of the New York City scene, Gil Hodges, of the lamented Brooklyn Dodgers and later the often lamentable Mets, and the Bronx Bombers’ Roger Maris, dubbed in that book’s subtitle “Baseball’s Reluctant Hero.”
And Now, Authors After Hours
Here’s a summer reading series of some note. Authors After Hours starts Saturday at the Amagansett Library at 6 p.m., when Paul Tough, who has been an editor at The New York Times Magazine and Harper’s, weighs in on the importance simple gumption plays in children’s future life outcomes. More so than I.Q., he argues in “How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character.”
Solace in Inanimate Objects“Cooper and the
Enchanted Metal
Detector”
Adam Osterweil
Namelos Books, $18.95
Goodbye school, hello summer reading. “Cooper and the Enchanted Metal Detector” is a novel for middle-grade readers that takes place over the course of a pivotal summer for Cooper, the 10 (or perhaps 11)-year-old protagonist. A complete epoch can occur bookended by June and August, and Adam Osterweil, who has brought young readers “The Comic Book Kid” and “The Amulet of Komondor,” among others, seems to know all about the arc of summer.
A Summer of Friday Authors
There are readings, and then there are readings at which you can wipe your mouth of a toothsome hors d’oeuvre, rise from your folding chair, and direct a question of your choosing at the author in attendance, plastic tumbler of chardonnay in hand.
Grace Schulman: On the Edge of Her SeatDuring a recent visit with Grace Schulman, a poet, translator, and professor, she remarked that the phone lines at her house were full of static.
But she hadn’t called for a repair, she said — her Springs house, and the beaches and all of the corners of the hamlet, are a refuge where she takes in the observations that later emerge in her poems.
A former poetry editor at The Nation, where she revived a poetry contest, Ms. Schulman directed the Poetry Center at the 92nd Street Y in Manhattan for a decade.
When the Worst Happens“My Daughter, Myself”
Linda Wolfe
Greenpoint Press, $20
On a Mother’s Day visit to Texas to see her only daughter, Jessica, mother of two small children, a mother’s worst nightmare begins. Suffering from dizziness and a splitting headache, Jessica is rushed to the emergency room. A CT scan and “every test known to women” are given and Jessica is sent home, diagnosed with a migraine.
New From Rosenblatt (et al.)
Oh sure, it’s a group reading, but there must be privileging. At least when Roger Rosenblatt clears his resonant throat to offer up some new prose — in this case, from “The Boy Detective,” a forthcoming memoir about growing up in the Big Apple.
‘Big Bad Wolfe’ Looks BackThe reporter turned essayist turned novelist Tom Wolfe, seen through his own writings, will be the subject of a staged reading at Guild Hall tomorrow night at 8. Curated by Judith Auberjonois — “ I hate to use that word,” she said, “because it is a little too trendy, but I did curate it” — “Big Bad Wolfe” has her husband, Rene, playing the author, via excerpts from his work starting with the early 1960s.
East End and New York poets will turn out in force Saturday for one of their own, Harvey Shapiro, who will be remembered through recollections and readings of his work starting at 6 p.m. at Stony Brook Southampton.
Mr. Shapiro, who lived in Brooklyn and East Hampton, was the author of numerous collections of poems, his most recent being “The Sights Along the Harbor,” from 2006. He was an editor at The New York Times Magazine and, from 1975 to 1983, the editor of The Times Book Review. He died on Jan. 7 at the age of 88.
Water WorldNorman (Fish) Finelli is an old-fashioned kid. He’s been feeding coins into his piggy bank, actually a ceramic lobster bank, to save up — not for a Jet Ski, but for a Seagull, “one of the finest motorboat engines ever made,” which is going to go on this leaky bucket of a boat he’s fixing up.
Real Estate Horrors — Aloud
Don’t dare show your face in public? Have others show theirs. Anonymous x Two, the ladies who dished the dirt so hard on the real estate biz here they had to remain in hiding, are having a reading of their recent book, “The Hamptons Real Estate Horror Show,” on Saturday from 4 to 5:30 p.m. at the Springs Presbyterian Church.
Myth and Mystery“Origins of the Past”
Edited by Tom Twomey
East End Press, $40
Chroniclers, diarists, and historians often must have felt what East Hampton’s master mechanic Nathaniel Dominy IV scribed on the rear of a metal tall-case clock dial he made in 1788: “Where oh! Where shall I be when this clock is worn out?” Heaven may have been the answer Dominy was suggesting, but to the recorder or analyst of history the perfect solution is to be published and remain a viable source of information.
David Margolick on “Dreadful”
Here’s a title to prick up your ears: “Dreadful: The Short Life and Gay Times of John Horne Burns.” Burns, a conflicted man of no small measure of inner turmoil and anger, came out with “The Gallery” in 1947, a debut collection of related stories praised for its descriptions of wartime Italy. It contained an early depiction of what it was like to be gay in the military and sold 500,000 copies.
Notes From the Underbelly“Caught”
Jeff Nichols
CreateSpace, $9.99
About two chapters into this book I was poised to dislike it, but like a “Trainwreck,” the title of Jeff Nichols’s memoir published in 2009 and turned into a movie two years later, I found it impossible to avert my eyes.
American Gruesome“Murder on Long Island”
Geoffrey K. Fleming
and Amy K. Folk
History Press, $19.99
Claire Reed Toughs It Out
Claire Reed left behind a privileged life of country clubs and golf outings to wade hip deep into the feminist fights, civil rights struggles, and disarmament movement of the latter part of the last century. She would become a tireless organizer and activist for a number of progressive nonprofits, and the right-hand woman of Bella Abzug leading up to and during Abzug’s Congressional career.
Mac Griswold on “The Manor”
A trip into Shelter Island’s deep past — to say nothing of down “the slave staircase” at the island’s storied Sylvester Manor — awaits the historically curious on Saturday at 3 p.m., when Mac Griswold discusses the particulars of her new book, “The Manor: Three Centuries at a Slave Plantation on Long Island.” The talk, part of the Sag Harbor Historical Society’s annual meeting, will take place at the Annie Cooper Boyd House on Main Street in that village.
Long Island Books: (Not So) Bad Boy“Bad Boy”
Eric Fischl
Crown, $26
One of the lasting impressions I have of Eric Fischl was a night at the Parrish Art Museum, where he was in discussion with an adjunct curator about Fairfield Porter’s influences. The curator, who is no longer with the museum, had developed an elaborate theory regarding Diego Velasquez’s influence on Porter, an idea at which Mr. Fischl scoffed.
Kids’ Reviewers Impaneled
Reviewing children’s books: all delicacy and tact, or a merciless weeding out? At the Amagansett Library on Saturday, a panel of reviewers will discuss what makes a good children’s book, what criteria goes into an evaluation, and even what might make one “literary.”
Fortunate Son“Indiscretion”
Charles Dubow
William Morrow, $25.99
There are no perfect lives. Even people who seem to have it all, whose births appear to have set them on a course that ensures success and happiness, even those fortunate few encounter trouble along the way. And does having it all invite being taken down a peg? Moreover, what if you have it all and still desire more? What then?
Children’s Books Powwow
Children’s books: So many think they can write them; so few actually do so with skill. Now, for Children’s Book Week, the Amagansett Library has rounded up some top practitioners for panel discussions starting at 6 p.m. this Saturday and continuing next Saturday, May 18.
Dogs for Steinbeck
You say John Steinbeck Weekend is news to you? Never mind that and simply give in to the charm of the “Travels With Charley” dog walk on Saturday starting at 8:30 a.m. at Havens Beach in Sag Harbor. Jill Rappaport of the “Today” show, known as an advocate for the four-legged, is the host, and the beneficiaries are the Animal Rescue Fund of the Hamptons and the Bay Street Theatre, where the walk will wind up with a “bagels and bones” reception.
Seedy Montauk: A Novel ViewThere’s no rock ’n’ roll and just a few mentions of drugs in Nanci E. LaGarenne’s new novel, “Cheap Fish,” but it’s all about Montauk and has sex, salty language, intrigue, and a murder mystery, all aboard a high-class floating brothel called the Lily Virginia in the middle of the ocean.
The characters were not based on real people but may carry the qualities of some or a few rolled into one, Ms. LaGarenne said. Readers, though, are having a lot of fun wondering who’s who from the Montauk bar scene, mostly Liars’ Saloon, which plays a central role in the book.
Long Island Books: Paths to Freedom“The Underground
Railroad on Long Island”
Kathleen G. Velsor
History Press, $19.99
Storytelling Techniques
Memoir: It’s all the rage, whether you’re a reader, a writer, or a publisher. How about workshopper?
Poets Laureate, Ho!
National Poetry Month: Get it while you can, versification fans. At Canio’s Books in Sag Harbor, to name one outlet, a couple of county poets laureate, Ed Stever of Suffolk and Linda Opyr of Nassau, will step to a lectern or its approximation to read starting at 5 p.m. on Saturday.
