Book it on down

Time to get cracking on the latest edition of the Arkansas Literary Festival

Ron Wolfe art for arkansas literary festival
Ron Wolfe art for arkansas literary festival

Arkansas Literary Festival Thursday-Sunday, Central Arkansas Library System’s Main Library, 100 Rock St., Little Rock, and other venues including Cox Creative Center, 120 River Market Ave.; Hillary Rodham Clinton Children’s Library and Learning Center, 4800 W. 10th St.; South on Main, 1304 S. Main St.; and Arkansas Arts Center, East Ninth and Commerce streets. Festival chairman is Jay Jennings. The festival is offered through CALS.

Most events are free; tickets are $25 in advance at Main Library and River Market Books and Gifts, $40 at the door for the “Author! Author!” cocktail reception at 8 p.m. Friday at Main Library Information: arkansasliteraryfestival.org, (501) 918-3098The best book at the Arkansas Literary Festival is likely to be the guest book - more than 80 authors, speakers and entertainers for the 11th annual event that will be held Thursday through April 27 in Little Rock.

The lineup includes mystery and suspense writer Catherine Coulter, New York chocolate-making cookbook writers Richard and Michael Mast and Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga.

Lewis’ memoir, March: Book One, is a graphic novel illustrated by North Little Rock native Nate Powell, now from Bloomington, Ind.

The number of participants has doubled in six years and the festival attracts thousands of readers with four days of talks, panels, workshops, recipes, children’s books and entertainment and book signings.

“Sometimes you have to make difficult choices,” festival coordinator Brad Mooy says.

Events overlap in 20 venues,most free, many in and around Central Arkansas Library System’s Main Library in downtown Little Rock.

Coulter is the best-selling author of Power Play and The Final Cut. She will teach a writers workshop, “Kill ’Em Clean,” at noon Friday at the Main Library’s Darragh Center (tickets are $20), and will speak on “The Fine Art of Suspense” at 1 p.m. Saturday atthe Ron Robinson Theater, 100 River Market Ave.

The Mast brothers will offer tastes of some of the concoctions in their dessert collection, Mast Brothers Chocolate: A Family Cookbook, at 4 p.m. Saturday in the Ron Robinson Theater.

Lewis, Powell and graphic novel co-writer Andrew Aydin will discuss their collaboration on March: Book One at 1:30 p.m. Sunday at the Mosaic Templars Cultural Center, 501 W. Ninth St.

CHAPTER ONE: NEAR AND FAR

Little Rock novelist Kevin Brockmeier will bring his new recollection, A Few Seconds of Radiant Filmstrip: A Memoir of Seventh Grade. Brockmeier will speak on “Seventh Grade in Little Rock” at 4 p.m. Saturday at the Darragh Center.

Children’s writer Darcy Pattison is a central Arkansan whose latest book is set far off: Abayomi, the Brazilian Puma. “Puma Tale” will be her subject at 2:30 p.m. Saturday at the Witt Stephens Jr. Central Arkansas Nature Center, 602 President Clinton Ave.

From Fayetteville, novelist, poet and short story writer Ellen Gilchrist has a new collection, Acts of God, about survival and perseverance. “Finale” is the title of her talk at 3 p.m. Sunday at the Darragh Center.

Californian Daniel O’Brien is head writer for the comedy site cracked.com and the co-author of You Might Be a Zombie and Other Bad News. “Bada** Presidents” will be his topic - also the subject of his new book, How to Fight Presidents - at 4 p.m. Saturday at Cox Creative Center.

Rebecca Makkai comes from Chicago with her first novel, The Borrower. She will join short story writer Kelly Luce from Austin, Texas, (Three Scenarios in Which Hana Sasaki Grows a Tail) and globe-twirling ballet dancer-turned-novelist Mario Alberto Zambrano (Loteria) for “Stellar Debuts,” a panel at 1 p.m. Saturday at the Arkansas Studies Institute, 401 President Clinton Ave.

North Carolinan Fred Bahnson is the author of Soil and Sacrament: A SpiritualMemoir of Food and Faith. Bahnson will speak on “Nourishment” at 5 p.m. Saturday at Christ Episcopal Church, 509 S. Scott St.

CHAPTER TWO: AH!-CHEW

Food authors Kat Robinson from Little Rock and Cindy Grisham from Benton will set the table for “Eat, Prey, Love” at 10 a.m. Saturday at Historic Arkansas Museum, 200 E. Third St.

The title says it for Grisham’s book, Arkansas Delta Food: Pot Likker, Coon Suppers and Chocolate Gravy. Robinson’s book is for dessert, Arkansas Pie: A Slice of the Natural State.

Other books loaded with food for thought include the culinary writings of Mary Roach and Mary Ann Caws.

Gulp is the title of Roach’s guided tour of the human alimentary canal. “Canal Voyage” will be her talk at 11:30a.m. Saturday at the Ron Robinson Theater.

Caws’ The Modern Art Cookbook offers such recipes as painter Claude Monet’s for madeleines. “Art and Food I” will be her talk at 6 p.m. Thursday at the Arkansas Arts Center. “Art and Food II,” a $20 buffet, will follow at 7 at the Arts Center.

To wash it all down, Pub or Perish will be a night of author readings at 7 p.m. Saturday at Stickyz Rock ’n’ Roll Chicken Shack, 107 River Market Ave.

CHAPTER THREE:

OUT OF THE BOOK BOX

Not everything on the festival’s wide shelf is a new book. Legos, robots and other nonbooks find a place, and used books by the armload:

The Arkansas Lego Users Group’s 75-square-foot display will be assembled all day Saturday in the Main Library’s Youth Services Department.

“R Robotics” will be a 3 p.m. Saturday workshop combined with an all-day 3-D printing display in the Main Library’s Level 4 teen section.

The Arkansas Shakespeare Theatre will lead a celebration of William Shakespeare’s 450th birthday at 10 a.m. in the Main Library’s Youth Services Department.

Used book sales will be Friday through Sunday in the Main Library’s basement and River Market Books and Gifts in the Cox Creative Center. Books at the Main Library will be 50 cents for paperbacks, $1 for hardcovers. The gift shop’s “gently read” books will be 50 percent off to members of Friends of Central Arkansas Libraries.

CHAPTER FOUR: METAPHOR AND MORE

If the literary festival seems like a dream, Dylan Tuccillo’s A Field Guide to Lucid Dreaming tells how to make sense of it.

Like a song? Robert Hilburn’s Johnny Cash: The Life talks about Cash growing up in Arkansas. Singer Rhett Miller knows his way around a Cash song as frontman for the Old 97’s, performing at 8 p.m. Thursday at South on Main. (Concert tickets are$25 reserved, $20 general admission.)

Like a picture? Children’s author and illustrator Kadir Nelson’s books include We Are the Ship and Baby Bear.

Like a fang time had by all? Comics artist Colleen Duran’s work includes the comic-book version of the TV show The Vampire Diaries.

Or like a time for searching among these and dozens more events?

In that case, just the book: The Searchers: The Making of an American Legend by Pulitzer Prize-winner Glenn Frankel.

Frankel will speak on “Western Mythmaking” at 1 p.m. Saturday at the MacArthur Museum of Arkansas Military History, 503 E. Ninth St.

Style, Pages 47 on 04/20/2014

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