Event Schedule

In Auction, her first poetry collection in eight years, the poet, novelist, and playwright Quan Barry travels the globe in her signature quest into the existential nature of experience. These poems explore the inner landscapes of both the human and animal realms, revealing them to be points along the same spectrum. At the heart of the book lies an extended study of toxic storytelling as an element of warcraft, but Barry also contemplates the death of a Buddhist master, the plight of migrants both at home and abroad, the ethics of travel and consumption, and the larger question of how and why we construct a self in order to navigate the world.  

Zero-sum games are played for lethal stakes in these arresting stories by one of America’s most acclaimed writers, the award-winning, best-selling author of Blonde. 

A brilliant young philosophy student bent on seducing her famous philosopher-mentor finds herself outmaneuvered; diabolically clever high school girls wreak a particularly apt sort of vengeance on sexual predators in their community; a woman stalked by a would-be killer may be confiding in the wrong former lover; a young woman is morbidly obsessed by her unfamiliar new role as “mother.” In the collection’s longest story, a much-praised cutting-edge writer cruelly experiments with “drafts” of his own suicide. 

In these powerfully wrought stories that hold a mirror up to our time, Joyce Carol Oates has created a world of erotic obsession, thwarted idealism, and ever-shifting identities. Provocative and stunning, Zero-Sum reinforces Oates’s standing as a literary treasure and an artist of the mysterious interior life.

Joyce Carol Oates will be in conversation with local Madison and New York Times best-selling author, Chloe Benjamin.

Presented in partnership with A Room of One's Own Bookstore. 

Don’t panic—Mercury Stardust, AKA The Trans Handy Ma’am is here to help!

For too many people, the simple act of contacting a plumber or repair person can feel like a game of chance. As a transwoman and a professional maintenance technician, Mercury Stardust has discovered (the hard way) that we live in a world with much to fear. If you’ve ever felt panicked about opening your home to strangers in order to fix a maintenance issue, this book is for you.

Renting a home can be a complex process—from finding a safe and affordable space, to hiring help for moving in and out, and of course, managing any repairs that come up during your stay. 

You deserve to feel empowered to take matters into your own hands—and it’s not as hard as you might think. In this book, Mercury will show you how to tackle the projects that need improvement in your home—from how to properly fix a clog in your bathroom sink and safely hang things on your walls to patching small and medium drywall holes.

Safe and Sound includes:

The definitive seafood guide from the three-Michelin-starred chef of Le Bernardin, featuring gorgeous photography and step-by-step techniques alongside 85 accessible recipes for preparing incredible fish at home.

“I hope that this book is a source of inspiration and education, encouraging you to cook with confidence and approach seafood with joy, and even love. The secret to Seafood Simple is to trust the process, and yourself.”

In its three decades at the top of New York City’s restaurant scene, Le Bernardin has been celebrated as one of the finest seafood restaurants in the world and its iconic chef Eric Ripert as the expert in fish cookery. Now, in Seafood Simple, Ripert demystifies his signature cuisine, making delectable fish dishes achievable for home cooks of all skill levels—yet still with elegance and panache.

This semiannual sale is organized by the Friends to help to support public events and lectures, priorities identified by the Vice Provost, special purchases and preservation of library materials, and grants for the visiting scholar program. We accept donations for upcoming sales on a continual basis. The sale is free (except the preview sale) and open to the public. 80 – 100 community volunteers participate in this event that draws students, faculty, and visitors from around the Midwest. Books for the sale are donated by University of Wisconsin faculty, staff, students, and Madison-area residents.

• Wednesday, October 11
  Preview Sale:  4:00-8:00 P.M. ($5 entry)
• Thursday & Friday, October 12 – 13
  Regular Sale: 10:30 A.M.-7:00 P.M. (no entry fee)
• Saturday, October 14

Bag Sale: 9:00 A.M.-1:00 P.M. ($5 per bag) 

Bring your own grocery bag or purchase one for $1 

From 1:05-2:00 p.m. all remaining items are FREE

Millennials and Gen Z-ers are considered two of the most anxious generations in history, and with many intense generation-specific stressors facing them in recent years—including climate change, political polarization, systemic racism, gun violence, financial instability, and so much more, it’s easy to see why people are being diagnosed with anxiety at alarming rates. 

Dr. Lauren Cook, a therapist who specializes in treating Millennials and Gen Z clients, and is a Millennial who also lives with anxiety, understands the many nuanced reasons why these two groups are struggling in different ways than their predecessors. Taking a feminist and intersectional lens, Dr. Cook shares her own struggles with anxiety and provides easy, actionable steps to help readers ride the waves of anxiety rather than constantly swimming against them. This relatable, honest, and information-packed book incorporates thorough, evidence-backed psychological research and diverse client experiences to illustrate a broad range of presentations of anxiety and help readers gain insight into their own stressors and effectively work through anxiety.

As the Great War rages across Europe, Rand Brandt, an idealistic young forester in the north-woods of Wisconsin, discovers a remarkable gift: his touch can grow any plant in minutes. Overjoyed, he dreams of devoting his life to conservation, restoring to its former glory a landscape devastated by lumbering. At night, Rand tests his powers, pushing his physical limits and revealing his secret only to his lover, Gabriel. But his frequent absences from camp don’t go unnoticed, and it isn’t long before Rand is drafted to grow timber for the war effort. Along with Gabriel, he’s shipped to France—though the army is a dangerous place for two men in love. 

While at camp, Rand also realizes the true price of his gift: everything he grows withers and dies, leaving the soil empty of all living matter. Horrified, he throws himself into ever more self-destructive trials, buckling under the pressure of so many secrets. In order to survive, he must confront the terrifying possibility that his gift is actually a curse, upending everything he believes about nature, love, and himself.

An incisive analysis of how the Supreme Court’s new conservative supermajority is overturning decades of law and leading the country in a dangerous political direction.

In The Supermajority, Michael Waldman explores the tumultuous 2021–2022 Supreme Court term. He draws deeply on history to examine other times the Court veered from the popular will, provoking controversy and backlash. And he analyzes the most important new rulings and their implications for the law and for American society. Waldman asks: What can we do when the Supreme Court challenges the country?

Over three days in June 2022, the conservative supermajority overturned the constitutional right to abortion, possibly opening the door to reconsider other major privacy rights, as Justice Clarence Thomas urged. The Court sharply limited the authority of the EPA, reducing the prospects for combatting climate change. It radically loosened curbs on guns amid an epidemic of mass shootings. It fully embraced legal theories such as “originalism” that will affect thousands of cases throughout the country.

Presented in partnership with the UW-Madison Center for East Asian Studies.

From ages 10 to 20, Craig Thompson and his little brother Phil, toiled in Wisconsin farms. Weeding and harvesting ginseng—an exotic medicinal herb that fetched huge profits in China—funded Craig’s youthful obsession with comic books. Comics in turn, allowed him to escape his rural, working class trappings.

Now, for the first time in his career, Thompson is working in serial form, in a bimonthly comic book series. Part memoir, part travelogue, part essay—all comic book—Ginseng Roots explores class divide, agriculture, holistic healing, the 300 year long trade relationship between China and North America, childhood labor, and the bond between two brothers.

The wandering Cleric Chih returns home to the Singing Hills Abbey for the first time in almost three years, to be met with both joy and sorrow. Their mentor, Cleric Thien, has died, and rests among the archivists and storytellers of the storied abbey. But not everyone is prepared to leave them to their rest.

Because Cleric Thien was once the patriarch of Coh clan of Northern Bell Pass--and now their granddaughters have arrived on the backs of royal mammoths, demanding their grandfather’s body for burial. Chih must somehow balance honoring their mentor’s chosen life while keeping the sisters from the north from storming the gates and destroying the history the clerics have worked so hard to preserve.

But as Chih and their neixin Almost Brilliant navigate the looming crisis, Myriad Virtues, Cleric Thien’s own beloved hoopoe companion, grieves her loss as only a being with perfect memory can, and her sorrow may be more powerful than anyone could anticipate. . .

Established in 1998, the lecture was named to honor Charlotte Zolotow, a distinguished children's book editor for 38 years with Harper Junior Books, and author of more than 65 picture books, including such classic works as Mr. Rabbit and the Lovely Present (Harper, 1962) and William's Doll (Harper, 1972). Ms. Zolotow attended the University of Wisconsin in Madison on a writing scholarship from 1933-36 where she studied with Professor Helen C. White. The Cooperative Children's Book Center, a library of the School of Education of the University of Wisconsin in Madison, administers the event which each year brings a distinguished children's book author or illustrator to the campus to deliver a free public lecture. Registration is requested to facilitate seating and space needs.

#1 New York Times bestselling author of Firekeeper’s Daughter Angeline Boulley takes us back to Sugar Island in this high-stakes thriller about the power of discovering your stolen history.

Presented in partnership with the Wisconsin Science Festival.

In this essential look at the regrowth of the American Midwest, tech journalist Rebecca A. Fannin chronicles her return to America’s heartland, revealing the dramatic entrepreneurial comeback that is transforming the Rust Belt into the Tech Belt. 

Change is sweeping across the American heartland. For too long ignored as “flyover country,” the once-mighty Midwest is experiencing a quiet but compelling revolution powered by savvy venture capital, high-tech innovation, entrepreneurial boldness, and good old American moxie. What has been known as the Rust Belt is now developing the shine of a tech belt. The former pinnacle of the US economy is making a comeback, which bodes well not only for the heartland but for our economy and morale nationwide. 

The stories in Kind of Blue juke and jive in an unpredictable voice-driven romp. Set in rural Wisconsin, Minneapolis, Duluth, Milwaukee, Detroit, New Orleans, Houston, and South Florida, these are stories that start and stop and surprise, swerving all over the road. These are stories of wanderlust and music, loss and misdirection, disasters large and small. With the sound and rhythm of language driving each tale, Christopher Chambers gives voice to the working- and middle-class worlds of the American Midwest and the South. 

Daring to Struggle, Daring to Win tells the fascinating true story of Helen Shiller, a radical organizer turned independent politician, and her 40-year struggle for justice in Chicago. 

Helen Shiller went from radical anti-war activist in Wisconsin, to a white ally of the Black Panther Party in Chicago, building community coalitions that led her to ultimately win a seat on the city council, while helping to break the back of the radicalized opposition to Harold Washington, Chicago’s first Black mayor. 

Shiller participated, when few others did, in the historic fight against the gentrification of a unique economically and racially mixed Uptown community on Chicago’s Northside. With insight into community organizing and political battles in Chicago from the 1970s through 2010, this book details the many policy fights and conflicts in Chicago during this time, illuminating recurrent political themes and battles that remain relevant to this day. 

Daring to Struggle, Daring to Win is a compelling, insightful, must-read for all those struggling for a better world today.

Idlewild is a tiny, artsy Quaker high school in lower Manhattan. Students call their teachers by their first names, there are no grades, and every day begins with 20 minutes of contemplative silence in the Meetinghouse. It’s during one of those meetings that an airplane hits the Twin Towers. 

For two Idlewild outcasts, 9/11 serves as the first day of an intense, 18-month friendship. Fay is prickly, aloof, and obsessed with gay men; Nell is shy, sensitive, and obsessed with Fay. The two of them bond fiercely and spend all their waking hours giddily parsing their environment for homoerotic subtext. Then, during rehearsals for the fall play, they notice two sexually ambiguous boys who are potential candidates for their exclusive Invert Society. The pairs become mirrors of one another and eventually drive each other to make choices that they’ll regret for the rest of their lives.

Presented in partnership with the Wisconsin Science Festival.

The New York Times best-selling author on the source of great bounty—and now great peril—all over the world.

Phosphorus has played a critical role in some of the most lethal substances on earth: firebombs, rat poison, nerve gas. But it’s also the key component of one of the most vital: fertilizer, which has sustained life for billions of people. In this major work of explanatory science and environmental journalism, Pulitzer Prize finalist Dan Egan investigates the past, present, and future of what has been called “the oil of our time.”

New York Times Notable Author and Caine Prize winner Leila Aboulela has been praised by J.M. Coetzee, Ali Smith, and Rachel Cusk, among others, for her rich and nuanced novels depicting Islamic spiritual and political life. River Spirit follows an embattled young woman’s coming of age during the Mahdist War in 19th century Sudan. With her characteristic prose, “clear, lovely, and resonant as a ringing bell” (Washington Post), Aboulela weaves a spellbinding narrative of the years leading up to the British conquest of Sudan in 1898 and offers a deeply human look at the tensions between Britain and Sudan, Christianity and Islam, colonizer and colonized. River Spirit gives us the unforgettable story of a people who—against the odds and for a brief time—gained independence from foreign rule through their willpower, subterfuge, and sacrifice.

In 1971, a white, Jewish, former ballerina chose to have a child with the famous Black jazz musician Roy Ayers, fully expecting and agreeing to his absenteeism. In My Life in the Sunshine, their son Nabil Ayers recounts a life spent living with the aftermath of that decision, and his journey to build an identity of his own despite his father’s absence. Even though Nabil has only met him a handful of times, his father has been a steady influence in his life. Like Roy, Nabil became deeply involved in the music industry, first as a musician, and currently as the President of Beggars Group USA, where he has worked with musicians such as The National, St. Vincent, and Big Thief. The title of his memoir is a homage to the opening lyric from his father’s 1976 song, “Everybody Loves the Sunshine,” which has always followed Nabil as both a painful and hopeful reminder of his connection to his father-- reflecting the passion and ambition that they share as well as the close relationship that they don’t. 

Presented in partnership with the Wisconsin Science Festival.

For more than three centuries, Americans have pursued strategies of security that routinely make them feel vulnerable, unsafe, and insecure. American Insecurity and the Origins of Vulnerability probes this paradox by examining American attachments to the terror of the sublime, the fear of uncertainty, and the anxieties produced by unending racial threat.

A small town's dark secrets turn deadly…

When an early morning call brings Deputy Ben Packard to the scene of a home invasion, he finds Bill Sandersen shot in his bed. Bill was a well-liked local who chased easy money his whole life, leaving bad debts and broken hearts in his wake. Everyone Packard talks to has a story about Bill, but no one has a clear motive for wanting him dead. The business partner. The ex-wife. The current wife. The high-stakes poker buddies. Any of them―or none of them―could be guilty.

As the investigation begins, tragedy strikes the Sheriff's department, forcing Packard to make a difficult choice about his future: step down as acting Sheriff and pursue the quiet life he came to Sandy Lake in search of, or subject himself to the scrutiny of an election for the full-time role of Sheriff, a job he's not sure he wants.

There's a hidden history to Sandy Lake that Packard, ever the outsider, can't see. Bad blood and old secrets run deep. But an attempt on Packard's life means he's getting uncomfortably close to the dangerous legacy of the quiet Minnesota town. And someone will do anything to keep it hidden.

The inside story of A League of Their Own—one of the most beloved, enduring, and genre‑busting baseball movies of all time—featuring exclusive interviews and behind‑the‑scenes memories from the original cast and creators, and chronicling how the Penny Marshall classic developed from an unheralded piece of American history into a perennial cinematic favorite.

No Crying in Baseball is a rollicking, revelatory deep dive into a one‑of‑a‑kind film. Before A League of Their Own, few American girls could imagine themselves playing professional ball (and doing it better than the boys). But Penny Marshall’s genre outlier became an instant classic and significant aha moment for countless young women who saw that throwing like a girl was far from an insult.

This Is Salvaged is a collection of stories of uncanny originality by a prize-winning writer who pushes intimacy to its limits in prose of unearthly beauty. 

A young girl reads the encyclopedia to her elderly neighbor, who is descending into dementia. A pair of teenagers seek intimacy as phone-sex operators. A competitive sibling tries to rise above the drunken mess of her own life to become a loving aunt. One sister consumes the ashes of another. And, in the title story, an experimental artist takes on his most ambitious project yet: constructing a life-size ark according to the Bible’s specifications. In a world defined by estrangement, where is communion to be found? The characters in This Is Salvaged, unmoored in turbulence, are searching fervently for meaning, through one another.

About Have You Been Long Enough At Table:

Taking its title from Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea, Leslie Sainz's Have You Been Long Enough At Table explores the personal and historical tragedies of the Cuban American experience through a distinctly feminine lens. Formally diverse--including prose poems, American sonnets, and persona poems--with echoes of Spanish throughout, this debut collection critiques power and patriarchy as weaponized by the governments of the United States and the Republic of Cuba. In investigating the realities of displacement and inherited exile, Sainz honors her imagined past, present, and future as a result of the "revolution within the revolution,"—the supposed emancipation of Cuban women.

Through lyric and associative meditations, Sainz anatomizes the unique grief of immigrant daughters, as her speakers discover how family can be a microcosm of the very violence that displaced them. What emerges is a spiritual blueprint for disinheritance, radical self-determination, and the nuanced examinations of myth, ritual, and resistance.

About Sweet Movie: