It’s Johnston’s turn to grab the spotlight

David Sedaris spent a lot of time two Saturdays ago in Spokane pitching a new book – but not his own.

He couldn’t stop raving about “Irish Girl,” a collection of stories by Tim Johnston.

Sedaris always picks a book by a deserving author to promote during his own standing-room-only book tours (he was reading to a packed crowd at the Martin Woldson Theater at The Fox).

In this case, the timing couldn’t have been more perfect. Johnston is booked for a reading at Auntie’s Bookstore, 402 W. Main Ave., on Thursday at 7 p.m.

“Irish Girl” won the Katherine Anne Porter Prize in Short Fiction and has been getting rave reviews around the country. Sedaris called Johnston’s stories dark, but brilliant and said he is “as wise as he is original.”

Publishers Weekly said Johnston “ventures deeply into the consciousness of Midwesterners to unearth old tensions and buried animosities.”

Sedaris said “Irish Girl” was better than his own books. And, unlike the Sedaris appearance, Johnston’s reading is, of course, free.

A poetry winner

Christopher Howell, nationally respected poet, Eastern Washington University professor and winner of a 2005 Washington State Book Award, will read at Auntie’s Bookstore on Friday at 7 p.m.

Howell, who won for his book “Light’s Ladder,” is on the faculty of EWU’s creative writing MFA program.

He will read from his latest collection, “Dreamless and Possible: New and Selected Poems.”

Shann lands an award

Shann Ferch, a Gonzaga University professor, has won the 2010 Katharine Nason Bakeless Literary Publication Prize, connected with the prestigious Bread Loaf Writer’s Conference in Vermont.

He won for his collection of short stories, “American Masculine: Montana Stories.” The book will be published in 2011 by Graywolf Press as part of the prize, under his pen name, Shann Ray.

Ferch is not a creative writing prof – he’s a professor of leadership in Gonzaga’s Doctoral Program in Leadership Studies. But he’s a widely published author and poet whose work has appeared in McSweeney’s, among other places.

A ‘Female Nomad’ author

“Female Nomad and Friends,” a sequel to Rita Golden Gelman’s 2001 best-seller “Tales of a Female Nomad,” will hit bookstores June 1.

And it will include an essay by Spokane author Åsa Marie Bradley.

The original book was about Gelman’s decision to sell all of her possessions and travel around the world. The sequel includes a number of tales (and recipes) from readers who also shared the nomadic experience.

Bradley’s story is titled “Thanksgiving: A Different Perspective,” about her memories of being an exchange student from Sweden, experiencing her first Texas Thanksgiving.

Balazs alert

Here’s a book alert of special interest in Spokane: The University of Washington Press will soon publish “Harold Balazs,” by Harold Balazs “and friends.”

It promises to be a big, beautiful distillation of the life and work of our region’s most beloved artist. It will include 150 color reproductions.

Look for it in July.