Pulitzer Prize-winning ‘Guns’ becomes TV special
One popular book-club read is Jared Diamond’s Pulitzer Prize-winning “Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies.” It is, in fact, one of the American Booksellers Association’s recommended book-club choices. Which is why it’s interesting to note that Diamond’s book has become a public television special. “Guns, Germs, and Steel: A National Geographic Presentation” is scheduled to air July 11, 18 and 25 (10 p.m. on KSPS-7 in Spokane).
Diamond’s thesis is fairly simple for something that takes him 480 pages to explain: More than any other single factor, geography determines human success.
“History followed different courses for different peoples because of differences among peoples’ environments, not because of biological differences among peoples themselves,” he writes.
Diamond, a professor of geography and physiology at UCLA’s Geffen School of Medicine, narrates the National Geographic special, picking up where his book left off to explore the Africa of today.
For more information, go online to www.pbs.org/gunsgermssteel, beginning June 30.
All in the family
Gabe Goodman is a middle-school student from Greeley, Colo., who loves his brother Benjamin.
How do we know this? Because Goodman addressed a letter to Spokane young-adult author Terry Trueman saying so.
And that letter, which Goodman wrote as part of a Letters About Literature competition sponsored by the Library of Congress’ Center for the Book, is one of a handful of national winners for 2005.
Some 46 states plus the District of Columbia participate in the competition, which has been held since 1999. Entrants submit their letters in one of three categories: grades 4-6, 7-8 and 9-12.
Goodman’s letter explains how much Trueman’s novel “Stuck in Neutral” – which has as its narrator a 14-year-old boy severely stricken with cerebral palsy – helped him understand and better accept his own brother, who suffers from autism.
The letter was the national winner in the boys’ 7-8 category.
Washington had only one entrant on the state level: Seattle’s Jonathan Li, in the 7-8 category, who wrote to Michael Crichton about his novel “Prey.”
Both Oregon and Montana had three entrants, with Latricia Hampton of Junction City, Ore., winning the national girls’ 4-6 category. Idaho doesn’t participate in the program.
You can find more information about the Letters About Literature program at www.loc.gov/loc/cfbook/letters.html.
For writers only
Book publicist Susan Holton will hold a workshop from 7 to 9 p.m. Thursday at Auntie’s Bookstore in Spokane.
A former Spokane resident living in Vancouver, Wash., Holton has worked in public relations for more than 20 years.
Her book clients include Random House, Spokane author Linda Lawrence Hunt and historical novelist Jane Kirkpatrick.
The workshop will include pointers on how to get your book noticed. The cost is $25. To register, call (360) 737-0486.
• Sandpoint’s Lost Horse Press still is looking for students in grades 5 through 12 for its June 24-25 “Young Writers of the Lost Horse Writing Conference 2005,” which will focus on poetry, book arts and calligraphy.
The program is free to all Bonner County students, including home-schoolers.
A free reading by the conference instructors, including Carlos Reyes, Libby Wagner and M. Paula McMinn, will be June 25 at 4 p.m.
For information, call (208) 255-4410, e-mail losthorsepress@minspring.com or see www.losthorsepress.org.
Meet the writers
Dozens of Western writers will congregate at the Mirabeau Park Hotel, 1100 N. Sullivan Road, Spokane Valley, on Friday at 7 p.m. to sign copies of their books. The mass signing, which is part of the Western Writers Association convention, is sponsored by Valley Hastings. For information, call Larry O’Neal at 924-0667 or the hotel at 924-9000.
• Mitch Finley, organizer of Auntie’s Bookstore’s literary reading series, reports that Jane Kirkpatrick’s scheduled Wednesday reading has been canceled. No new date has been set.
Book talk
• Poetry Reading Group, 3 p.m. today, Auntie’s Bookstore, Main and Washington (838-0206).
• Auntie’s Book Group (“The Eyre Affair,” Jasper Fforde), 7 p.m. Tuesday, Auntie’s Bookstore.
The reader board
• Jack and Phyllis Varney (“Dark Star Descending”), 7:30 p.m. Monday, Auntie’s Bookstore.
• Hal Glatzer (“A Fugue in Hell’s Kitchen”), reading/performance, 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, Auntie’s Bookstore.
• Phil Condon (“Montana Surround”), reading, 7:30 p.m. Friday, Auntie’s Bookstore.
• Western Writers of America convention book signing, 7 p.m. Friday, Mirabeau Park Hotel Ballroom (924-9000).
• Patricia Campbell Kowal (“Stillpoint”), signing, 12:30 to 2 p.m. Saturday, Auntie’s Bookstore.