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Bigfoot Regional Presents: Slam Olympics

ADX 417 SE 11th Ave, Portland, OR, United States

Ever wanted to witness slam poets play fun, wacky games in front of an entire audience? Well, then come on out for our first ever Slam Olympics!! Watch as three teams of brave slam poets go head-to-head in silly poetry challenges, such as: — Who can eat a chili pepper and keep their cool best while performing a poem? — Will the poet who pulls a piece of paper that reads "say your poem in a Midwestern accent" out of a hat be able to do so through their entire poem with conviction? — What objects will poets be given to write an entire poem on top of and then read to the audience? — Which songs will poets bring for the karaoke cover round???…

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$10 – $15

Kids’ Storytime With Elizabeth Rusch & Elizabeth Goss

Powell's City of Books 1005 W Burnside Street, Portland, OR, United States

Nothing is really something! What might be hidden in the space around things, and how is that space important? In art, this is known as negative space, but “nothing” can be thought of more broadly — as free time during the day or the space between people. When we allow ourselves a moment of nothingness, we make room for creativity and so much more. All about Nothing (Charlesbridge) – written by Elizabeth Rusch and illustrated by Elizabeth Goss — is an artful picture-book exploration of negative space and the beauty of nothingness. This mindful meditation encourages children to see the world differently. Preorder a Signed Edition

Free

Classical Up Close

Powell's City of Books 1005 W Burnside Street, Portland, OR, United States

Musicians from the Oregon Symphony return to Powell’s City of Books for a Pop-Up Performance as part of the 10th season of Classical Up Close — a festival of free chamber music concerts held all over the Portland Metro area. This is your chance to see classical music made in an intimate, casual environment with some of our region’s most talented musicians. Audience members are encouraged to ask the musicians questions and interact on a personal level in this unique concert environment. Everyone welcome!

Free

Neal Shusterman & Eric Elfman

Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing 3415 SW Cedar Hills Blvd, Beaverton, OR, United States

Eoin Colfer meets Rick Riordan — with a little Margaret Peterson Haddix sprinkled on top — in I Am the Walrus (Little, Brown Books for Young Readers), the first book in a hilarious new sci-fi series from authors Neal Shusterman and Eric Elfman. When 14-year-old Noah falls from the trees on his classmate Sahara, he doesn’t understand how, or why, he would have been up there. It’s just one more in a string of strange things happening to Noah lately. Like when he keels over and every muscle in his body freezes when confronted by bullies. And when he vanishes into the background at a moment he doesn’t want to be noticed. And when he unexpectedly blasts Sahara with a bird shriek while flapping his…

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Free

Matt Kracht

Powell's City of Books 1005 W Burnside Street, Portland, OR, United States

Guess what: bees are incredible. If you don't think so, you're wrong; but you're also in luck! Extreme bee enthusiast Matt Kracht — author of The Field Guide to Dumb Birds of North America and its sequel, The Field Guide to Dumb Birds of the Whole Stupid World — is here to set the record straight with his helpful guidebook to all things bees. With lighthearted watercolor and ink drawings, humorous quips, lists, and musings, OMFG, BEES! (Chronicle) will show you just how important these esteemed bee-list celebrities really are. (Hint: We can't live without them.) Delving into various bee topics, from distinguishing between bees and not bees (very crucial), to exploring the absolute wonder that is bee behavior (they do a coded dance directing…

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Free

The Break with Kaveh Akbar

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

In partnership with Alano Club of Portland, “The Break is a monthly virtual gathering of writers and artists lead by Kaveh Akbar, celebrating amongness, collaboration, and interdisciplinary creative experimentation. Though many of the activities and discussions orbit or are inflected by recovery themes (Akbar has been in active recovery for eight years), participants are not required to self-identify as being in recovery to participate.” Register at: https://www.portlandalano.org/the-break Kaveh Akbar Kaveh Akbar is an Iranian-American poet and scholar, and the author of Pilgrim Bell, published by Graywolf Press; Calling a Wolf a Wolf, published by Alice James Books in the US and Penguin Books in the UK; and the chapbook Portrait of the Alcoholic, published by Sibling Rivalry Press. In 2014, he founded the poetry interview…

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Free

Delve Readers Seminar: Romeo and Juliet

Literary Arts 925 SW Washington Street, Portland, OR, United States

The Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland is producing two Shakespeare plays this season, Romeo and Juliet and Twelfth Night—both perennial favorites. OSF tries to make these plays fresh for contemporary audiences with inventive or provocative interpretations. These seminars will help you think through how you might stage the dramas if you were the director. How do we take a written text and imagine it on stage? For live theater, directors must ensure that every line, every gesture, every costume, every set—in short, everything the audience will see and hear—conforms to a consistent interpretation of the play. These seminars are great preparation for your trip to Ashland, and will help you get much more out of the performances. If you read Romeo and Juliet in high…

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$125

Reading: Warren C. Easley: Fatal Flaw

Annie Bloom's Books 7834 SW Capitol Hwy, Portland, OR, United States

Annie Bloom's welcomes back Oregon author Warren C. Easley for an in-store reading from his latest Cal Claxton mystery novel, Fatal Flaw. Signed and personalized copies are available for order! Please, please, please include the name for personalization in the order notes; all orders without a name specified in the order notes will be signed only. About Fatal Flaw: It's winter in the Oregon wine country, and small-town lawyer Cal Claxton deserves a respite after his last grueling case. But just as the world learns about a threatening new virus variant, a woman named Willow Daniels shows up at his office, asking Cal to represent her in the settlement of her uncle's estate. The uncle's death was ruled a suicide, but Willow isn't buying it.…

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Free

Jake Bittle in Conversation With Monica Samayoa

Powell's City of Books 1005 W Burnside Street, Portland, OR, United States

When the subject of migration that will be caused by global climate change comes up in the media or in conversation, we often think of international refugees — those from foreign countries who will emigrate to the United States to escape disasters like rising shorelines and famine. What many people don’t realize though, is that climate migration is happening now — and within the borders of the United States. A human-centered narrative with national scope, Jake Bittle’s The Great Displacement (Simon & Schuster) is the first book to report on climate migration in the US. From half-drowned Louisiana to fire-scorched California, from the dried-up cotton fields of Arizona to the soaked watersheds of inland North Carolina, people are moving. In the last decade alone, the…

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Free

Jeff Boyd in Conversation With Dave Depper

Powell's City of Books 1005 W Burnside Street, Portland, OR, United States

Julian Strickland is seemingly the lone Black man in the hipster dreamland of Portland, Oregon. To his friends, he’s the coolest member of the scene: the soulful drummer from Chicago in an indie rock band that’s just about to break through. But to himself, he’s a sheltered Christian homeschool kid who used to write book reports on Leviticus. A virgin until the night of his marriage, divorced at 24, he’s still in disarray two years later — pretending to fit in, wondering if any of his relationships are real, estranged from his family, and struggling to reconcile his relationship with God. Then he meets Ida Blair, a Black painter at the start of a promising career. They begin a tentative relationship, and Ida seems to…

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Free
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