Event alert: Stefanie Chambers, Courtney Yasmineh, Lawrence D'Attilio, plus YA favorites Brittany Cavallaro and Mackenzi Lee

The authors are coming, the authors are coming! Also pizza.

Monday, June 26, 7 pm, at Boswell:
Stefanie Chambers, author of Somalis in the Twin Cities and Columbus: Immigrant Incorporation in New Destinations.

In the early 1990s, Somali refugees arrived in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota. Later in the decade, an additional influx of immigrants arrived in Columbus, Ohio. These refugees found low-skill jobs in warehouses and food processing plants and struggled as social “outsiders,” often facing discrimination based on their religious traditions, dress, and the misconception that they are terrorists. The immigrant youth also lacked access to quality educational opportunities.

Stefanie Chambers provides a cogent analysis of these refugees in Midwestern cities where new immigrant communities are growing. Her comparative study uses qualitative and quantitative data to assess the political, economic, and social variations between these urban areas. Chambers examines how culture and history influenced the incorporation of Somali immigrants in the U.S. and recommends policy changes that can advance rather than impede incorporation.

Stefanie Chambers is the Charles A. Dana Research Associate Professor of Political Science at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut. She is the author of Mayors and Schools: Minority Voices and Democratic Tensions in Urban Education.

Tuesday, June 27, 7 pm, at Boswell:
Courtney Yasmineh, author of A Girl Called Sidney: The Coldest Place.

After first spiriting her mother away and then running away herself to the family’s remote Northwoods cabin in Minnesota, Sidney challenges herself to survive alone and find her voice over the course of a brutal winter.

The narrative takes the reader on a dark and moody ride back and forth in both time and place, between Chicago and a tiny rural town. Getting inside Sidney’s head as she tries to make sense of a cast of characters – family, hangers-on, and old and new friends – the novel examines the roots of their dysfunction while Sidney plots the future and works to make real her pursuit of music.

Appealing to readers of women rocker bios and contemporary fiction of the heartland the story back to a distinct time and looks with a fresh perspective on the experiences of a young woman that will resonate with many adults.

Courtney Yasmineh is a rock musician and singer-songwriter. She has several albums and thousands of road-gig miles to her credit. She lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Wednesday, June 28, 7 pm, at Boswell:
Lawrence D’Attilio, author of The Soul of Vietnam: Photographs and Stories.

The book’s images mitigate the decadent ideas many people have about Vietnam. Today it is less a place of rice fields, disenfranchised peasants, and backwards economics. It also is not a country of overwhelming social conditioning determined by a paternalistic government. It helps to know it is the world’s thirteenth largest population and among the fastest expanding economies. It is endless beautiful sand beaches, very high mountains, a greatly expanded middle class, and a culture that beckons you to go there and stay for a long time.

Each image in the book is a contribution to a fresh understanding of Vietnam. The five-fold increase in population since 1975 can be considered one of history’s greatest human accomplishments.

Lawrence ‘Larry’ D’Attilio obtained a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from the University of Louisville. Larry has taught photography since 1971 and currently teaches one on one and at workshops he organizes in the U.S and Vietnam.

Thursday, June 29, 7 pm, at Boswell:
YA Pizza Party with Mackenzi Lee, author of The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue and Brittany Cavallaro, author of The Last of August.

It's a YA pizza party featuring two authors and Pizza Man Pizza. In addition to pizza, we'll be offering a free YA galley to each attendee. We'll let you choose a second galley if you buy a book from one of our authors and you'll get a third if you buy a book from each author:

About The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue:

Henry "Monty" Montague doesn't care that his roguish passions are far from suitable for the gentleman he was born to be. But as Monty embarks on his grand tour of Europe, his quests for pleasure and vice are in danger of coming to an end. Not only does his father expect him to take over the family's estate upon his return, but Monty is also nursing an impossible crush on his best friend and traveling companion, Percy. The Gentleman’s Guide to Vice and Virtue is a hilarious and swashbuckling stand-alone teen historical fiction novel.

About The Last of August:

In the follow up to the acclaimed A Study in Charlotte, Jamie Watson and Charlotte Holmes are in a chase across Europe to untangle a web of shocking truths about the Holmes and Moriarty families. So begins a dangerous race through the gritty underground scene in Berlin and glittering art houses in Prague, where Holmes and Watson discover a complicated case that may change everything they know about their families, themselves, and each other.

Mackenzi Lee holds a BA in History and a MFA from Simmons College in writing for children and young adults. Her short fiction and nonfiction has appeared in Atlas Obscura, Crixeo, and The Newport Review. Her debut novel, The Monstrous Thing, won the PEN-New England Susan P. Bloom Children’s Book Discovery Award. She is also a bookseller at Trident in Boston.

Brittany Cavallaro is a poet, fiction writer, and old-school Sherlockian. She is the author of the poetry collection Girl-King and is the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship. She earned her BA in literature from Middlebury College and her MFA in poetry from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. You may know her from her days at the PhD program of UWM's Creative Writing Program. After this, we're talking a Summerfest break. We'll be back with programming in mid-July.