Join us tomorrow, Wednesday, July 23 at 3 pm for a special summer storytelling event for children of all ages. Author and illustrator Laura Vila will read her new book, Building Manhattan, and lead a creative interactive art activity for kids.

Building Manhattan is a vividly illustrated picture book about the history of the many cultures who came to the island of Manhattan and what they built. It encompasses Manhattan’s rich history from its conception as an island of natural beauty with diverse wildlife, to its contemporary diversity of cultures and architecture. Illustrated with vivid and detailed paintings, each page is layered with history that is revealed though rich storytelling.

In writing and illustrating Manhattan’s rich history, it was Laura’s goal to make history both exciting and accessible to young children. Along with the book she has created enrichment materials with educational emphasis focused on helping teach children new ways to relate history to their own lives.

“The art of making children’s books is not only one of words and pictures, it is the art of making books into experiences with a life of their own inside a child’s mind.”

- L. Vila

Is the Conservative Era Over?

Dissent Magazine will host a discussion at Book Culture next Tuesday night, July 22 at 7 pm.

With the November election, many are forecasting that the conservative era might finally be coming to an end. Dissent editor Michael Walzer will speak with Joshua Freeman, David Greenberg and Suzanne Nossel in a discussion on the politics, culture, and ideas of the conservative movement that put Nixon, Ford, Reagan, and two Bushes in power.

Is this unraveling a failure of the conservative imagination as well as of its movement’s organizing powers? Are we facing an era of moderate centrism and bipartisanship? Or will the end of conservative politics usher in an era of divisive radicalism?

Come and join in the conversation.

We’ve joined the photo frenzy and created a Flickr account, which will serve as a handy spot for showcasing our event photos. Check out our sets to see if your favorite authors have been to Book Culture recently.

We’re spending the summer catching up on some social networking fun, so it’s probably a good time to mention that you can also find us on GoodReads, LibraryThing and Yelp, where we would graciously applaud any positive reviews of our shop that you might feel like writing up?!

Time Out New York Kids included a nice write-up about our children’s section in their July issue. From the article:

The addition of carpeting, gentle light and a cozy children’s corner has softened the edge, but Book Culture remains committed to showcasing works that might receive less attention elsewhere. You’ll find Carle and Wise Brown on the kid-height displays, but you’ll also find titles like Silent Music: A Story of Baghdad by James Rumford and The Lonesome Puppy by Yoshitomo Nara.

Check out the full piece to see a photo of our owner Chris and his adorable twin daughters - frequent shoppers and readers in our kid’s nook!

This is a good time to mention that we have a summer kid’s event coming up on Wednesday, July 23 at 3 pm with Laura Vila, the author of Building Manhattan. Click here for all the details.

We’ve fallen behind on updating this blog, and hope to change that in the coming weeks. We’ll be posting photos from our spring events, and sharing news about upcoming summer happenings, so stay tuned!

In the meantime, we’ve also failed to mention that we are IndieBound! Last month the American Booksellers Association announced a new initiative that honors and supports local businesses, especially community bookstores throughout the nation that celebrate free-thinking and unique retailers.

We’ve got the Declaration of IndieBound up in our store and these Ten Reasons to Shop Local on our website. You can learn more about the IndieBound mission here. In the coming months, we’ll share additional news about this initiative , as well as an alliance with a similar spirit being created by independent booksellers in NYC.

This July 4th Weekend, remember to celebrate and support all your local independent retailers!

We’ve got a great line up of events this month at Book Culture, starting tonight with Steven Wax, author of Kafka Comes to America. Steven was on Leonard Lopate yesterday, you can search the archives and listen here.

Also this week will be readings and discussions with Tom Engelhardt (The World According to Tom Dispatch) and Elizabeth Pisani (Wisdom of Whores). And Nina Jaffe returns on Sunday for another children’s storytime event, this one celebrating drum culture around the world. Bring Dad along for some Father’s Day fun for the entire family!

Later this month we are also excited about hosting two memoir events with three New York-based female writers, all of whom have taught at our favorite neighborhood university: Judith Matloff will launch her book Home Girl on June 24th and the next night, June 25th, authors Kelly McMasters and Honor Moore will read from and discuss their recently released memoirs.

Come join us for some of these upcoming events!

(It’s air conditioned in here…hope to see you soon!)

Last night Saree Makdisi read from and discussed his new book, Palestine Inside Out: An Everyday Occupation. We had a few minutes before the event to ask Saree about what he is reading these days.

What are you currently reading?

Thomas Malthus’ An Essay on the Principle of Population and political writings of the poet Robert Southey. I’m also reading Blackwater: The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army.

What are you looking forward to reading?

The Hakawati by Rabih Alameddine.

What are writers or books that you count among your favorites?

For poetry, always Blake. And these days the novel I’m recommending to everyone is Caleb Williams:Things as They Are by William Godwin.

A perfect spring/summer canvas tote bag for the city or the beach — Now available in three colors, for only $5.95 each!

Shopping local at Book Culture saves you money and provides hometown advantages for the entire community! We hope to see you in the store this weekend!

Our events season slows down in the late spring and summer, but we do still have several on tap for May, June and possibly July. Our May events include tonight’s conversation with John T. Hamilton and Avital Ronell, who will be discussing Hamilton’s new book: Music, Madness and the Unworking of Language.

Also this week: on Thursday, Michael I. Meyerson will discuss his new release, Liberty’s Blueprint: How Madison and Hamilton Wrote the Federalist Papers, Defined the Constitution and Made Democracy Safe for the World. And on Sunday afternoon, something for the kids! Nina Jaffe returns with another storytelling session, this time highlighting The Golden Flower: A Taino Myth from Puerto Rico, which we have available for sale in both English and Spanish. Bring the whole family and celebrate Mother’s Day at this participatory cultural event.

Another event we are excited about hosting is Saree Makdisi at the end of the month, on May 29. He will be reading from and discussing his new book, Palestine Inside Out.

Please see our events page and children’s event page for more details. And mark your calenders for Book Culture’s biggest May Sale ever: May 16, 17 and 18th - almost everything in the store will be 20% off*!!

(*Excludes standard exceptions: periodicals, text editions, course adoptions.)