The Writers’ League of Texas presents
The Bookish Brunch
The Bookish Brunch
Honoring Texas Book Festival Authors
Sarah Bird, Bill Bishop, Bill & Cheryl Jamison, and Marion Winik
And the 2008 Violet Crown and Teddy Award Winners
Sarah Bird, Bill Bishop, Bill & Cheryl Jamison, and Marion Winik
And the 2008 Violet Crown and Teddy Award Winners
10 a.m. to noon Sunday, November 2 At the home of Michele Kay & Robert Schultz in Austin $50 per person (advance reservations required) Signed books by authors will be available at the event. Proceeds benefit the Writers’ League of Texas Reservations may be made online. The Writers’ League of Texas is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organizations. All deductions are tax-deductible as allowable by law. Fair-market value of the brunch is $25 per person. |
Bishop, in his engrossing book The Big Sort: Why the Clustering of Like-Minded America Is Tearing Us Apart, argues that Americans are becoming increasingly polarized – not just by red or blue state, but separated down to the community level. Originally begun as a series of articles for the Austin American-Statesman that Bishop wrote with Robert Cushing, a retired sociologist and statistician from the University of Texas, The Big Sort uses a rich and diverse foundation of information to build its compelling conclusion. Eye-opening, thought-provoking, and entertaining, The Big Sort is “essential reading for activists, poli-sci types, journalists and trend watchers,” writes Kirkus, ina starred review. The book was also recently endorsed by former President Bill Clinton. |
Around the World in 80 Dinners Award-winning cookbook authors and travel writers, the Jamisons harness their decades of travel and food knowledge and take readers along on their epic gastronomic journey across the globe in Around the World in 80 Dinners: The Ultimate Culinary Adventure. After four years of painstaking planning and cashing in hundreds of thousands of frequent flier miles, they visit 10 countries, from Bali to Brazil, in over 13 weeks, sampling each exotic locale’s regional cuisine. Being expert globetrotters, they provide invaluable travel tips, kindly letting readers in on what they did to make their trip possible, from their methods for getting the best airfare and hotel deals to the precautions that any smart international traveler should take. |
Since First Comes Love, her best-selling memoir of her first marriage, Marion Winik has been chronicling both life and death – as a mother, as a daughter, as a woman. Through her segments on NPR’s All Things Considered and her monthly column in Ladies Home Journal, millions have found inspiration and companionship in her candor, humor, and resilience. In The Glen Rock Book of the Dead, Winik re-examines her losses and comes up with something new. |
| How Perfect is That In her seventh novel, How Perfect Is That, Bird turns her vitriolic humor on the blue bloods of Austin high society. The novel’s protagonist, Blythe Young, is a fallen socialite who goes to wild extremes to retain her former status – including dodging IRS heavies and drugging a gaggle of society ladies to blur any memory of the Sam’s Club taquitos she served them. Janet Finch, author of White Oleander, describes Bird’s newest work as “a fried Twinkie of a book – crunchily witty, creamy-hearted and shockingly delicious.” Like her protagonist, Bird is no stranger to change and adaptation. She spent her childhood in a military family moving from base to base, including stints in Japan. Then, in her 20’s, she jumped ship to Europe for a year of soul-searching after a particularly painful break-up. With her demons behind her, she moved to Austin in 1973 to attend graduate school and, despite her globe-trotting past, has never left. In addition to writing other such celebrated novels as The Flamenco Academy and The Yokota Officers Club, Bird is also a long-time contributor and columnist for Texas Monthly. She lives with her husband, George, and her teen-aged son, Gabriel, in Austin. |
| The Writers’ League of Texas partially funded by the City of Austin, Texas Commission on the Arts, and National Endowment for the Arts. Our members also contribute a great deal of time and money to help us achieve our mission. |
