Photo via boringpittsburgh.com

A few quick updates.  Sadly, the South Side Joseph-Beth is closing.  We have some wonderful bookshops in the area such as Mystery Lovers and Caliban Books, but this was a great place for events, general book-buying, and a spacious and bright store.  It will be missed.  Near this time last year, the Squirrel Hill B&N closed.

On a brighter note–Pittsburgher  and Post-Gazette reporter Len Barcousky is doing an event for his new book, Remembering Pittsburgh, today at the Fire Escape CoffeeHouse.   Find out more in the Post-Gazette article.   They’ll be donating $2 to the Allegheny County Library Association’s Bookmobile Center for each copy sold.

On December 3, the Gist Street reading series has a great lineup: Holly Goddard Jones, author of Girl Trouble, and poet Jericho Brown.  If you haven’t been to Gist Street yet, please go.  Author John McNally says, “If you want your art without the pretension, your surroundings cozy without being claustrophobic, your hosts friendly rather than brooding, I urge you to check out the fiction and poetry readings at Gist Street.”

And Pittsburgh Arts & Lectures has two events coming up worth checking out: Andrew Ross Sorkin, the author of Too Big to Fail, on November 15, and Lee Child, author of 61 Hours on December 6.

Happy Fall!  There’s a spooky book event coming up this weekend, to get you ready for Halloween.  But first, check out Small Press Pittsburgh’s handy-dandy list of Pittsburgh bookstores organized by neighborhood and by type.  They’ve also made up a list of libraries including bus route info!

Today Pittsburgh author Heather Frazier will be reading at the Paranormal Pittsburgh Event at Barnes & Noble – South Hills Village, from her book Pittsburgh Ghosts: Steel City Supernatural between 12 and 3pm.  Her website is pretty awesome.  She’ll be joined by Jim Titus, author of Supernatural Pittsburgh and Its Suburbs.

Check in tomorrow for a Q&A with the author of Night of the Living Dead: Behind the Scenes of the Most Terrifying Zombie Movie Ever!

Pittsburgh’s own Alicia Kachmar has a new book out, called Witch Craft, filled with creepy-cute Halloween-themed crafts.  Books n’at spoke with Alicia about her book and the burgh.

You can find out more about Alicia on her website, her blog, and her etsy page, where she has more information and photos of all her adorable and creative projects.

If you like this book, here’s the Facebook fan page for it, and it’s in stores now.

Q&A with Alicia:

Alicia Kachmar

What inspired you and your co-editor to create this book?  What was the process like?

Well, the book was my co-editor’s idea, so props to Margaret McGuire, a full-time editor at Quirk Books. She was about halfway done with compiling the crafts/crafters by the time I came on board. She asked me over Etsy to contribute a crochet project, but after displaying my crafty know-how over email, she asked me to be the co-editor! I then searched for the rest of the projects and contributed a few of my own. For someone who has not worked in publishing, (other than contributing a project to the Photojojo book), I learned as I went along, but overall it was really fun to work with so many talented people and…feel like I was really utilizing my degree in English!

Read more…

We’ve got some great Halloween reads with Pittsburgh connections coming to the site in the next couple of weeks.  We got in the spooky spirit after reading this excellent piece on Being Dead in Pittsburgh, a thoughtful essay on the many cemeteries that have been built over in our city.  The writer also includes this crazy photo of a turkey skeleton up in a tree on the Montour trail.

Now, on to sunnier topics…

Mt. Lebanon author Mitchell James Kaplan’s book, By Fire, By Water, has been chosen for Philadelphia’s “One Book, One Jewish Community” program.  (via The Jewish Exponent)

Guiding Light actress and author Tina Sloan is bringing her one-woman show to Pittsburgh on Monday, and she’s got a new book out called Changing Shoes, about aging with style.  Here’s a short video of her talking about the book:

Tina Sloan talks about \”Changing Shoes\”

Mary Karr, author of Lit, The Liars Club, and Cherry was in town, giving a Drue Heinz lecture.  She also met with inmates of the Allegheny County Jail to discuss writing.  Check out the great interview with her in the Post-Gazette.

And congrats to Kevin S–he’s won our giveaway of a copy of Turn Left at the Trojan Horse by Brad Herzog!

Some quick updates on the what’s going on in the Pittsburgh book world this month:

The New Yinzer has a great lineup on October 20th for their TNY Presents series.

There’s a book event for kids on October 8, with a reading and signing of Numbers Elementary by local author Mick Shuck (via Glitzburgh)

Check out Poetz.com– there’s an amazing calendar of literary events filling almost every day in October.

Mark Kurlansky, author of bestselling books such as Salt, will be speaking on October 5 at Pitt.

• Pittsburgh author Gary Link’s historical novels set in Pittsburgh are written up in the Examiner.
• The Tribune-Review reports that local author Kathryn Haines’ fourth book is coming out, and she’ll be doing an event at Mystery Lovers Bookshop 6/11.
• Michiko Kakutani gives Nathaniel Philbrick a mostly positive review in The New York Times.
• The Lost Cyclist is a new book about Pittsburgher Frank Lenz, who disappeared while attempting to bike around the world.
• And.. you can follow Books n’at on Twitter!

Pittsburgh Authors in the News:

Pittsburgh’s own Nathaniel Philbrick has written a review of Philip Hoare’s The Whale in this week’s New York Times Book Review.  Philbrick writes acclaimed historical nonfiction, and his parents lived in Point Breeze.  We’ll be talking more about Philbrick, he’s a great writer and a really nice guy.

Michael Chabon has a funny, self-deprecating interview in the Wall Street Journal, that focuses on the literary life in San Francisco.  I’d argue that ours is just as great.