There’s a whole lot going on tonight.

Abigail Carter is up at Third Place Books. She’s the author of a book called The Alchemy of Loss, which is about her experiences as a 9/11 widow. We’ll have to see if the 9/11 Truth people decide to show up.

At Elliott Bay Book Company, Michael Daley and Tim McNulty will read. Daley has just written his second poetry collection in 25 years. McNulty writes both poetry and prose.

Up at the University Book Store, Greg Melville reads from Greasy Rider, which is about his cross-country road trip in a vegetable-oil powered car. I have gotten many copies of this book, and I just can’t bring myself to care. Maybe you do. That’s why you should go to the University Book Store.

But speaking of road trips, the Hugo House is hosting an event tonight called Road Trip. I don’t think it has any relation to the surprisingly good 2001 movie of the same name, but it does have Matt Ruff, who is a Seattle-area treasure, and Aimee Bender, who is one of my all-time favorites. There is also a poet named Marie Howe, and a musician named Laurie Katherine Carlsson. I don’t know anything about them, but they could be the worst performers in the world and Bender and Ruff would still make this worth attending. All will be reading/performing new work on the theme of road trips.

Here is an interview I just recently did with Aimee Bender. A snippet:

An Invisible Sign of My Own felt different than your short stories—it felt more rooted in reality in some certain way. Did the writing of the novel affect the story that you told?

Yes—I had a more magical character who was a whittler who carved his fingers into flowers. He may end up in a short story someday but he didn’t fit the tone of the novel so I had to cut him, which was ultimately a relief. But he hung around in many drafts like a sore thumb, um, literally. I remember thinking with Invisible Sign that I wanted it all to be possible—not quite reality, but not full-blown magic either.

Check out the full interview here.

The full readings calendar, including the next week or so, is here.