BLACKWELL EVENTS & EXHIBITIONS

Forthcoming events to be announced. Please contact Blackwell, 89 Park St, Bristol for more details.

Make murder your business and join us at our annual crime fiction extravaganza for an evening free from speeches and readings - a great chance to meet both debut and established crime writers including:

Tony Black, Chelsea Cain, Cassandra Clark, Barbara Cleverly, Natasha Cooper, R. S. Downie, Philip Gooden, Dolores Gordon-Smith, Ian Gosling, Veronica Heley, David Hewson, Suzette Hill, Deryn Lake, Patrick Lennon, R. N. Morris, The Mulgray Twins, Stuart Pawson, Ann Purser, Mike Ripley, Zoe Sharp, Nicola Upson & many more.

This is a ticketed event ONLY. Tickets £5.00, (£2.00 redeemable against any purchase on the evening) can be obtained from the Ground Floor Payment Desk at Heffers Bookshop, 20 Trinity Street, Cambridge or by contacting Richard Reynolds on 01223 568532 or email: literature@heffers.co.uk.

Come and meet author Irvine Welsh who will be talking about his new book Crime at Heffers Bookshop, 20 Trinity Street, Cambridge on Wednesday 16th July.

From the author of Trainspotting and Porno, Crime is an energetic, thrilling novel about innocence and absolute evil.

For more information and ticket sales, please telephone 01223 568568.

June: Engleby by Sebastian Faulks.
July: The Sea Lady by Margaret Drabble.

If you would like to join our Crimecrackers Reading Group, please contact Richard Reynolds in the Literature Department, Heffers Bookshop, 20 Trinity Street, Cambridge:
Telephone: 01223 568521.
Email: literature@heffers.co.uk

To join the reading group, please contact Katie James on 01223 568522 or email: general@heffers.co.uk.

Forthcoming events to be announced. Please contact Cardiff University Union, Senghennydd Road, Cardiff for more details.

Forthcoming events to be announced. Please contact 53-62 South Bridge Edinburgh for more details.

Irish Writers in London Summer School 2008

Special guest at this year's summer school will be the poet and critic Tom Paulin. Other writers appearing include the playwright Janet Behan (niece of Brendan), poet Martina Evans, crime-writer Paul Charles and novelist Deirdre Shanahan.

First established in 1996, the summer school runs for two nights per week for six weeks at London Metropolitan University in Holloway and aims to provide an informal but informative setting for students wishing to study Irish literature over the summer. The course consists of a mixture of lectures, seminars, readings and cultural activities. Each week an established Irish writer comes to read and speak about their work to the students. Two evenings prior to this, students read, discuss and analyse extracts of the writer's work with the course tutor

N.B. This is not a creative writing course. However, it will complement such a course of study at London Metropolitan University or elsewhere. No prior qualifications are required to attend.

Times: 6.00pm until 8.30pm: Tuesdays and Thursdays from June 12 - July 18 (with the first session on a Thursday and final session on a Friday)

Fees: Credit bearing: £190 (15 credits) Non-credit: £110; Concessionary: £85

To enroll: www.londonmet.ac.uk/halshortcourses - Email: halshortcourses@londonmet.ac.uk - Tel: 020 7133 4398

For further course information: http://www.londonmet.ac.uk/irishstudiescentre/courses/writers - Email Tony Murray at t.murray@londonmet.ac.uk

The Irish Writers in London Summer School is supported by the Garnett Foundation.

Marie Phillips will be talking about her book - new in paperback - Gods Behaving Badly at Blackwell Bookshop, 48-51 Broad Street, Oxford.

Being immortal isn't all it's cracked up to be. Life's hard for a Greek god in the 21st century: nobody believes in you any more, even your own family doesn't respect you, and you're stuck in a dilapidated hovel in north London with too many siblings and not enough hot water. But for Artemis (goddess of hunting, professional dog walker), Aphrodite (goddess of beauty, telephone sex operator) and Apollo (god of the sun, TV psychic) there's no way out...Until a meek cleaner and her would-be boyfriend come into their lives, and turn the world literally upside down. "Gods Behaving Badly" is that rare thing, a charming, funny, utterly original first novel that satisfies the head and the heart.

Marie Phillips was born in London in 1976. She studied anthropology and documentary making, and worked as a TV researcher for several years. More recently she has worked as an independent bookseller whilst writing Gods Behaving Badly.

This event is free, however participants must have a ticket. To obtain a ticket or for further information, please visit the Customer Service Department on the Second Floor, Blackwell Bookshop, 48-51 Broad Street, Oxford. Alternatively, please telephone 01865 333623.

Here's an essential date for your diary: Saturday 9th August is the day of our annual Blackwell Summer Family Day. This promises to be a wonderful day of fun and enjoyment for the whole family, all centred around The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.

There'll be theatrical and musical entertainment, children's activities, competitions and other attractions throughout the day. Watch this space for further exciting information!

Do you like talking about books? Then join Books on the Broad Reading Group, winner of the Penguin / Orange Book Group of the year!

Future Choice include:

July 2008 Solaris by Stanislaw Lem
Science Fiction classic. A psychologist arrives at a research space station called Prometheus, his mission to ascertain whether research into the mysterious planet of Solaris should be terminated. He finds Prometheus all but deserted, its straggling crew seemingly haunted by hallucinations of figures from their pasts.

August 2008 The Grass is Singing by Doris Lessing
The first novel from one on the world's greatest living writers. Set in South Africa under white rule, this is both a riveting chronicle of human disintegration and a beautifully understated social critique. Mary Turner is a self-confident, independent young woman who becomes the depressed, frustrated wife of an ineffectual, unsuccessful farmer. Little by little the ennui of years on the farm work their slow poison, and Mary's despair progresses until the fateful arrival of an enigmatic and virile black servant, Moses. Locked in anguish, Mary and Moses - master and slave - are trapped in a web of mounting attraction and repulsion.

September 2008 Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
Conrad's Heart of Darkness is a profound exploration into the human subconscious twinned with a terrifying portrayal of the dangers of imperialism. Seaman Marlow tells of his journey to the heart of the Belgian Congo in search of the elusive Mr Kurtz. Away from civilisation as he knows it, he comes to reassess not only his own values, but also those of nature and of society. For in this heart of darkness, it is the terrifying face of human savagery that becomes most visible. The novel which inspired (loosely) the magnificent film, 'Apocalypse Now'.

October 2008 Black Swan Green by David Mitchell
The fourth novel from David ('Cloud Atlas', 'Number 9 Dream') Mitchell. It's a dank January in the Worcestershire village of Black Swan Green and thirteen-year-old Jason Taylor, covert stammerer and reluctant poet, anticipates a stultifying year in the deadest village on Earth. But Jason hasn't reckoned with a junta of bullies, simmering family discord, the Falklands War, an exotic Belgian emigre, a threatened gypsy invasion and the caprices of those mysterious entities known as girls.

For further information, please contact either Lydia or Kathryn:
1. Lydia: (01865) 333668; email law.ox@blackwell.co.uk
2. Kate: kathryn.d.wilson@st-annes.oxon.org

Our meetings take place on the first Monday of every month from 6.30pm to 8pm in Caffe Nero on the first floor of Blackwell Bookshop, 50 Broad Street, Oxford.

We offer a number of Walking Tours of Oxford led by our knowledgeable and experienced Walking Tour guide

The Literary Tour of Oxford

Every Tuesday at 2pm and Thursday at 11.30am

An informative way of seeing Oxford, the University and its colleges, this exclusive tour shows where famous writers such as Dorothy L Sayers, Stephen Hawking, William Golding, Graham Greene, Alan Bennett, Percy Bysshe Shelley, T.E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia) and Lewis Carroll lived and studied.

Both tours include a visit to the Cross Inn where William Shakespeare stayed whilst he visited Oxford. These rooms feature stunning 16th Century cloth paintings in a building that is older than Oxford University itself. Please note: stairs to climb. The 'Inklings' Tour

Wednesdays at 11.45am

This essential tour for 'Inklings' enthusiasts visits locations in the city that inspired J.R.R. Tolkien's 'Lord of the Rings'. The tour also visits places where Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Nevill Coghill, Charles Williams and other famous members of the 'Inklings' group lived and worked.

The tour includes a visit to their famous old haunt 'The Eagle and Child' public house!

The Town and Gown Tour

Fridays at 2pm

This new tour explores the history of the relationship between Oxford University and the town (now city) of Oxford. See and hear about the places where the town and gown riots took place, including the infamous and very bloody outbreak of violence on St. Scholastica’s Day (10th February) in 1354 (or 1355!) at the Swyndlestock Tavern near the Carfax Tower.

Prices:
£6.50 Adults
£6 over 55s and students
£4 children

All tours are 1 hour 30 minutes duration

All participants receive a free £2 voucher to spend at Blackwell Bookshop

For bookings and enquiries:
Telephone 01865 333606 / e-mail oxford@blackwell.co.uk
Group bookings welcome

Tours conducted Tuesday 27th May – Friday 24th October (inclusive)

Look out for our famous Christmas Walking Tours in December! (Telephone or e-mail us for further details).

Come and meet Jill Liddington who will be at Blackwell's University Bookshop Hallam talking about and signing copies of her book Rebel Girls.

80 years ago this summer all women finally won the right to the vote and Rebel Girls tracks this story of forgotten suffragettes across the north of England. Their horse drawn caravan set off from Whitby harbour in summer 1908 and took their message out to the remotest Yorkshire Dales to win Edwardian hearts and minds.

This is a free event and no ticket is required. For further information, please contact Blackwell's University Bookshop Hallam.