Xhenet Aliu, Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich, & Gabrielle Fuentes at Belmont Books

Belmont Books is thrilled to have three wonderful prose writers visiting for a special event.

In Xhenet Aliu‘s new novel Brass, a waitress at the Betsy Ross Diner, Elsie hopes her nickel-and-dime tips will add up to a new life. Then she meets Bashkim, who is at once both worldly and naive, a married man who left Albania to chase his dreams–and wound up working as a line cook in Waterbury, Connecticut. Back when the brass mills were still open, this bustling factory town drew one wave of immigrants after another.Wondering if the key to her future is unlocking the secrets of the past, Lulu decides to find out what exactly her mother has been hiding about the father she never knew. Told in equally gripping parallel narratives with biting wit and grace, Brass announces a fearless new voice with a timely, tender, and quintessentially American story. Aliu’s debut fiction collection, Domesticated Wild Things, and Other Stories, won the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Fiction. Her stories and essays have appeared in Glimmer Train, The Barcelona Review, American Short Fiction, and elsewhere.

Before Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich (The Fact of a Body) begins a summer job at a law firm in Louisiana, working to help defend men accused of murder, she thinks her position is clear. The child of two lawyers, she is staunchly anti-death penalty. But the moment convicted murderer Ricky Langley’s face flashes on the screen as she reviews old tapes–the moment she hears him speak of his crimes — she is overcome with the feeling of wanting him to die. Shocked by her reaction, she digs deeper and deeper into the case. Despite their vastly different circumstances, something in his story is unsettlingly, uncannily familiar. By examining the details of Ricky’s case, she is forced to face her own story, to unearth long-buried family secrets, and reckon with a past that colors her view of Ricky’s crime. A 2014 National Endowment for the Arts fellow, Marzano-Lesnevich has received a Rona Jaffe Award and has twice been a fellow at both MacDowell and Yaddo. Her essays appear in the New York Times, Oxford American, as well as many other publications.

In Gabrielle Fuentes‘s debut novel, we find ourselves in 1977 Spain. Military rule is over. Bootleg punk music oozes out of illegal basement bars, uprisings spread across towns, fascists fight anarchists for political control, and students perform protest art in the city center, rioting against the old government, the undecided new order, against the universities, against themselves…Mosca is an intelligent, disillusioned university student, whose younger brother is among the “disappeared,” taken by the police two years ago, now presumed dead. Spurred by the turmoil around them, Mosca and her friends commit an act that carries their rebellion too far and sends them spiraling out of their provincial hometown. But the further they go, the more Mosca believes her brother is alive and the more she is willing to do to find him. The Sleeping World is a “searing, beautifully written” (Cristina Garcia, author of Dreaming in Cuban) and daring novel about youth, freedom, and our most visceral need: to keep our loved ones safe. Gabrielle Lucille Fuentes is Cuban-American and grew up in Wisconsin.

CELESTE NG in conversation with ALEXANDRIA MARZANO-LESNEVICH

Harvard Book Store is thrilled to welcome back award-winning local author of Everything I Never Told You CELESTE NG for a discussion of her latest novel, Little Fires Everywhere. Celeste will be joined in conversation by The Fact of a Body author ALEXANDRIA MARZANO-LESNEVICH. This event is co-sponsored by 826 Boston.

This event is free; no tickets are required. Also, this event includes a book signing!

About Little Fires Everywhere
From the bestselling author of Everything I Never Told You, this riveting novel traces the intertwined fates of the picture-perfect Richardson family and the enigmatic mother and daughter who upend their lives.

In Shaker Heights, a placid, progressive suburb of Cleveland, everything is planned—from the layout of the winding roads, to the colors of the houses, to the successful lives its residents will go on to lead. And no one embodies this spirit more than Elena Richardson, whose guiding principle is playing by the rules.

Enter Mia Warren—an enigmatic artist and single mother—who arrives in this idyllic bubble with her teenaged daughter Pearl, and rents a house from the Richardsons. Soon Mia and Pearl become more than tenants: all four Richardson children are drawn to the mother-daughter pair. But Mia carries with her a mysterious past and a disregard for the status quo that threatens to upend this carefully ordered community.

When old family friends of the Richardsons attempt to adopt a Chinese-American baby, a custody battle erupts that dramatically divides the town—and puts Mia and Elena on opposing sides.  Suspicious of Mia and her motives, Elena is determined to uncover the secrets in Mia’s past. But her obsession will come at unexpected and devastating costs.

Little Fires Everywhere explores the weight of secrets, the nature of art and identity, and the ferocious pull of motherhood—and the danger of believing that following the rules can avert disaster.

 

Memoirists ALEXANDRIA MARZANO-LESNEVICH (The Fact of a Body) and MELISSA FEBOS (Abandon Me)

Join Papercuts J.P. and La Rana Rossa pizzeria for an evening with memoirists ALEXANDRIA MARZANO-LESNEVICH and MELISSA FEBOS.

LESNEVICH’s memoir The Fact of a Body captures when she began a summer job at a law firm in Louisiana, working on the retrial defense of death-row convicted murderer and child molester Ricky Langley.  She thought her position was clear. Shocked by her unexpected reaction to the case, she digs deeper and deeper, realizing that despite their vastly different circumstances, something in his story is unsettlingly, uncannily familiar.

In her dazzling Abandon Me, FEBOS captures the intense bonds of love and the need for connection—with family, lovers, and oneself.

This event is ticketed, and you can purchase tickets here.