Library Foundation

Talk of the Stacks is a reading series exploring contemporary literature and culture held at the Minneapolis Central Library in downtown Minneapolis (Pohlad Hall, 300 Nicollet Mall). Programs are free and open to the public. Seating is first come, first served. Programs begin at 7 PM. Doors open at 6:15 PM.

Heather McElhatton: Million Little Mistakes

Heather McElhatton’s wildly successful do-over novel, Pretty Little Mistakes, has been translated into multiple languages and optioned by NBC to be made into a television series. Now back with another “Choose Your Own Adventure” book, Million Little Mistakes, McElhatton asks the question: If you won $22 million in the lottery, what would you do with the money? McElhatton is a writer and independent producer for Public Radio International. Her commentaries and stories have been heard nationally on This American Life, Marketplace, Weekend America, Sound Money, and The Savvy Traveler. She has also appeared on Ira Glass’s very first episode of the television version of This American Life.

In celebration of the launch of this highly-anticipated sequel, famed humorist and storyteller Kevin Kling will introduce the program. Music will accompany the reading.

Antonya Nelson: Bound

Antonya Nelson is the award-winning author of nine books of fiction, including Nothing Right, Talking in Bed, Nobody’s Girl, and Living to Tell. Nelson’s work has appeared in the New Yorker, Esquire, Harper’s, Redbook, The Best American Short Stories, and elsewhere. She has received a Guggenheim Fellowship, an NEA Grant, and recently, the United States Artists Simon Fellowship. Nelson is known for her razor-sharp depictions of contemporary family life in all of its sometimes sad, sometimes hilarious complexity. Bound, her much anticipated first novel in over a decade, tells the story of tangled lives, set in a Wichita, riveted by the reemergence of the city’s real-world “BTK” serial killer. She is married to the writer Robert Boswell and holds the Cullen Chair in Creative Writing at the University of Houston.

Joseph O’Neill: Blood-Dark Track

Joseph O’Neill was born in Ireland, raised in Holland, has a law degree from Cambridge University, and now lives in New York. A regular contributor to The Atlantic Monthly, he is the author of This Is the Life, The Breezes, and Netherland, which received the 2009 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction. This international author will present a new edition of Blood-Dark Track, a memoir about his journey to know his grandfathers: one an IRA soldier, the other an alleged Axis spy from Turkey, both imprisoned in WWII. Blood-Dark Track, first published in the U.K. by Granta Books, is reprinted by Vintage with a new preface in which O’Neill discusses the book in the context of Netherland and addresses issues of politics and ethnicity.

Ian Frazier: Travels in Siberia

Writer and humorist Ian Frazier is the critically-accclaimed author of Great Plains, On the Rez, and Dating Your Mom, among other works. His latest book, Travels in Siberia, is the culmination of ten years of research and travel to the mythical region of Siberia. More than just a historical travelogue, Travels in Siberia is an account of Russia since the end of the Soviet Union and a personal and often humorous reflection on this vast country – exploring the geography, the people, the history, the weather, the bugs, and the unexpected. Frequent contributor to The New Yorker, Frazier lives in New Jersey with his wife and children.

NBCC Reads:
A Literary Showcase

The National Book Critics Circle (NBCC), consisting of over 600 book reviewers, presents annual awards for the best books in different genres. This special edition of Talk of the Stacks will feature three diverse and talented authors, all of whom were recognized this year by the prestigious NBCC awards committee. Eula Biss won the NBCC Award for criticism for No Man's Land: American Essays; Stephen Burt was a finalist in the criticism category for Close Calls with Nonsense: Reading New Poetry; and Marlon James was a finalist in the fiction category for The Book of Night Women. Jeffrey Shotts, senior editor at Graywolf Press and editor of Biss and Burt’s respective books, will moderate.

Previous Programs

Click on the icon for an audio recording of the corresponding program.