Skylight Books Author Reading Series

These Dreams of You (Europa Editions)

We're thrilled to present Steve Erickson, author of Zeroville and editor of the literary journal Black Clock, who will read and sign his new novel These Dreams of You.

"In its gorgeous, vivid prose and its acutely sensitive soul, These Dreams of You shows us just what a novel can still do in our own crazy times." --Boston Globe

"Erickson's seemingly fractured novel turns out to be something else -- the novel as fractal, a series of endless, astounding tessellations." --The New York Times Book Review

"Over his entire career Erickson has challenged readers with a fiercely intelligent and surprisingly sensual brand of American surrealism." --The Washington Post

Steve Erickson is the author of eight previous novels, including Zeroville, which was named one of the best novels of the year by Newsweek, the Washington Post Book World, and the Los Angeles Times Book Review, and noted as one of five favorite novels in a winter 2008 National Book Critics Circle poll. He also has written two books about American politics and popular culture, Leap Year and American Nomad.  Erickson has written for Esquire, Rolling Stone, Bookforum, Frieze, Conjunctions, Salon, the L.A. Weekly, the New York Times Magazine and other publications and journals, and his work has been widely anthologized. Currently he is the film critic for the Los Angeles Magazine and the editor of the literary journal Black Clock, which is published by the California Institute of the Arts where he teaches in the MFA Writing Program. Erickson has received a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts grant and a fellowship from John Simon Guggenheim Foundation. In 2010 he was been nominated for a National Magazine Award for criticism and received one of seven awards in literature given by the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

THIS EVENT WAS RECORDED LIVE AT SKYLIGHT BOOKS February 22, 2012.

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When the Killing's Done (Penguin)

 Acclaimed novelist T.C. Boyle (The Women) returns to Skylight to read and sign this new paperback edition of his latest novel, When the Killing's Done, a fictional take on real-life battle between the National Park Service and animal welfare activists over invasive species in the Channel Islands. With vividly drawn characters and heart-pounding plot twists, Boyle asks an important question: When it comes to restoring delicate ecosystems, are the lives of some animals worth more than those of others?

"He writes lyrically, beautifully — about the ocean, the land, about California history and its pitfalls and perils.... Boyle makes us laugh and wonder at his dazzling gifts but his comedy is a dark business." --Los Angeles Times

"Terrifically exciting and unapologetically relevant." --The Washington Post

"Character, science and history co-evolve marvelously here in a tale of fanaticism gone literally overboard." --Barbara Kingsolver, The New York Times

T.C. Boyle is the author of twelve novels including most recently, The Women, a New York Times bestseller, and nine collections of short stories, including Wild Child. A member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, he lives near Santa Barbara, CA and is Distinguished Professor of English at the University of Southern California.

Photo of the author by Jamieson Fry.

THIS EVENT WAS RECORDED LIVE AT SKYLIGHT BOOKS March 8, 2012.

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