Return of Four Stories Japan!

For all you folks living in Kansai (that's western Japan for the rest of you), Four Stories Japan returns this weekend. Four Stories is a prose reading event featuring four different writers each time, and hosted by the inimitable Tracy Slater (and held regularly in Boston, semi-regularly in Osaka/Tokyo).

The readings this weekend are:

Amy Chavez, columnist for The Japan Times since 1997 and author of the books Japan, Funny Side Up and Running the Shikoku Pilgrimage: 900 miles to enlightenment

Marc Kaufman, lecturer at Tokyo's Sophia University and fiction and nonfiction writer with work in Narrative Magazine and more

Peter Mallett, university professor and freelance writer on classical music and the arts, former arts editor of Kansai Time Out, publisher and editor of Artspace, and author of the novel-in-process Appassionata

Tracy Slater, Four Stories founder and author of the book The Good Shufu: A Wife in Search of a Life Between East and West, forthcoming from Penguin's Putnam and Berkley imprints

The readings will be held at a different venue from in that past, so click on the link above to get information and directions about that. It'll be Saturday, June 29th, beginning at 5 pm, at Café Absinthe in Osaka.

The link will also lead you to MP3s from past readings in both Osaka, Tokyo, and Boston. Check it out!

Hurrah for Friends

My friends are up to amazing things.

First, my friend Tracy Slater runs a reading series in Boston and also Osaka/Tokyo called Four Stories. It has been nominated by the Boston Phoenix for the best storytelling series in Boston, so vote for Four Stories, if you are so inclined. You can hear some of the readings (including a few of mine) by downloading MP3s of events at the Four Stories website.

Second, my friend Shannon Borg has a blog, 26 Kitchens, that this week got a mention in the New York Times Dining & Wine section. Shannon writes about her memories of the kitchens in her life, including the one we shared as roommates of yore.

So proud of my friends!

Four Stories Fundraiser for Japan

I'm not sure how many Boston readers visit this blog, but just in case, the famed Boston-area Four Stories reading series is holding a fundraiser on May 23rd for children orphaned by the earthquake/tsunami in Tohoku, Japan. Founder and host extraordinaire Tracy Slater has planned an auction in addition to a reading by internationally acclaimed writers. Click on the link for more details.

Tracy will also plan fundraising events in Tokyo and Osaka at later dates. Sign up to be emailed when more details are available by following the link above.