Can't Miss It: Tuesday

NERD BOOK: Junot Diaz, the nerdy Dominican-American novelist whose The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao took the literary scene by storm a couple years ago, is in town tonight as part of Seattle Arts & Lectures Lecture Series. A few tickets may still be available, but you'll have to check at Benaroya's box office, as online sales have closed.

7:30 p.m. // Mark Taper Forum, Benaroya Hall, 200 University St. // $10-$60

COMING TO AMERICA: Yiyun Li came to the US from China in 1996 to study medicine, but quickly turned to fiction writing and in no time made a name for herself: winner of the PEN/Hemingway, Frank O'Connor International Short Story, and Guardian First Book Awards, not to mention popping up in Granta's issue of "best young American novelists." And this with only one book of short stories and a single novel under her belt. Tonight, she reads from hr debut The Vagrants, a story about the execution of a counter-revolutionary in back-woods China in 1979.

7:30 p.m. // Elliott Bay Books, 100 S. Main // free!

INDIE ROCK REDUX: The Physics of Meaning, out of Durham, North Carolina, test the fates with their brand of melodic indie rock: can the world handle another mid-tempo band that likes to mix it up with some violins, and a lead singer whose voice falls somewhere between Ben Gibbard and Jeremy Enigk? With PWRFL Power and Cap Lori.

8 p.m. // High Dive, 513 N. 36th // $8, 21+