So we'll begin, the guy at the podium said, the huge black blast door in the Microsoft Auditorium at the Downtown Library eased down its track, slowly cutting off our view of the lobby, and we shivered. "I wish the P-I were here," said the Stranger's Josh Feit at one point. "This is what they do really well." Oddly enough, the Seattle P-I, the hands-down leader in news on the web around here, wasn't on......

Tonight at the Central Seattle Public Library, Tim Westergren, founder of music software company/massive audio archive/internet radio service Pandora, hosts a public forum on his business model and the state of digital music as a whole. This get-together is a free event, open to everyone. It's a chance for me to share our story with you and hear what you have to say. I'll tell you about the Music Genome Project's beginnings, living through......

Monday BOOK CRUSH: Librarian Nancy Pearl´s latest book is Book Crush, a guide to books you loved when you were growing up. How does she know? Head over to the launch party and find out. 7-8:30pm // Seattle Central Public Library Microsoft Auditorium // FREE PETER BEAGLE SPEAKS: For the Fantastic Fiction Salon, fantasy author Peter Beagle (The Last Unicorn, Tamsin, and The Innkeeper's Song) teaches "Dialogue Says it All." 7pm // Hugo House......

Monday SHERMAN FREAKING ALEXIE: The best-selling author returns with his first novel in ten years. Flight tells the story of an orphaned Indian boy who travels back and forth through time in a violent search for his true identity. Real Change-published poets (that would actually include Alexie, too) read as part of the program. 7:30pm // Town Hall // $5 LOCAL AUTHOR: Maya Sonenberg, the Creative Writing Program Director at the UW, presents a......

Monday PREQUEL TO MCARTNEY'S WINGS: Richie Unterberger, the author of several books on the history of rock, shows some film footage and plays some music recordings of unreleased Beatles material. He´s promoting his latest book, The Unreleased Beatles -- Music and Film. We had no idea they were in jail! (Ha! Because of the "unreleased" -- see how...oh...sure, we can move on.) 7pm // Seattle Central Public Library Microsoft Auditorium // FREE GARDENING AT......

Monday THAT STARBUCKS "I WAS A CHILD SOLDIER" GUY: At twelve, Ishmael Beah found himself fleeing rebels, wandering from village to village. At thirteen, he was a soldier in Sierra Leone, hooked on drugs and capable of things he would never have imagined. Now, rehabilitated and living in the U.S., he tells his story in A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier, in an attempt to raise awareness of the child soldier......

BOOKS: Suze Orman, Seattlest's unofficial accountant from television is at the Central Library tonight. Mrs. Seattlest refuses to acknowledge that her name is pronounced "Susy." 12:30pm (whoops, already missed this one // Microsoft Auditorium/Central Library // free MOVIES: Roll your own double feature at the Crest tonight. Blood Diamond and Casino Royale are both there, but don't do that thing where you pay for one show and watch like eight movies. Actually, you'll have to......

Monday WOMEN & MONEY: Personal finance expert and author, Suze Orman talks about the complicated and dysfunctional relationship that women have with money in her book, Women & Money: Owning the Power to Control Your Destiny. 7:30pm // Town Hall // $5 AGORAPHOBES TAKE HEART: Everything you’ve been told about dating is wrong. Love Will Find You is a new approach to love from dating expert Kathryn Alice. It may be the first dating......

BENEFIT: The Clif Bar Save Our Snow Tour, featuring DJ Sabzi from the Blue Scholars, stops by Fremont to help start global cooling. First they came for the snow, but we said nothing, because we follow the sun. 7-10:30pm // Evo Gear in Fremont 122 NW 36th St. // $5 BOOK:Journalist and activist Ann Jones talks about her book Kabul in Winter: Life Without Peace in Afghanistan, her account of volunteering to teach English to......

Monday AUTHOR, AUTHOR: In Bich Minh Nguyen's memoir, Stealing Buddha's Dinner, a young family escapes from Vietnam shortly before the fall of Saigon and relocates to Grand Rapids, Michigan. "In her recreation of a world populated by family ties, Ritz crackers, and Judy Blume books, she has captured the 1980s with perfection," says Kirkus Reviews. 7:30pm // Elliott Bay // FREE Tuesday ANNE LAMOTT RECOMMENDS: Elizabeth Gilbert talks about her book Eat, Pray, Love:......

Wednesday, December 13 >>>Hugo House, 7:30pm. Screenwriters Salon: Geoff Miller and Mark Handley invite you to bring your questions about format, technique, structure, dialogue, writing characters, and how to use your catering gig to hand your script to celebs. $5 general/$2 students. Free to members. >>>Seattle Public Central Library, 5:30-7:00pm. Mayor Greg Nickels and City Council President Nick Licata rochambeau to see who gets to salute Seattle author Tim Egan. His book, The Worst......

Wednesday, November 15 >>>UW iSchool at Kane Hall, 7:00-9:00pm. "Voices in an Empty Room: Five Apologies for the Narrative": Children's author Richard Peck discusses his writing and teaching careers, and his experiences with the kids today. He'll read from On The Wings Of Heroes, his new novel about a World War II childhood. Free with RSVP. Kane Hall, Rm. 220. >>>Third Place Books, 7:00pm. We saw this book talk about adoptive parents and thought......

Wednesday, November 8 >>>UW Forum for Science and Ethics Policy, 5:30pm. Dr. Dennis Schatz, VP for Education at the Pacific Science Center, cheerleads for “Making Science as Pervasive as Sports in Society.” His ulterior motive? It can only be to pack the Sonics off to Oklahoma and build our very own Exploratorium right here in Seattle, to which we say “Be Aggressive, Be Be Aggressive!” Free. UW Health Sciences Building, T-478. >>>Pacific Science Center......

Wednesday, November 1 >>>Benaroya Hall, 7:30pm. Seattle Arts and Lectures brings prolific big shot and errant van survivor Stephen King by. Maybe you’ve heard of him? For the Constant Reader, it’s an event not to be missed. He'll talk about Lisey’s Story, his latest novel. Tickets $25 and $35. But, like many things in King’s Dark Tower world, they’ve already moved on. >>>University Temple Methodist Church, 7:00pm. Keeping with the All Soul's Day theme,......

Wednesday, October 11 >>>University Temple United Methodist Church, 7:30pm. Religious believers can be co-opted, argues distinguished biologist and secular humanist E.O. Wilson in his talk "The Creation: A Meeting of Science and Religion." Blah blah salvation of biodiversity blah glory of nature blah work together. We dislike this automatic Religion-and-Science connection ("Ballet and Groundskeeping: A New Unity"), but he's a smartie. Could be worth it. Suggested donation: $5 at the door. >>>UW Information School, 7:00-9:00pm.......

Your inner 13-year-old is going to have the time of its life on Thursday. Seattlest is offering to you a nerd license for March 3, 2005. Use it wisely. "The Persistence of Frankenstein: Art, Science and Creation" is going to take you all the way back to what most people consider the very beginnings of the science fiction genre, but will then proceed to explain why Mary Shelley's classic is more relevant today than......