Book It: The Five Best Literary Events This Week

The literary scene is full of inspiration: a writer speaking about a motivational memoir, a writing class with a noted novelist, a discussion of how the next economy could be more inclusive and successful for all people, and a talk about how nuclear watchdogs are working to safeguard our planet and everyone living on it. And there's also a celebration of a dystopian YA novel, because we have to have something fun to read between various inspirations. Here are the five best literary events to book this week.

Sylvia Acevedo, Path to the Stars
Tuesday, September 11, 7 p.m.
Tattered Cover Aspen Grove
7301 South Santa Fe Drive, Littleton
Free
It may not take a rocket scientist to write a fascinating and inspiring memoir, but Sylvia Acevedo is one anyway — and more. She’s also the current CEO of the Girl Scouts of the USA, and she comes to Tattered Cover to shares the story of her life as a Latina woman who owes her success in part to Scouts. Acevedo will read from and sign her memoir, Path to the Stars: My Journey From Girl Scout to Rocket Scientist.

Community Writing Class with Laura Pritchett
Wednesday, September 12, 6 p.m.
First Western Trust Bank
1155 Canyon Boulevard, Suite 300, Boulder
Free
Zee JLF Boulder partners with First Western Trust Bank to host Colorado Book Award-winning novelist Laura Pritchett (The Blue Hour), who runs a community class on writing about the great outdoors. We Coloradans traditionally love the outdoors…and some of us just want to sit inside and write about it. (Of course, there’s probably a middle ground there.) Want to know more? Details available online.

Nathan Schneider, Everything for Everyone
Friday, September 14, 7 p.m.
BookBar
4280 Tennyson Street
Free
Journalist and professor of Media Studies at the University of Colorado Boulder Nathan Schneider joins two stars of the Denver co-op business community — Yessica Holguin from the Denver Community Wealth Building Network and Mona Neely, Director of Communications for the Colorado Rural Electric Association — to fill BookBar with discussion of how local economics can engender a powerful, creative and fair democracy. Schneider will read from and sign copies of his new book, Everything for Everyone: The Radical Tradition That Is Shaping the Next Economy.

Rocky Flats in Context
Saturday, September 15, 7 p.m.
Naropa University Performing Arts Center
2130 Arapahoe Avenue, Boulder
Free
Join Naropa University’s Joanna Macy Center in welcoming writers, scientists, and community activists for this rare glimpse into the current saga of nuclear science, the determination to prevent nuclear war and protect life on earth – and locally, to prevent Rocky Flats from ever being open to the public. The event is called There Is No Refuge From Nuclear War or Nuclear Waste: Rocky Flats in Context. Find more details and register online.

Scott Westerfield, Imposters
Sunday, September 16, 2 p.m.
Tattered Cover
2526 East Colfax Avenue
Free
Scott Westerfield, New York Times best-selling author of the YA series The Uglies comes to the Tattered Cover to read from and sign his newest novel, Imposters. The new book is the beginning of a new storyline in the same Uglies universe, so if you are a fan, jump on this dystopian bandwagon early.

Do you have an event you want Westword to consider for a list? Send the details to [email protected].