Maryville Talks Books is presented by Maryville University and Left Bank Books, and features lectures by noted authors. Admission is free and open to the public unless otherwise indicated. Seating is first come, first served.

For more information: email Kayla Yettke or call 314.529.6602.

Thanks to our sponsors:

Emma Donoghue
The Wonder

Tuesday, Oct. 11—7 p.m.
Maryville University Auditorium

Admission is free, but reservations are required.

In Emma Donoghue’s latest masterpiece, an English nurse brought to a small Irish village to observe what appears to be a miracle—a girl said to have survived without food for months—soon finds herself fighting to save the child’s life. Tourists flock to the cabin of the eleven-year-old, who believes herself to be living off manna from heaven, and a journalist is sent to cover the sensation. Lib Wright, a veteran of Florence Nightingale’s Crimean campaign, is hired to keep watch over the girl. Written with all the propulsive tension that made Donoghue’s Room a bestseller.

 

 

Nick Offerman
Good, Clean Fun

Tuesday, Oct. 20-7 p.m.
Sheet Metal Local 36 Union Hall

This is a ticketed event

After two New York Times bestsellers, Nick Offerman returns with the subject for which he’s known best—his incredible real-life woodshop. Nestled among the glitz and glitter of Tinseltown is a testament to American elbow grease and an honest-to-god hard day’s work: Offerman Woodshop. Captained by hirsute woodworker, actor, comedian, and writer Nick Offerman, the shop produces not only fine handcrafted furniture, but also fun stuff—kazoos, baseball bats, ukuleles, even mustache combs. Now Nick and his ragtag crew of champions want to share their experiences of working at the Woodshop, tell you all about their passion for the discipline of woodworking, and teach you how to make a handful of their most popular projects along the way.

 

Mary Roach—Grunt: The Curious Science of Humans at War
Tuesday, Nov. 1—7 p.m.
Maryville University Auditorium

This is a ticketed event

Grunt tackles the science behind some of a soldier’s most challenging adversaries—panic, exhaustion, heat, flies, noise. Roach also visits a repurposed movie studio where amputee actors help prepare Marine Corps medics for the shock and gore of combat wounds. She discovers how diarrhea can be a threat to national security, and why a zipper is a problem for a sniper. Roach answers questions not found in any other book on the military: How is a wedding gown like a bomb suit? Why are shrimp more dangerous to sailors than sharks? Take a tour of duty with Roach, and you’ll never see our nation’s defenders in the same way again.

 

 

Bruce Watson—Freedom Summer
Wednesday, Nov. 16—2 p.m.
Maryville University Auditorium

Held in conjunction with the Maryville Reads program

In 1964, 700 college students volunteered to spend summer in America’s poorest state, Mississippi. Less than seven percent of blacks there could vote. Black schools were separate and far from equal. Cops routinely beat Civil Rights marchers, and vigilante violence was rampant. Freedom Summer would change all that, but at a tremendous cost. Freedom Summer ultimately inspired the Voting Rights Act, and the volunteers went on to spearhead the anti-war movement, the women’s movement, and other protests of the 1960s.

 

 

 

Joe Buck in Conversation with Jon Hamm
Lucky Bastard: My Life, My Dad, and the Things I’m Not Allowed to Say on TV
Monday, Nov. 21—7 p.m.
Chaminade (Skip Viragh Center for the Arts)

This is a ticketed event (SOLD OUT)

Over the past two decades, Joe Buck has become an increasingly important figure in sportscasting, starting in 1994 when FOX began broadcasting NFL games. Since then, he has moved seamlessly between announcing for the NFL, MLB, and golf. Buck is the voice fans hear during the biggest games of the year—the World Series and the Super Bowl. Buck is still, and will always be, linked to his father Jack Buck, the undisputed and much beloved voice of the St. Louis Cardinals. For the first time he takes readers into the broadcast booth, and into his childhood home in this candid and humorous memoir.