SAVE THE DATE
 
* *

Wednesday, Dec. 4
at 7 p.m. 
Johanny Vazquez Paz
Poetry Reading

Thursday, Dec. 5
at 7 p.m. 
E. Patrick Johnson
Book Launch Party

Friday, Dec. 6
Late Night Andersonville
Neighborhood Shopping Event

Saturday, Dec. 7 
starting at 11 a.m. 
Annual SitStayRead Wishing Tree Donation Drive Kick-off featuring Drag Queen Story Hour!

Special Holiday Hours: 
December 24
10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
December 25
CLOSED
December 31
11 a.m. to 5 p.m. 
January 1
CLOSED

Tuesday January 14 
at 7 p.m.
Peggy Orenstein 
in conversation with 
Heidi Stevens
Author Reading and Book SIgning

Wednesday, January 15 at 7 p.m. 
E. J. Koh
Author Reading and Book Signing

Thursday January 16 
at 7 p.m. 
Ronni Davis
When the Stars Lead to You
YA Book Launch Party

Thursday, February 13 at 7 p.m. 
Best Women's Erotica of the Year: Volume 5
Rachel Kramer Bussel, Lauren Emily, Jayne Renault, Sierra Simone & Suleikha Snyder
Anthology Reading
& Valentine's Day Party
 
* * *
 
 
Sunday, November 3 
at 2 p.m.
Burn the Place
by Iliana Regan

Women Aging with Wisdom & Grace Discussion & Potluck
Sunday, November 10
10 a.m. to noon
Suggested Reading:
Old in Art School
by Nell Painter

Sunday, November 10 
at 5 p.m.
Fresh Ink edited by Lamar Giles

Monday, November 11 
at 7:15 p.m.
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte 

Sunday, November 17 
at 1 p.m.
Girl, Woman, Other
This month's meeting is co-hosted by the Silver Room and will take place at  their Hyde Park location, 1506 E 53rd St.

Sunday, November 17 
at 4 p.m.
Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer

Tuesday, November 19 at 7:30 p.m.
Washington Black
by Esi Edugyan 

The Social Justice Book Group is  on a
3-month hiatus. Check back in February 2020!
  


Get your tickets to
COMFORTABLE SHOES,
created by WOMEN & CHILDREN FIRST bookseller
 Ida Cuttler!

BUY TICKETS! 

Runs 10/3-11/16, 
Thurs. - Sat. @ 7:30 p.m.

Neo-Futurist Ensemble Member Ida Cuttler writes and performs in this rigorous storytelling epic of exhausting proportions, using the structure of One Thousand and One Nights. Directed by Halena Kays, and accompanied by violinist Katie Klocke. This is a high-energy, highly personal feminist narrative, responding to the present day. 

BUY TICKETS! 
Pre-order 
Announcements

By ordering a forthcoming book through your local independent bookstore, you can get access to exclusive offers, special giveaways, and signed copies! Below, explore the books we are most excited about and any associated promotions

 
* * *


by Carmen Maria Machado
Publishing
November 5, 2019
Signed pre-order books -- limited quantity!
 

* * *

 
by
Erin Morgenstern
Publishing
November 5, 2019


* * *


by Andrea Beaty
Publishing
November 5, 2019
Free character patch with pre-order! (while supplies last)
  


* * *


by Michelle Obama
Publishing
November 19, 2019


* * *



by Tomi Adeyemi
Publishing
December 3, 2019
Free Maji Clan Tattoo Pack with pre-order -- limited quantity!


* * *


by Adam Silvera
Publishing
January 14, 2020


* * *

by Danez Smith
Publishing
January 21, 2020

 
 
Dear Friends of Women & Children First, 

Thank you for making our October one we will always remember! Night after night, we had full houses for spectacular events, and we were overwhelmed by community support
 in response to  recent harassment as documented by this 
beautiful segment aired on ABC 7. 

Did you know that our bookstore and Loyola University Chicago's Women's Studies and Gender Studies Program were both established in 1979? We'll be celebrating our anniversaries jointly with an author conversation featuring two of our favorite feminists: Rebecca Traister and Megan Stielstra


That same week, we'll be hosting the Chicago stop on Lindy West's highly anticipated book tour for her new essay collection, The Witches Are Coming! BUY TICKETS


Plus, in the store, our 2020 calendars have arrived and our selection of boxed holiday cards will be coming very soon!  

As always, thank you for supporting Chicago's only feminist bookstore! 

With love & thanks,

W&CF
AUTHOR READING        
Fat, Pretty, and Soon to Be Old  
Kimberly Dark 
Wednesday, October 30
 at 7 p.m.     
 
Fat, Pretty, and Soon to Be Old is a moving, funny, and startlingly frank collection of personal essays about what it means to look a certain way. Or rather, certain ways. Navigating Kimberly Dark's experience of being fat since childhood--as well as queer, white-privileged, a gender-confirming "girl with a pretty face," active then disabled, and inevitably aging--each piece blends storytelling and social analysis to deftly coax readers into a deeper understanding of how appearance privilege (and stigma) function in everyday life.  
AUTHOR READING        
Race for Profit       
Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor
Thursday, October 31
at 7 p.m.     
 
By the late 1960s and early 1970s, reeling from a wave of urban uprisings, politicians finally worked to end the practice of redlining. Reasoning that the turbulence could be calmed by turning Black city dwellers into homeowners, they passed the Housing and Urban Development Act of 1968 and set about establishing policies to induce mortgage lenders and the real estate industry to treat Black homebuyers equally. The disaster that ensued revealed that racist exclusion had not been eradicated but rather transmuted into a new phenomenon of predatory inclusion.  
AUTHOR CONVERSATION         
Diversity, Inc.         
Pamela Newkirk 
in conversation with Mary Morten
Friday, November 1
at 7 p.m.     
 
In an effort to ensure their organizations represent the racial and ethnic makeup of the United States, industry and foundation leaders have pledged hundreds of millions of dollars to commission studies, launch training sessions, and hire consultants and diversity czars. But is it working?  
AUTHOR PRESENTATION          
Sofia Valdez, Future Prez   
Andrea Beaty 
Tuesday, November 5
 at 6:30 p.m.
at the Swedish American Museum 
(5211 N. Clark St.)
Register HERE.
 
The newest children's picture book from the creators of Iggy Peck, Architect; Rosie Revere, Engineer; and Ada Twist, Scientist stars Sofia Valdez, a community leader who stands up for what she believes in!  
AUTHOR CONVERSATION         
Amazons, Abolitionists, and Activists    
Mikki Kendall & A. D'Amico 
in conversation with Jamie Nesbitt Golden
Wednesday, November 6
 at 7 p.m.
 
A fun and fascinating graphic novel-style primer, Amazons, Abolitionists, and Activists covers key figures and events that have advanced women's rights from antiquity to the modern era.
AUTHOR CONVERSATION         
Everything Below the Waist 
Jennifer Block 
in conversation with Deborah Siegel
Thursday, November 7
 at 7 p.m.
 
American women visit more doctors, have more surgery, and fill more prescriptions than men. In Everything Below the Waist, Jennifer Block asks, Why is the life expectancy of women today declining relative to women in other high-income countries, and even relative to the generation before them?
AUTHOR CONVERSATION         
In the Dream House
Carmen Maria Machado 
in conversation with Emil Ferris
Friday, November 8
 at 7 p.m.
at the Swedish American Museum 
(5211 N. Clark St.)
Register HERE
 
Tracing the full arc of a harrowing relationship with a charismatic but volatile woman, Carmen Maria Machado struggles to make sense of how what happened to her shaped the person she was becoming.
IN-STORE CONCERT         
We Compose! 
Saturday, November 9 at 7 p.m.
Register HERE
 
The past, present, and future of classical music belongs to all of us. Explore the role of women in classical music - as muses, as performers, and as creators - and examine how these roles have shaped our shared history, our collective memory. Each month, oboist and composer Laura Adkins shares the stage with different guest musicians, performing everything from arrangements of famous opera arias to 13th century chant to contemporary solo works. Learn about new female composers and performers, and dive into your own memories and beliefs about women in classical music (hint: you have more than you think!).
TICKETED EVENT        
Good and Mad: The Revolutionary Power of Women's Anger
Rebecca Traister 
in conversation with Megan Stielstra
Sunday, November 10
 at 4 p.m.
at Wilson Abbey
(935 W. Wilson Ave.)
BUY TICKETS 
 
From Rebecca Traister, the New York Times bestselling author of All the Single Ladies comes a vital, incisive exploration into the transformative power of female anger and its ability to transcend into a political movement. In the year 2018, it seemed as if women's anger has suddenly erupted into the public conversation. This event is co-sponsored by Loyola University Chicago's Women's Studies and Gender Studies Program, which is celebrating its 40th Anniversary alongside Women & Children First! 
TICKETED EVENT          
The Witches Are Coming
Lindy West
Tuesday, November 12
 at 7 p.m.
at Wilson Abbey
(935 W. Wilson Ave.)
BUY TICKETS
 
The conditions that fostered the catastrophic resentment and abetted Trump's victory did not spring up in a vacuum; they are woven into America's DNA. Lindy West explores how we got here through a long lens of pop culture, dissecting the stories we've been telling ourselves about ourselves, the assumptions we swallow as fact and the facts we deny, and the disastrous death-grip of mediocre white men on our past century's art and media.
AUTHOR CONVERSATION        
The Secrets We Kept
Lara Prescott 
in conversation with Rebecca Makkai
Wednesday, November 13
 at 7 p.m.
 
At the height of the Cold War, two secretaries are pulled out of the typing pool at the CIA and given the assignment of a lifetime. Their mission: to smuggle Doctor Zhivago out of the USSR, where no one dare publish it, and help Pasternak's magnum opus make its way into print around the world.
AUTHOR CONVERSATION        
The View from Somewhere
Lewis Raven Wallace 
in conversation with  Tracy Baim
Thursday, November 14 at 7 p.m.
 
#MeToo. #BlackLivesMatter. #NeverAgain. #WontBeErased. Though both the right- and left-wing media claim "objectivity" in their reporting of these and other contentious issues, the American public has become increasingly cynical about truth, fact, and reality. In  The View from Somewhere, Lewis Raven Wallace dives deep into the history of "objectivity" in journalism and how its been used to gatekeep and silence marginalized writers as far back as Ida B. Wells.
AUTHOR PRESENTATION        
Brilliant Imperfection
Eli Clare
Friday, November 15 at 7 p.m.
 
In Brilliant Imperfection Eli Clare uses memoir, history, and critical analysis to explore cure--the deeply held belief that body-minds considered broken need to be fixed. Cure serves many purposes. It saves lives, manipulates lives, and prioritizes some lives over others. It provides comfort, makes profits, justifies violence, and promises resolution to body-mind loss.
POETRY READING       
while they sleep (under the bed is another country)
Raquel Salas Rivera with special guest
Daniel Borzutzky
Saturday, November 16 at 6 p.m.

Join us for poetry reading featuring Raquel Salas Rivera and Daniel Borzutzky. Raquel Salas Rivera is the 2018-19 Poet Laureate of Philadelphia. They are the inaugural recipient of the Ambroggio Prize from the Academy of American Poets for their book x/ex/exis.   
AUTHOR READING       
Ordinary Girls
Jaquira Diaz 
Wednesday, November 20 at 7 p.m.

While growing up in housing projects in Puerto Rico and Miami Beach, Díaz found herself caught between extremes. As her family split apart and her mother battled schizophrenia, she was supported by the love of her friends. As she longed for a family and home, her life was upended by violence. As she celebrated her Puerto Rican culture, she couldn't find support for her burgeoning sexual identity.
AUTHOR CONVERSATION  
Darkly: Black History and America's Gothic Soul
Leila Taylor
in conversation with Angelica Jade Bastién
Thursday, November 21 at 7 p.m.

Haunted houses, bitter revenants, and muffled heartbeats under floorboards: the American gothic is a macabre tale based on a true story. Part memoir and part cultural critique, Darkly explores American culture's inevitable gothicity in the traces left from chattel slavery.
AUTHOR CONVERSATION  
The Seven Necessary Sins for Women and Girls 
Mona Eltahawy
in conversation with Sahar Mustafah
Friday, November 22 at 7 p.m.

Feminist activist Mona Eltahawy advocates a muscular, out-loud approach to teaching women and girls to harness their power through what she calls the "seven necessary sins" that women and girls are not supposed to commit: to be angry, ambitious, profane, violent, attention-seeking, lustful, and powerful. All the necessary "sins" that women and girls require to erupt.
NEIGHBORHOOD EVENT
SMALL BUSINESS SATURDAY!  

This year, resolve to support your local community and economy by shopping indie on Small Business Saturday! We'll have complimentary refreshments plus special giveaways (tote bags, prints, and more)! More details coming soon!

Women & Children First


Copyright © 2019. All Rights Reserved