Reading series in Madison Square Park

Madison Square Park is a favorite spot of mine, a surprisingly rejuvenating patch of green in the Flatiron District, and even if, like me, Shake Shack is not in your budget this week, it is a peaceful place to enjoy a (brown bag) lunch or read for a bit. If you haven't been there lately, swing by before August 15 to take in Antony Gormley's eerie and ethereal sculptures observing you from the rooftops. And if you're near MSP (yeah, we're intimate, so I'm allowed to use acronyms) on Thursday evenings, they offer a free reading series at 6:30 pm from July 1 through August 5. I'll definitely be there on July 8 for former NYT food critic Frank Bruni. Here's the lineup and a little text from the Mad Sq. Reads website:

Mad. Sq. Reads 2010
July 1 - August 5
Thursdays at 6:30 pm
At the Farragut Monument in the north end of the park

July 1: FOR THE LOVE OF FAMILIES: Dave & Jane Isay
Jane and Dave Isay: she writes about children and sibling behavior, he writes about mothers. It’s no coincidence that they’re mother and son. Dave is the founder of StoryCorps and the recipient of a MacArthur “genius” fellowship. His mother Jane is the author of Mom Still Likes You Best: The Unfinished Business Between Siblings (Doubleday, 2010).

July 8: FOOD NIGHT: Frank Bruni
Frank Bruni was born into an Italian family that equated food with love. As a child, he dieted with his mother; as a college student, he became bulimic. Before, in between and after, he gobbled crummy processed food, sleep-ate, and eventually pigged his way into size 42 relaxed khakis and no love life. Born Round: The Secret History of a Full-Time Eater (Penguin, 2009) is the hugely praised bestseller of the New York Times former chief restaurant critic.

July 15: TO THE MOON ON APOLLO 11: Craig Nelson
In Rocket Men: The Epic Story of the First Men on the Moon (Penguin, 2010), Craig Nelson “captures the drama and chaos of July, 1969 and the almost unbearable tension of the moon landing, (which is) described so vividly that the engrossed reader isn’t sure that Armstrong and crewmate Buzz Aldrin are going to make it.” (The Washington Post).

July 22: DONALD BARTHELME CONSIDERED: Panel Discussion
Critics can’t quite agree: was Donald Barthelme the end of modernism or the first practitioner of American postmodern narrative? Join the National Book Foundation and acclaimed writers Emily Barton, Tracy Daugherty, Stacey D’Erasmo, and David Gates for a discussion of Barthelme’s legacy, influence, and narrative innovations.

July 29: FICTION NIGHT: Allegra Goodman
Of Allegra Goodman's The Cookbook Collector (Random House, 2010), Publishers Weekly proclaims, “This dazzling novel is [Jane] Austen updated for the dot-com era, played out between 1999 and 2001 among a group of brilliant risk takers and truth seekers. . . . [Eventually] career paths collide, social values clash, ironies multiply, and misjudgments threaten to destroy romantic desire...this is Goodman’s most robust, fully realized, and trenchantly meaningful work yet.”

August 5: DOG DAYS OF SUMMER: Rachel McPherson
Rachel McPherson is the founder of The Good Dog Foundation, the largest animal-assisted therapy organization on the East Coast, and based on years of experience there has written the ultimate “dog message” book, Every Dog Has a Gift: True Stories of Dogs Who Bring Hope & Healing Into Our Lives (Tarcher, 2010). She'll be bringing dogs to love!