News Despite the newfangled challenges iPhones appear to pose, I've wanted one for weeks. But before I throw down all that cash, I'm going to make a carrying case based on the one for iPods in Susan Beal's new(ish) book Bead Simple (The Taunton Press, 2008.) Beal, a Portlander with PDX Super Crafty, was previously a subject of the cover story "Crafty Bitches." An easy-to-understand pattern ...   More

News Updated noon Friday, Aug. 8: Jason Simms sends an update after the Olympic opening ceremonies in Beijing: Here's an opening ceremony update...before it even airs in the US! Earlier today, a lot of people mistook me for an athlete but that's another story. What the world wants to know about now is the much anticipated opening ceremony. Right now, four billion people are watching the opening ceremony ...   More

News After last night's political theater—Sen. Hillary Clinton casting the clinching vote for Sen. Barack Obama and then Obama's "surprise" appearance—the Democratic National Convention in Denver enters its last day. Last night about 8 p.m., I walked outside the Pepsi Center, where the convention is being held, to get some fresh air. As I walked, I noticed an extraordinarily long ...   More

News Local writer Sean Patrick Hill was nice enough to send us a report from the most recent edition of Portland's excellent Loggernaut Reading Series: Wednesday, Oct. 29 at Urban Grind: When Loggernaut Reading Series co-founder Erin Ergenbright asked me if I had been to one the readings within its three-and-a-half year existence, I was embarrassed to say, “No.” Then again, when I asked ...   More

News Each week, WW writer John Minervini brings you the latest in book reviews, author Q&A's and Portland literary gossip. Click here to join the Tome Raider mailing list. - 'Do you deal in haunted mattresses?' - 'How haunted?' he asked. - Riley Michael Parker That quotation just about set the tone for last Thursday's (Oct. 30) zinester reading at swanky Southeast Tapas Bar the Maiden. ...   More

News You can take the sleazy dude out of the Left Coast, but you can't take the Left Coast out of the sleazy dude. Phil Busse, the erstwhile Mercury editor, mayoral candidate, clairvoyant restaurant reviewer, prison boxing habitué and hilariously overpaid political campaign manager, has taken leave of Portland for a visiting professorship at St. Olaf College in Minnesota—a job that apparently ...   More

News Each week, WW writer John Minervini brings you the latest in book reviews, author Q&A's and Portland literary gossip. Click here to join the Tome Raider mailing list. When it comes to Wordstock (Nov. 6-9), bibliophiles are spoiled for choice. In fact, the geeky excitement of getting to meet all those novelists, poets, comic artists and other princes of paper is almost matched by the anxiety ...   More

News Each week, WW writer John Minervini brings you the latest in book reviews, author Q&A's and Portland literary gossip. Click here to join the Tome Raider mailing list. “You guys ready to make some babies...with words?” - Derrick Brown, 2nd Round What were you doing last night (Nov. 6) at 9pm? Man, whatever it was, it wasn't half as cool as the Superstar Slam Poetry Competition. ...   More

News Each week, WW writer John Minervini brings you the latest in book reviews, author Q&A's and Portland literary gossip. Click here to join the Tome Raider mailing list. Remember Who Framed Roger Rabbit? The scene where Judge Doom is describing his vision to demolish Toontown and build a giant freeway? Here's a clip to refresh your memory: [youtube XOXDrAk4tpc] Well, imagine that Christopher ...   More

News Each week, WW writer John Minervini brings you the latest in book reviews, author Q&A's and Portland literary gossip. Click here to join the Tome Raider mailing list. Portland literati (right, clothed) enjoy fancy appetizers amid classical sculpture (left, nude) at the 2008 Oregon Book Awards, Nov. 10. Oregon Book Awards: 7:30pm @ the Portland Art Museum If you had asked on Saturday, ...   More