It's a spooky time of year, but these author events are serious. From a screening of the presidential debates to a reading by Dennis Lehane (will Matt Damon be there?!) to an appearance by the PC guy (hobo-obsessed John Hodgman), things are hot in the literary world this month. Good thing, too—it’s getting cold outside. All we want is to curl up with a good book.
(* = recommended)

Wednesday, October 1, 7:00 pm, Porter Square Books
Poetry with Henry Braun and Lee Sharkey

Wednesday, October 1, 6:00pm, Brattle Theatre, $5
Thomas Frank, The Wrecking Crew: How Conservatives Rule

Thursday, October 2, 10:00 am, Porter Square Books
David Shannon, Too Many Toys

*Thursday, October 2, 7:00pm, Brookline Booksmith
Lynda Barry, What It Is

Barry’s bright artwork is a unique collision of collage and graphic novel. Her latest is a memoiric musing on creativity, both beautiful and thoughtful.

Thursday, October 2, 7:00 pm, Porter Square Books
Monica Ferrell, The Answer is Always Yes

Thursday, October 2, 7:00pm, Harvard Book Store
James Traub, The Freedom Agenda: Why America Must Spread Democracy (Just Not the Way George Bush Did)
Jonathan Mahler, The Challenge: Hamdan v. Rumsfeld and the Fight Over Presidential Power

Friday, October 3, 3:00pm,Harvard Book Store
Roger Martin, Racing Odysseus: A College President Becomes a Freshman Again

*Friday, October 3, 7:00pm, Harvard Book Store
Kelly Link, Pretty Monsters: Stories

Link’s writing hovers between fiction, sci-fi, and fantasy, managing to make use of the best of all worlds. Her subtle style enhances quirky plot points, making them almost believable.

Sunday, October 5, 2:00pm, Brookline Booksmith
Bob Morris, Assisted Loving: True Tales of Double-Dating With My Dad

Monday, October 6, 7:00pm, Harvard Book Store
Deborah Copaken Kogan, Between Here and April

Tuesday, October 7, 7:00pm, Brookline Booksmith
Beth Teitell, Drinking Problems at the Fountain of Youth

Tuesday, October 7, 7:00pm, Harvard Book Store
Marjorie Garber, Patronizing the Arts

Tuesday, October 7, 7:00 pm, Porter Square Books
Jonathan Strong, Drawn from Life

Wednesday, October 8, 7:30pm, First Parish Church
Jared Bernstein, Crunch: Why Do I Feel So Squeezed? (And Other Unsolved Economic Mysteries)

*Wednesday, October 8, 7:00pm, Harvard Book Store
Dexter Filkins, The Forever War

Thursday, October 9, 6:00pm
Scott Weidensaul speaks on coffee's effect on migratory birds

Friday, October 10, 6:00pm, Brattle Theatre, $5
David Macaulay, The Way We Work: Getting to Know the Amazing Human Body

Friday, October 10, 3:00pm, Harvard Book Store
Sherry Turkle, The Inner History of Devices

*Friday, October 10, 7:00pm, Brookline Booksmith
Sarah Vowell, The Wordy Shipmates

Friday, October 10, 7:00 pm, Porter Square Books
Breakwater Reading Series featuring MFA students from UMASS and Emerson College

Saturday, October 11, 7:00pm, First Parish Church Meetinghouse, $5
Sarah Vowell, The Wordy Shipmates

*Monday, October 13, 7:00pm, Harvard Book Store
Greg Melville, Greasy Rider: Two Dudes, One Fry-Oil-Powered Car, and a Cross-Country Search for a Greener Future

Tuesday, October 14, 10:30 am, Porter Square Books
Susan Goodman, See How They Run

Tuesday, October 14, 7:00pm, Harvard Book Store
Jonathan Carroll, The Ghost in Love: A Novel

Tuesday, October 14, 7:00pm, Brookline Booksmith
William Conescu, Being Written
Diana Spechler, Who By Fire

Tuesday, October 14, 7:00 pm, Porter Square Books
Dustin Smith, Penelope Robinson, and Richard Hoffman

Wednesday, October 15, 9:30 am, Porter Square Books
Graeme Base, Enigma: A Magical Mystery

Wednesday, October 15, 12:30pm, Borders Back Bay (511 Boylston Street)
Christopher Klein, Discovering the Boston Harbor Islands: A Guide to the City’s Hidden Shores

May include pirate talk!

Wednesday, October 15, 7:00 pm, Porter Square Books
Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, Free-Range Knitter: The Yarn Harlot Writes Again

Wednesday, October 15, 7:30pm, First Parish Church
David W. Moore, The Opinion Makers: An Insider Exposes the Truth Behind the Polls

Wednesday, October 15, 7:00pm, Brattle Theatre, $10
New York Review of Books and Guardian America Presidential Election Topics Panel with Mark Danner, Michael Tomasky, Peter W. Galbraith, Frances Fitzgerald

Includes live screening of the October 15th Presidential Debate

Wednesday, October 15, 7:00pm, Brookline Booksmith
Daniel Levitin, The World in Six Songs: How the Musical Brain Created Human Nature

*Thursday, October 16, 6:00 pm, First Parish Church (Globe Corner Bookstore)
Wayne Bernhardson, Moon's Patagonia Handbook

Based in Buenos Aries, Bernhardson travels around South America six months of the year. Must be nice. Visit his blog and this presentation for the dish on these beautiful countries to our south.

Thursday, October 16, 6:00pm, McKim Orientation Room, BPL
David Liss, The Whiskey Rebels.

Friday, October 17, 6:30 pm, Porter Square Books
John Green, Paper Towns
with Hank Green

Thursday, October 16, 3:00pm, Young Adult Room, BPL
Alisa Libby, The Blood Confessions

Thursday, October 16, 7:00pm, Harvard Book Store
Russell Shorto, Descartes' Bones: A Skeletal History of the Conflict Between Faith and Reason

Thursday, October 16, 7:00 pm, Porter Square Books
Sheila Brass and Marilynn Brass, Heirloom Cooking with the Brass Sisters

Thursday, October 16, 7pm, Brookline Booksmith
Clayton Eshleman, Grindstone of Rapport: A Clayton Eshleman Reader

Thursday, October 16, 7:30pm, Sanders Theatre, Memorial Hall
Julia Alvarez, How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accent

*Friday, October 17, 3:00pm, Harvard Book Store
Mark A. Noll, God and Race in American Politics: A Short History

We don’t know how this history could be short, but we look forward to finding out.

Friday, October 17, 7:00 pm, Porter Square Books
Julia Glass, I See You Everywhere

Friday, October 17, 7:00pm, First Parish Church Meetinghouse, $5
Dennis Lehane, The Given Day: A Novel

OMG they made a movie about that one book of his! He must be good.

Saturday, October 18, 12:00pm, North End Branch Library
Grub Street Writer's Circle, Born Before Plastic: Stories from Boston's Most Enduring Neighborhoods

Sunday, October 19, 6:00pm, Enormous Room (569 Mass Ave, Cambridge)
Four Stories with Andre Dubus III and Margot Livesey, plus young writers from Grub Street's YAWP Teen Writing Fellowship and Beacon Academy

Monday, October 20, 6:00pm, Brattle Theatre, $5
Laurence H. Tribe, The Invisible Constitution

Monday, October 20, 7:30pm, First Parish Church
Fred Pearce, Confessions of an Eco-Sinner: Tracking Down the Sources of My Stuff

Monday, October 20, 7:00pm, Brookline Booksmith
Katie Goodman, Improvisation for the Spirit: Live a More Creative, Spontaneous, and Courageous Life Using the Tools of Improv Comedy

*Monday, October 20, 7:00 pm, Porter Square Books
Leslie Chang, Factory Girls: From Village to City in a Changing China

We tend to think of migrant workers as agricultural, but there are migrant factory workers as well. Easily disconnected from friends and family, easily catapulted toward success by learning English or computer skills, China’s 130 million (almost half the population of the U.S.) migrant workers are a huge force. Chang explores their experience, telling of a shoe factory with its own hospital, cinema, and firefighters (really) and Chinese New Year celebrations in a remote village. Learn about a world you never knew existed.

Tuesday, October 21, Harvard Book Store
Meet and greet with new HBS owner Jeff Mayersohn

Tuesday, October 21, 7:00pm, Brookline Booksmith
The First Amendment Speakers Bureau

Tuesday, October 21, 7:00 pm, Porter Square Books
Jeffrey Lewis, Adam the King

Wednesday, October 22, 6:00pm, Brattle Theatre, $5
Gregory Maguire, A Lion Among Men

Wednesday, October 22, 6:00pm, Coolidge Corner Theatre, $5.00
John Hodgman, More Information Than You Require

Wednesday, October 22, 6:00pm McKim Orientation Room, BPL
Jennifer Haigh, The Condition

Wednesday, October 22, 7:00 pm, Porter Square Books
Terry Tempest Williams, Finding Beauty in a Broken World

Thursday, October 23, 7:00pm, Brookline Booksmith
Todd Hasak-Lowy, Captives

Thursday, October 23, 6:00pm, Brattle Theatre, $30*
Art Spiegelman, Breakdowns: Portrait of the Artist as a Young #@&*!

*redeem your ticket for a copy of Breakdowns

Thursday, October 23, 7:00 pm, Porter Square Books
M. T. Anderson, The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Volume 2

Friday, October 24, 3:00pmHarvard Book Store
Sandy Pentland, Honest Signals: How They Shape Our World

Friday, October 24, 7:00 pm, Porter Square Books
Susan Cheever, Desire: When Sex Meets Addiction

Saturday, October 25, 6:00 pm, Porter Square Books
Cathleen Bell, Launch Party for Slipping

Monday, October 27, 6:00pm, BPL
Kevin Funk and Steven Fake, Scramble For Africa: Darfur - Intervention and the USA

Monday, October 27, 7:00pm, Harvard Book Store
Harvard Square Book Circle discusses Amy Bloom's Away

Monday, October 27, 7:00pm, Brookline Booksmith
John Demos, The Enemy Within: 2,000 Years of Witch-Hunting in the Western World

Monday, October 27, 7:00 pm, Porter Square Books
Michelle Nicholasen and Barbara O'Neal, I Brake for Meltdowns

Tuesday, October 28, 6:00pm, Brattle Theatre, $27*
Roy Blount Jr., Alphabet Juice: The Energies, Gists, and Spirits of Letters, Words, and Combinations Thereof; Their Roots, Bones, Innards, Piths, Pips, and Secret Parts, ... With Examples of Their Usage Foul and Savory

* redeem your ticket for a copy of Alphabet Juice

Tuesday, October 28, 6:30pm French Alliance Boston, $10 ($5 FAB members)
Hervé Kempf, How the Rich Are Destroying the Earth

Tuesday, October 28, 7:00 pm, Porter Square Books
Rosamond Purcell, Egg and Nest

Tuesday, October 28, 7:00pm, Brookline Booksmith
Susan Squire, I Don’t: A Contrarian History of Marriage

Wednesday, October 29, 7:00 pm, Porter Square Books
Doria's Halloween Family Storytelling Performance

Wednesday, October 29, 7:00pm, Harvard Book Store
James Wood, How Fiction Works

Wednesday, October 29, 7:30pm, First Parish Church Meetinghouse
Linda J. Bilmes, The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Cost of the Iraq Conflict

Wednesday, October 29, 7pm, Brookline Booksmith
Win McCormack, You Don't Know Me: A Citizen's Guide to Republican Family Values

Thursday, October 30, 7:00pm, First Parish Church, $5
Irene Pepperberg, Alex & Me: How a Scientist and a Parrot Discovered a Hidden World of Animal Intelligence--and Formed a Deep Bond in the Process

Thursday, October 30, 7:00pm, Brighton Branch Library
Stefanie Koorey, The Hatchet: Lizzie Borden's Journal of Murder, Mystery and Victorian History.

Thursday, October 30, 7:00 pm, Porter Square Books
Christina Thompson, Come on Shore and We Will Kill and Eat You All: A New Zealand Story

Thompson met her Maori husband in New Zealand nearly 20 years ago; here, she tells the tale of that meeting but also of Maori culture and its contrasts with our own.

Thursday, October 30, 7:00pm, Brookline Booksmith
Elise Tripp, Melinda & Carlos Arredondo, and guests, Surviving Iraq: Soldiers' Stories

Friday, October 31, 7:00pm, Harvard Book Store
Leslie S. Klinger, The New Annotated Dracula
followed by a Lit-Inspired Costume Party

Friday, October 31, 7:00 pm, Porter Square Books
Breakwater Reading Series featuring MFA students from Bridgewater and Emerson Colleges