Free Author Talk: Meet Award-Winning Novelist (Mill Valley)

Submitted by the Event Organizer

photo courtesy of the author

Join us at the Mill Valley Public Library for a conversation with award-winning author and poet, Devi Laskar, in celebration of her new novel, Midnight, at the War. Inspired by journalists Christiane Amanpour and Sylvia Poggioli, Midnight, at the War is a book about a reporter chasing the biggest story of her career as she contends with a tense newsroom, a dangerous global conflict, and all the problems she’s running away from at home, by the acclaimed novelist that Megha Majumdar calls “a gem of a writer.” In conversation with Dr. Vijaya Nagarajan.

Set in the years immediately after 9/11, and drawn from Devi Laskar’s own experience as a government reporter in the 1990s and early aughts, Midnight, at the War is an exploration of love and grief, of moral ambiguity and forgiveness, of modern war and the wars we wage within ourselves.

Devi S. Laskar is a writer and poet, and a visual artist, photographer, songwriter, and former newspaper reporter. Her debut novel, The Atlas of Reds and Blues, focused on the intersection of social racism, misogyny and police violence, and won several awards including the Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature. The novel was named by The Washington Post as one of 50 best books of 2019. Her second novel, Circa, a story about friendship and immigration, was selected as a GOOP Book Club pick. She has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize, and Best of the Net. Laskar holds degrees from Columbia University, the University of Illinois and the University of North Carolina. She is a former journalist, covering crime and government.

Vijaya Nagarajan is an Associate Professor, former Chair of the Department of Theology/Religious Studies, and in the Program of Environmental Studies at the University of San Francisco. She writes and teaches on Hinduism, gender, ritual, ecology, Hinduism/climate, the commons, energy, and ethics. She has also been active in the American Academy of Religion and in environmental movements in the United States and in India. Her book, Feeding a Thousand Souls: Women, Ritual and Ecology in India— An Exploration of the Kolam, is a deep exploration of a popular women’s ephemeral ritual art made of rice flour, the kolam, and the multiple ways in which beauty can embody ethics.

Books will be for sale at this event from the Friends of the Mill Valley Library.

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