Programs

Bestselling author Claire Messud visits the Toronto Reference Library Atrium to discuss her new novel, This Strange Eventful History, an immersive story of a family born on the wrong side of history.

Over seven decades, from 1940 to 2010, the pieds-noirs Cassars live in an itinerant state—separated in the chaos of World War II, running from a complicated colonial homeland, and, after Algerian independence, without a homeland at all. This Strange Eventful History, told with historical sweep, is above all a family story: of patriarch Gaston and his wife Lucienne, whose myth of perfect love sustains them and stifles their children; of François and Denise, devoted siblings connected by their family’s strangeness; of François’s union with Barbara, a woman so culturally different they can barely comprehend one another; of Chloe, the result of that union, who believes that telling these buried stories will bring them all peace.

Author Claire Messud will be interviewed by award-winning writer Souvankham Thammavongsa about This Strange Eventful History, an intimate look at the human toll of the social and political upheaval of the recent past.

Q&A and book signing to follow. Books available for purchase. 

Registration for this event is not required. 

About this event’s guests: 

Claire Messud

Souvankham Thammavongsa

Read more:

This Strange Eventful History

The Emperor’s Children

How to Pronounce Knife

**

This event is part of our signature Salon Series, where we host local and international authors, artists and thinkers in conversation about their new books and big ideas.

**

Note: This is an in-person event located on the first floor Atrium of the Toronto Reference Library (789 Yonge Street). Registration is encouraged, but not required.

Arrive early, meet people. Come early so you can chat with your fellow literature lovers, and make new friends. 

Accessibility at Toronto Public Library:

Toronto Public Library is committed to accessibility. Please call or email us if you are Deaf or have a disability and would like to request accommodation to participate in this program. Please let us know as far in advance as possible and we will do our best to meet your request. At least three weeks’ notice is preferred. Phone 416-393-7099 or email accessibleservices@tpl.ca. 

Bestselling author Billy-Ray Belcourt discusses his new collection of intersecting stories about Indigenous love and loneliness.

Across the prairies and Canada’s west coast, on reserves and university campuses, at literary festivals and existential crossroads, the characters in Coexistence are searching for connection. They’re learning to live with and understand one another, to see beauty and terror side by side, and to accept that the past, present, and future can inhabit a single moment.

An aging mother confides in her son about an intimate friendship from her distant girlhood. A middling poet is haunted by the cliché his life has become. A chorus of anonymous gay men dispense unvarnished truths about their sex lives. A man freshly released from prison finds that life on the outside has sinister strictures of its own. A PhD student dog-sits for his parents at what was once a lodging for nuns operating a residential school—a house where the spectre of Catholicism comes to feel eerily literal.

Billy-Ray Belcourt speaks with author and educator Jeffrey Ansloos about Coexistence, a crystalline, emotionally potent collection of stories.

Q&A and book signing to follow. Books available for purchase.

Ticket registration for this event is required: Free tickets for this event will be available to book via Eventbrite beginning on April 30 at 9:00am ET.

***

This event is part of our signature Salon Series, where we host local and international authors, artists and thinkers in conversation about their new books and big ideas.

It is also part of our Indigenous Celebrations series, generously supported by TD Bank Group, through the TD Ready Commitment.

***

Note: This is an in-person event at The Bram and Bluma Appel Salon, the premiere event space for Toronto Public Library's cultural and heritage programming located on the second floor of the Toronto Reference Library (789 Yonge Street).

Arrive early, meet people. The talk starts at 7pm, but doors open at 6pm. Come early so you can chat with your fellow literature lovers, and make new friends. As with all Appel Salon events, we'll have a bar with a selection of beer and wine, as well as snacks, available to purchase (only debit and credit cards accepted).

Reminder! We oversell these events to make sure that the greatest number of people have an opportunity to attend. Tickets are only guaranteed until 15 minutes before the show starts, at which point we will start opening up available spots to the rush line.

***

Accessibility at Toronto Public Library:

Toronto Public Library is committed to accessibility. Please call or email us if you are Deaf or have a disability and would like to request accommodation to participate in this program. Please let us know as far in advance as possible and we will do our best to meet your request. At least three weeks’ notice is preferred. Phone 416-393-7099 or email accessibleservices@tpl.ca.

Writer and podcaster Rob Harvilla visits the Appel Salon to regale music lovers with tales from his new book 60 Songs That Explain the ‘90s, a companion to the #1 music podcast on Spotify.

The 1990s were a chaotic and gritty and utterly magical time for music, a confounding barrage of genres and lifestyles and superstars, from grunge to hip-hop, from sumptuous R&B to rambunctious ska-punk, from Axl to Kurt to Missy to Santana to Tupac to Britney. In 60 Songs that Explain the ‘90s, Ringer music critic Rob Harvilla reimagines all the earwormy, iconic hits Gen Xers pine for with vivid historical storytelling, sharp critical analysis, rampant loopiness, and wryly personal ruminations.

Rob Harvilla will be interviewed by CBC Radio's Elamin Abdelmahmoud about the bizarre, joyous, and inescapable songs from a decade we both regret entirely and miss desperately.

Q&A and book signing to follow. Books available for purchase.

Ticket registration for this event is required: Free tickets for this event will be available to book via Eventbrite beginning on May 8 at 9:00am ET.

About this event’s guests:

Rob Harvilla

Elamin Abdelmahmoud

Read more:

60 Songs That Explain the ‘90s

Son of Elsewhere

The Podcast:

60 Songs That Explain the ‘90s

**

This event is part of our signature Salon Series, where we host local and international authors, artists and thinkers in conversation about their new books and big ideas.

**

Note: This is an in-person event at The Bram and Bluma Appel Salon, the premiere event space for Toronto Public Library's cultural and heritage programming located on the second floor of the Toronto Reference Library (789 Yonge Street).

Arrive early, meet people. The talk starts at 7 pm, but doors open at 6 pm. Come early so you can chat with your fellow literature lovers, and make new friends. As with all Appel Salon events, we'll have a bar with a selection of beer and wine, as well as snacks, available to purchase (only debit and credit cards accepted).

Reminder! We oversell these events to make sure that the most people have an opportunity to attend. Tickets are only guaranteed until 15 minutes before the show starts, at which point we will start opening up available spots to the rush line.

**

Accessibility at Toronto Public Library:

Toronto Public Library is committed to accessibility. Please call or email us if you are Deaf or have a disability and would like to request accommodation to participate in this program. Please let us know as far in advance as possible and we will do our best to meet your request. At least three weeks’ notice is preferred. Phone 416-393-7099 or email accessibleservices@tpl.ca.

Tommy Orange, author of Pulitzer Prize finalist and American Book Award-winning novel There There, discusses Wandering Stars, his follow-up novel tracing the legacies of the Sand Creek Massacre of 1864 and the Carlisle Industrial School for Indians through to the shattering aftermath of Orvil Redfeather’s shooting in There There.

Colorado, 1864. Star, a young survivor of the Sand Creek Massacre, is brought to the Fort Marion Prison Castle, where he is forced to learn English and practice Christianity by Richard Henry Pratt, an evangelical prison guard who will go on to found the Carlisle Industrial School for Indians, an institution dedicated to the eradication of Native history, culture, and identity. A generation later, Star’s son, Charles, is sent to the school, where he is brutalized by the man who was once his father’s jailer. Under Pratt’s harsh treatment, Charles clings to moments he shares with a young fellow student, Opal Viola, as the two envision a future away from the institutional violence that follows their bloodline.

Oakland, 2018. Opal Viola Victoria Bear Shield is barely holding her family together after the shooting that nearly took the life of her nephew Orvil. From the moment he awakens in his hospital bed, Orvil begins compulsively googling school shootings on YouTube. He also becomes emotionally reliant on the prescription medications meant to ease his physical trauma. His younger brother Lony, suffering from PTSD, is struggling to make sense of the carnage he witnessed at the shooting by secretly cutting himself and enacting blood rituals which he hopes will connect him to his Cheyenne heritage. Opal is equally adrift, experimenting with Ceremony and peyote, searching for a way to heal her wounded family.

Tommy Orange speaks with Elamin Abdelmahmoud, host of CBC Radio's Commotion, about Wandering Stars, a story that is by turns shattering and wondrous.

Q&A and book signing to follow. Books available for purchase.

Ticket registration for this event is required: Free tickets for this event will be available to book via Eventbrite beginning on May 14 at 9:00am ET.

***

This event is part of our signature Salon Series, where we host local and international authors, artists and thinkers in conversation about their new books and big ideas.

It is also part of our Indigenous Celebrations series, generously supported by TD Bank Group, through the TD Ready Commitment.

***

Note: This is an in-person event at The Bram and Bluma Appel Salon, the premiere event space for Toronto Public Library's cultural and heritage programming located on the second floor of the Toronto Reference Library (789 Yonge Street).

Arrive early, meet people. The talk starts at 7pm, but doors open at 6pm. Come early so you can chat with your fellow literature lovers, and make new friends. As with all Appel Salon events, we'll have a bar with a selection of beer and wine, as well as snacks, available to purchase (only debit and credit cards accepted).

Reminder! We oversell these events to make sure that the most people have an opportunity to attend. Tickets are only guaranteed until 15 minutes before the show starts, at which point we will start opening up available spots to the rush line.

***

Accessibility at Toronto Public Library:

Toronto Public Library is committed to accessibility. Please call or email us if you are Deaf or have a disability and would like to request accommodation to participate in this program. Please let us know as far in advance as possible and we will do our best to meet your request. At least three weeks’ notice is preferred. Phone 416-393-7099 or email accessibleservices@tpl.ca.

Writer Keiron Pim visits the Appel Salon to discuss his new book Endless Flight: The Genius and Tragedy of Joseph Roth with host Eleanor Wachtel.

The mercurial, self-mythologising novelist and journalist Joseph Roth, author of the 20th-century masterpiece The Radetzky March, was the finest observer and chronicler of his age. Endless Flight travels with Roth from his childhood on the eastern edge of the Austro-Hungarian Empire to an unsettled life spent roaming Europe between the wars. His decline mirrored the collapse of civilized Europe: in his last peripatetic decade, he opposed Nazism in exile from Germany, his wife succumbed to schizophrenia and he died an alcoholic on the eve of WWII.

Exploring the role of Roth’s absent father in his imaginings, his attitude to his Jewishness and his restless search for home, Endless Flight delivers a visceral yet sensitive portrait of his quest for belonging, and a riveting understanding of the brilliance and beauty of his work.

Writer Keiron Pim will be interviewed by writer and broadcaster Eleanor Wachtel about his gripping account of Roth’s legacy, which speaks powerfully to us in our era of uncertainty, refugee crises and rising ethno-nationalism.

Q&A and book signing to follow. Books available for purchase.

Ticket registration for this event is required: Free tickets for this event will be available to book via Eventbrite beginning on May 20 at 9:00am ET.

About this event’s guests:

Keiron Pim

Eleanor Wachtel

Read more:

Endless Flight: The Genius and Tragedy of Joseph Roth

***

This event is part of our new Jewish Heritage programming series, presented in partnership with the Miles Nadal JCC.

This series represents the first of two new heritage series, along with Islamic Heritage (coming this fall). These series, alongside our established Black History, Asian Heritage, and Indigenous Celebrations series, aim to showcase the rich tapestry of cultures that make up our city.

By providing a platform for learning, discussion, and celebration, we hope to foster a greater understanding and appreciation of the Jewish community's invaluable contributions to our shared history and identity.

Join us in celebrating the diversity that strengthens our community and makes our city a more vibrant and inclusive place for all.

***

This event is also part of our signature Salon Series, where we host local and international authors, artists and thinkers in conversation about their new books and big ideas.

***

Note: This is an in-person event at The Bram and Bluma Appel Salon, the premiere event space for Toronto Public Library's cultural and heritage programming located on the second floor of the Toronto Reference Library (789 Yonge Street).

Arrive early, meet people. The talk starts at 7 pm, but doors open at 6 pm. Come early so you can chat with your fellow literature lovers, and make new friends. As with all Appel Salon events, we'll have a cash bar with a selection of beer and wine, as well as sandwiches and snacks.

Tickets are only guaranteed until 15 minutes before the show starts, at which point we will start opening up available spots to the rush line.

Accessibility at Toronto Public Library:

Toronto Public Library is committed to accessibility. Please call or email us if you are Deaf or have a disability and would like to request accommodation to participate in this program. Please let us know as far in advance as possible and we will do our best to meet your request. At least three weeks’ notice is preferred. Phone 416-393-7099 or email accessibleservices@tpl.ca.

Pop culture critic, podcaster and video-maker Matt Baume visits the Appel Salon to discuss his new book Hi Honey, I'm Homo! Armed with humour, wit and reams of research, Matt will share behind the scenes stories and examine the cultural impact of the most groundbreaking coming out scenes in TV history.

For decades, amidst the bright lights, studio-audience laughs, and absurdly large apartment sets, the real-life story of American LGBTQ+ liberation unfolded in plain sight in front of millions of viewers, most of whom were laughing too hard to mind. Whether with awkward confessions, sympathetic support or jubilant celebrations, sitcoms have tackled LGBTQ+ coming out stories from every conceivable angle. As a result, they have plenty to teach us about the best (and worst) ways to foster an environment where everyone feels comfortable being themselves. 

Author Matt Baume speaks with writer, film programmer, pop culture critic Anthony Oliveira about how comedy and humor have made coming out easier, how queer TV characters have evolved over the years and why coming out is such a vital part of Pride.

Ticket registration for this event is required: Free tickets for this event will be available to book via Eventbrite beginning on May 15 at 9:00am ET.

About this event’s guests:

Matt Baume

Anthony Oliveira

Read more:

Hi Honey, I’m Homo!

Dayspring

**

This event is part of our signature Salon Series, where we host local and international authors, artists and thinkers in conversation about their new books and big ideas.

**

Note: This is an in-person event at The Bram and Bluma Appel Salon, the premiere event space for Toronto Public Library's cultural and heritage programming located on the second floor of the Toronto Reference Library (789 Yonge Street).

Arrive early, meet people. The talk starts at 7 pm, but doors open at 6 pm. Come early so you can chat with your fellow literature lovers, and make new friends. As with all Appel Salon events, we'll have a cash bar with a selection of beer and wine, as well as sandwiches and snacks.

Tickets are only guaranteed until 15 minutes before the show starts, at which point we will start opening up available spots to the rush line.

Accessibility at Toronto Public Library:

Toronto Public Library is committed to accessibility. Please call or email us if you are Deaf or have a disability and would like to request accommodation to participate in this program. Please let us know as far in advance as possible and we will do our best to meet your request. At least three weeks’ notice is preferred. Phone 416-393-7099 or email accessibleservices@tpl.ca.

Celebrated NPR music critic Ann Powers visits the Appel Salon to discuss her new book Traveling: On the Path to Joni Mitchell. Not another standard telling of the Joni Mitchell story but a tale of long journeying told through extensive interviews and deep archival research, creating a fresh and fascinating addition to the Joni Mitchell canon.

Joni Mitchell has spellbound listeners for decades as one of the most influential singer-songwriters to emerge from the Folk music scene of the 1960s, and her musical legacy left a loud imprint on musicians, fans and storytellers of all walks of life. In Traveling, Ann Powers brings her honed skills as a music biographer to trace the story of Joni from rural Canada to her ultimate International stardom and her recent triumphant comeback after the aneurysm that nearly took her life. And along the way, Powers delivers a new type of music biography that contradicts the traditional idea that a fan can ever truly and deeply know their musical icons.

Ann Powers shares Traveling: On the Path to Joni Mitchell and discusses this singular creative force that was never content to remain in one place, or remain the same person, her entire life.

About this event’s guests:

Ann Powers

Read more:

Traveling: On the Path to Joni Mitchell

Good Booty: Love and Sex, Black & White, Body and Soul in American Music

**

This event is part of our signature Salon Series, where we host local and international authors, artists and thinkers in conversation about their new books and big ideas.

**

Note: This is an in-person event at The Bram and Bluma Appel Salon, the premiere event space for Toronto Public Library's cultural and heritage programming located on the second floor of the Toronto Reference Library (789 Yonge Street).

Arrive early, meet people. The talk starts at 7 pm, but doors open at 6 pm. Come early so you can chat with your fellow literature lovers, and make new friends. As with all Appel Salon events, we'll have a cash bar with a selection of beer and wine, as well as sandwiches and snacks.

Tickets are only guaranteed until 15 minutes before the show starts, at which point we will start opening up available spots to the rush line.

Accessibility at Toronto Public Library:

Toronto Public Library is committed to accessibility. Please call or email us if you are Deaf or have a disability and would like to request accommodation to participate in this program. Please let us know as far in advance as possible and we will do our best to meet your request. At least three weeks’ notice is preferred. Phone 416-393-7099 or email accessibleservices@tpl.ca.