Each month, the Elliott Bay Book Club reads and discusses the best in contemporary fiction with the occasional classic thrown in for good measure. Our February book selection is The New Life by Orhan Pamuk. Through the simple act of reading a book, a young student is uprooted from his old life and identity. Within days he has fallen in love with the luminous and elusive Janan; witnessed the attempted assassination of a rival suitor; and forsaken his family to travel aimlessly through a nocturnal landscape of travelers' cafes and apocalyptic bus wrecks. As imagined by Pamuk, the result is a wondrous marriage of the intellectual thriller and high romance. The Nation said, "We are fortunate that Pamuk is alive, and that his The New Life is out there."

Co-presented with the WASHINGTON CENTER FOR THE BOOK AT THE SEATTLE PUBLIC LIBRARY. Seattle writers, analysts, and civic instigators Eric Liu and Nick Hanauer have followed up on their lively earlier collaboration, The True Patriot, with their newest, The Gardens of Democracy: A New American Story of Citizenship, the Economy, and the Role of Government (Sasquatch). "Eric Liu and Nick Hanauer are progressives who always think outside the box, and that's why everyone should pay attention to them. The Gardens of Democracy shakes up our stale debate over government's role in a dynamic society, and in a thoughtful, creative and inventive way. Everyone will find something to disagree with here, and that's the point: getting us out of our comfort zones is an immensely useful democratic undertaking." – E.J. Dionne, Jr. Free admission. The program will take place on Level 4 (the red floor)—in Washington Mutual Foundation Meeting Room 1. Seattle Central Public Library is at 1000 Fourth Avenue (between Madison & Spring). For more information, please call Elliott Bay at (206) 624-6600, The Seattle Public Library at (206) 386-4636, or see www.spl.org.