ALTAR TO AN ERUPTING SUN | A Busboys and Poets Books Presentation
Date and Time
Jul 20, 2023 6:00 pm
Location
14th & V
2021 14th St NW, Washington, District of Columbia, 20009
Jul 20, 2023 6:00 pm
14th & V
“This novel is indeed a gift to our remembrance and inspiration for our future. Collins tells a story of a movement, or movements, which need to be told. I know these stories, love them, and have lived many of them with characters bigger than life, more courageous than any heroes of the past, and a commitment to Mother Earth.”
—Winona LaDuke, Honor the Earth, author of All Our Relations: Native Struggles for Land and Life
Join Chuck Collins, author of the new novel, Altar to an Erupting Sun, in conversation with climate activist Liz Butler from Movement Catalyst and IPS Executive Director and award-winning novelist, Tope Folarin to discuss his unique novel exploring how a community deals with a violent tragedy in the midst of a slow going tragedy: climate change. In this near-future story, we’re introduced to veteran environmental activist Rae Kelliher following her shocking death. Her husband Reggie calls her “party in a box” and “a weaver of people and movements.” Facing a diagnosis of terminal illness, Rae engages in a shocking suicide-murder, taking the life of an oil company CEO for his complicity in delaying responses to climate catastrophe. Seven years later, Rae’s friends and family gather at her Vermont farm to try to understand her violent exit and the rapid social transformations triggered by her desperate act.
Chuck Collins is joining us on the Busboys stage to share his new novel. Copies of the book will be available for purchase during and after the event, and Collins will be signing following the program.
This event is free and open to all. Our program begins at 6:00 pm, and will be followed by an audience Q&A. Copies of ALTAR TO AN ERUPTING SUN will be available for purchase before and after the program. Please note that this event is IN PERSON and will NOT be livestreamed.
We ask that guests RSVP HERE in order to receive direct updates about the event
Chuck Collins is a campaigner and storyteller who has worked for decades on environmental and economic justice campaigns. He is the Director of the Program on Inequality and the Common Good at the Institute for Policy Studies where he co-edits Inequality.org. He is co-founder of DivestInvest.org, a global movement to divest from fossil fuels and invest in climate solutions; and trustee of the Post-Carbon Institute and Resilience.org. Collins is an expert on U.S. inequality, community resilience, and the racial wealth divide and the author of numerous reports and several other books, including Is Inequality in America Irreversible? He is a founding board member of the Patriotic Millionaires. He lives with his family in Southern Vermont. Altar to an Erupting Sun is his debut novel.
Liz Butler has over 20 years of experience organizing and campaigning on critical issues, with a focus on both corporate and legislative campaigns. She currently serves as the Movement Strategy Center’s Network Organizing Project Director and Senior Fellow. She lives just outside of Washington, D.C. with her husband and son.
Tope Folarin is a Nigerian-American writer based in Washington DC. He serves as Director of the Institute for Policy Studies and the Lannan Visiting Lecturer in Creative Writing at Georgetown University. He is the recipient of the Caine Prize for African Writing, the Whiting Award for Fiction, and a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts, among other awards. He was educated at Morehouse College and the University of Oxford, where he earned two Masters degrees as a Rhodes Scholar. His debut novel, A Particular Kind of Black Man, was published by Simon & Schuster.
