Among the authors visiting Chicago in April are poets, novelists, and essayists, as well as winners of the Pulitzer Prize, Chicago Heartland Prize, and National Book Award. Here are some of the month’s highlights:
 
Mary Oliver, who won the Pulitzer Prize for her poetry collection American Primitive (811.54 O48a), speaks at Rubloff Auditorium, 280 S. Columbus Dr., on Wednesday, April 2, at 6:30 pm. The Poetry Center sponsors this event, which is free for members and costs $10 for nonmembers and $8 for students. http://www.poetrycenter.org/reading/index.html 
 
The Chicago Public Library hosts essayist and novelist Pico Iyer, author of Sun after Dark: Flights into the Foreign (910.4 I97s2004) and Video Night in Kathmandu: And Other Reports from the Not-So-Far East (950.42 I97V) to discuss his new book The Open Road: The Global Journey of the Fourteenth Dalai Lama on Wednesday, April 16, at 6:00 pm at the Auditorium of the Harold Washington Library Center (400 S. State Street) in their free author series. http://www.chipublib.org/events/details/id/5035/

On Sunday, April 20, at noon, Elizabeth Strout, author of Amy and Isabelle (813.54 S925a1998), joins Victoria Lautman for WFMT’s Writers on the Record series at the Lookingglass Theatre. Tickets are free, but reservations are recommended. http://www.wfmt.com/main.taf?p=1,1,41,23