Author appearances, poetry and spoken word events in London this week
Thursday 10 October
Helen Fielding is at Foyles signing copies of the new Bridget Jones novel. Yes, it's out. You may have missed the news due to limited press coverage. You're pretty much going to have to book a place just to get in the queue. Free event + price of book, 12pm
Some tickets seem to have become available for Michael Palin at Wimbledon BookFest (£15, 8.15pm); and/or you can see Roy Hattersley (£12.50, 6.15pm).
Conn Iggulden has a new historical series, this time set in the Wars of the Roses. Find out about it at Waterstones Piccadilly. £5 / £3, 6.30pm
Jeanette Winterson is reading at the Wapping Project. £6, 7pm
Roger Robinson and Stan Skinny are the guests at Bang Said the Gun stand up poetry night in SE1. £7 / £5, 8pm
London Liming meets Chill Pill at Rich Mix, with Simon Mole, John Agard, Jessica Care Moore, Deanna Rodger, Raymond Antrobus, the Roundhouse Poets and more. £10 / £8, 7.30pm
Jean Sprackland, Christopher Reid and Helen Mort perform Poetry at the Print Room in Notting Hill. £10, 7.30pm
Poetry meets biomedical science at Keats House tonight. Free, prebook, 7pm
Friday 11 October
The Wood Green Literary Festival starts with Travis Elborough and Max Décharné talking about the way London history can be stranger than fiction. £3, 7pm
Fleur Adock, Kevin Ireland and CK Stead read their poetry at Birkbeck University. £7 / £5, 7pm
Nigel Williams sets his comic novels around Wimbledon; it's only appropriate he should be at the Wimbledon BookFest. £10, 8pm
Saturday 12 October
Saturday at Wimbledon BookFest has David Wood and Tim Vine for the kids, and Jay Rayner, Melissa Benn with Viv Groksop and Roddy Doyle talking to James Naughtie for the grown-ups.
Wood Green gets into full swing. We recommend Lucy Inglis on Georgian London (£3, 1.30pm), John Rogers on This Other London (£3, 3.30pm), Jake Arnott and Cathi Unsworth talking noir (£3, 4.30pm) and Crap London (£3, 5pm). There's loads of stuff for kids, too.
Children's author Trish Cooke is at Camberwell Library at 11am and Peckham Library at 2.30pm
Oscar Guardiola-Rivera is at Housmans to recount the overthrow of Chilean president Salvador Allende. Free, 6.30pm
Sally Pomme Clayton tells a story of a night visit, with sound and film accompaniment, at Rich Mix. £9 / £7, 8pm
Sunday 13 October
Authors shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize read from their novels at the Southbank Centre. £12 / £10, 7.30pm
It's the last day of Wimbledon BookFest, going out in style with Margaret Drabble, Paul O'Prey, Darcey Bussell, Michelle Paver and Cerys Matthews.
Wood Green also draws to a close. Start early with a literary bike ride (£5, 9am), or for the less active try some short crime fiction (£3, 1pm), London's history through crime fiction (£3, 3pm), the Big Green Bookswap (£3, 3.30pm) or a big quiz with Greg Stekelman (£10 a team, 7.30pm). And again, don't forget the young 'uns.
HKB Finn, Grim Chip, Burn After Reading, Domingo Candelario and Cecilia W Anderson join Jumoke Fashola for Jazz Verse Jukebox at Ronnie Scott's. £8, 7.30pm
Enfield Poets make the trip to Kentish Town as the guests at Torriano Poets. £5 / £3, 7.30pm
Monday 14 October
See Simon Mole's spoken word journey through a family's evening meal, at the Southbank Centre today and Tuesday. £8, 7.30pm
Ross Sutherland, Amy Acre and Richard Marsh perform at Hammer and Tongue at the Green Note in Camden. £5, 7.30pm
Philip Oltermann and Miranda Seymour talk about the Anglo-German relationship, at the Courtauld Institute for the Royal Society of Literature. £8 / £5, 7pm
Tall Lighthouse presents an open mic night at the Poetry Cafe. 8pm
Tuesday 15 October
Gary Younge and Hannah Pool talk about the forgotten heroes of black history, at the Southbank Centre. £10, 7.45pm
Valerie Russ, who found 10,000 lions in London's streets (and told us about it) is at the City of Westminster Archives Centre. Free, prebook, 6pm
Peter Conradi, who wrote The King's Speech, is at Daunt Books Marylebone talking about a meeting between FDR and George VI on the eve of WW2. £8, 7pm
Dorothy Koomson is talking about and reading from her work at Canada Water Library. Free, prebook, 7pm
Niall O'Sullivan hosts the Poetry Cafe's weekly open mic night, Poetry Unplugged. £5 / £4, 7.30pm
John McHugo gives a concise history of the Arabs at Kensington Central Library in this pre-London History Festival event. £5 / £3, 6.30pm
Dan Hancox talks to Paul Mason about a village in Spain trying to create a Communist utopia, at Foyles. £5 / £3, 6.30pm
David Graeber, author of The Democracy Project, is at the Southbank Centre discussing the Occupy movement. £8, 6.30pm
Wilbur Smith signs copies of his latest novel at Waterstones Piccadilly from 5.30pm
Wednesday 16 October
Cat lovers make a purr-line for West Hampstead where Tom Cox is talking about The Good, The Bad and The Purry at West End Lane Books. Free, prebook, 7.30pm
Tim Dee and James Cook present the most requested poems in the history of Poetry Please to mark a new anthology, at Foyles. £3, 6.30pm
Explore the poetry of Vladimir Nabakov with Poet in the City at Waterstones Piccadilly. £9.50 / £7.50, 6.30pm
Dinah Livingstone reads her poems at Swiss Cottage library. Free, 6pm
Poets from Woking and Brondesbury go head to head at the Poetry Cafe's Stanza Bonanza. Free, 7.30pm
Follow @LondonistLit for our pick of that day’s literary events.
