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EVENTS

All Lion’s Tooth events are free and open to the public

Thursday, February 9, 2023 | 7PM at the Component Taproom
Component Brewing's Beers & Book Club 
Discussion of We Were Never Here by Andrea Bartz at the Component Taproom

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Buy the book

Saturday February 11, 2023 | 10-7PM
Fundraiser for Bay View Montessori School

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Shop at Lion's Tooth on Saturday February 11 and 10% of the sales will be donated to the Bay View Montessori School.

Saturday, April 8, 2023 | 4PM at The Sugar Maple
Release party for Breakfall, a new novel by Zhanna Slor

Join us around the corner at The Sugar Maple to celebrate the release of Breakfall, the new novel by Milwaukee's own and Lion's Tooth favorite Zhanna Slor.
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Preorder the book
ABOUT THE BOOK
"BREAKFALL is a sexy and compelling slow burn, part twisted romance, part mystery — think FIFTY SHADES OF GREY with a murder."
— Nick Petrie, author of THE RUNAWAY
 Mina Banksy, a 32-year-old writer and mother of a rambunctious toddler, is still reeling from a tumultuous divorce when two Chicago detectives show up at her door looking for her friend, Dylan. Or, more accurately, the van that she allowed him to register in her name, because Dylan, a friend from her former Jiu Jitsu gym, is a recovered addict and convicted felon. The van quickly becomes the least of her problems, as Dylan, too, is nowhere to be found. His disappearance triggers a series of events that turn everyone at the close-knit gym into suspects or victims, and somehow all roads lead back to Mina Banksy, and the scandal that forced her to leave the gym in the first place.
 Part unlikely romance and part murder mystery, set inside the eclectic subculture of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, BREAKFALL is an exploration of sexual desire, motherhood, and marriage in modern times.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Zhanna Slor was born in the former Soviet Union and moved to the Midwest in the early 1990s. She has been published in many literary magazines, including Ninth Letter, Another Chicago Magazine, and Michigan Quarterly Review, as well as contributing to the popular news publication The Forward. Her debut novel, AT THE END OF THE WORLD, TURN LEFT, was named by Booklist as one of the "Top Ten Crime Debuts" of the last year, and by CrimeReads as one of the "Ten Great Novels to Read This April." She lives in Milwaukee with her young daughter. Find her online at zhannaslor.com

​Saturday April 22, 2023 | 10-7PM
Fundraiser for Rufus King International High School

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Shop at Lion's Tooth on Saturday April 22 and 10% of the sales will be donated to Rufus King International High School.

Saturday, June 10, 2023 | 4-7PM
Reading and workshop with author Mary Helen Stefaniak
Author of The Six-Minute Memoir: Fifty-Five Short Essays on Life

Please join us for an evening with author Mary Helen Stefaniak, including a reading and a workshop, both free and open to the public.
Starting at 4:30PM - Reading, signing, and conversation about the author’s new book, The Six-Minute Memoir: Fifty-Five Short Essays on Life. “A treasure trove of marvels, the sort of book you want to wave around and buy for everyone you love”; says Valerie Laken, author of Separate Kingdoms and Dream House. “These brief, beguiling essays turn ordinary moments into extraordinary delights.”
Starting at 5:45PM - Following the reading, you’re invited to join Mary Helen for a free writing workshop. Select a prompt from the end of the book and capture a moment from your own personal past. Sharing your work will be encouraged but not required
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buy the book
​ABOUT THE BOOK
This collection of 55 short essays culled from two decades’ worth of Mary Helen Stefaniak’s Alive and Wellcolumn in The Source—many of them read by the author in six-minute spots on Iowa Public Radio—delivers more joy than many books twice its size. Each essay invites readers into the ordinary life of a woman “with a family and friends and a job and a series of cats and a history, living in one old house after another, at the turn of the 21 st century in the middle of the Middle West.” Set in Iowa, Omaha, Milwaukee, and around the globe, many of the essays are laugh-aloud funny. What’s more, writing prompts at the end of the book invite readers to search their own lives for such moments—the kind that could have been forgotten but instead are turned, by the gift of perspective and perfectly chosen detail, into treasure.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Mary Helen Stefaniak is the author of a collection of short fiction and three novels. Her work has been honored by the Wisconsin Library Association, translated into seven languages, and chosen as an Indie Next Great Read. A graduate of Marquette University and the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, Mary Helen was born and raised in Milwaukee. She spent her early years living in her grandmother’s house on East Bay Street, about a block from Kinnickinnic Avenue. (The location is featured in The Turk and My Mother, her debut novel.) The Six-Minute Memoir: Fifty-Five Short Essays on Life is her first book of nonfiction.
AND SAVE THESE DATES:
  • Saturday March 19, 2023, all day | Lion's Tooth celebrates 2 years in Bay View, with a show of original art by Luke Chappelle and surprises TBA
  • Saturday April 15, 2023, 5-7PM | Release party for How a Flower is Born by Casey "KC" Harrison, the very first mini comic completed as part of the Dandelion Comics Residency
  • ​Saturday April 29, 2023, all day | Independent Bookstore Day, activities TBA​
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Thursday, January 26, 2023 | 5-7PM, discussion starts at 5:30PM
Event with Milwaukee author Kenneth M. Kapp
Discussion of Johnny's Trail of Tears

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ABOUT THE BOOK
Johnny's Trail of Tears is a coming-of-age story unfolding along the Cherokee Trail of Tears. In the manner of magical realism, Johnny sets out in 1948 from southern Illinois and is guided along his journey by Indian Sentinels and Jewish Mystics. After staying with Sequoyah in Fort Payne he is ready to begin the quest on his restored motorcycle, an Indian Pony. He leaves for New Echota, one of the nation’s most significant Cherokee sites where the tragic trail began, and travels along the northern route of the forcedmarch. His last stop is in Springfield, Missouri, the site of a lynching in 1906 that took three innocent African-American lives. He carries memories of their pain and suffering to the bluffs above the Illinois River overlooking Tahlequah, Oklahoma – the end of the Trail.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Ken was a Professor of Mathematics, a ceramicist, a welder, an IBMer, and yoga teacher. He lives with his wife in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, writing late at night in his man-cave. He enjoys chamber music and mysteries. He's a homebrewer and runs whitewater rivers. His essays appear online in havokjournal.com and shepherdexpress.com. Please visit www.kmkbooks.com.

Friday, January 27, 2023 | 5-7PM, discussion starts at 5:30PM
Event with author Elizabeth A. Hoffmann, JD, PhD
Discussion of Lactation at Work

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ABOUT THE BOOK
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In recent decades, as women entered the US workforce in increasing numbers, they faced the conundrum of how to maintain breastfeeding and hold down full-time jobs. In 2010, the Lactation at Work Law (an amendment to the US Fair Labor Standards Act) mandated accommodations for lactating women. This book examines the federal law and its state-level equivalent in Indiana, drawing on two waves of interviews with human resource personnel, supervising managers, and lactating workers. In many ways, this simple law - requiring break time and privacy for pumping - is a success story. Through advocacy by allies, education of managers, and employee initiative, many organizations created compliant accommodations. This book shows legal scholars how a successful civil rights law creates effective change; helps labor activists and management personnel understand how to approach new accommodations; and enables workers to understand the possibilities for amelioration of workplace problems through internal negotiations and legal reforms.
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​ABOUT THE AUTHOR
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Elizabeth A. Hoffmann is Associate Professor of Sociology and Law & Society at Purdue University. Hoffmann studies how people's legal consciousness and organizational location shape their experience of the law in the workplace. Her research has been supported by the National Science Foundation and has won awards from the Labor and Employment Research Association, the Upjohn Institute for Employment Research, and the American Bar Foundation.

​Thursday, January 5, 2023 | 5:30PM
Calling all horror fans! Threads book event
With author 
Bob Mielke and DieDieBooks co-founder Nick Toti

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Lion’s Tooth is so pleased to host an event for the very first title from DieDieBooks, specialized in book-length studies on horror films. Each book covers a specific movie and is written by a different author in a personal, idiosyncratic and obsessively researched style. 
 
Join us on January 5 at 5:30PM for a discussion of Threads, an exploration of the 1984 nuclear panic film by Milwaukee native Bob Mielke. DieDieBooks co-founder Nick Toti will also be here to talk about the idea behind the series and more generally about the vibrant subculture of horror fans.
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ABOUT THE BOOK
 
Threads is a movie that pulls no punches, reveling in the slow-building sense of dread that arises from its nightmarish—and painfully realistic—depiction of the lead-up, destruction, and years-long aftermath of a nuclear attack on Sheffield, England. Commissioned by the BBC to warn audiences about the dangers of the Cold War, this television film has since been reclaimed and celebrated by horror fans as one of the scariest movies ever made.
 
Mikita Brottman, the lauded author of numerous books of film criticism and true crime (and also a Sheffield native), commented on Mielke's book: "You cannot win a nuclear war, but as Mielke explains in this genial and engaging guide, you can definitely enjoy watching one. Although Threads paints a grim portrait of post-nuclear-war Sheffield, Mielke's lively, lucid and cheerful book makes the doom a little less relentless."
 
The central character in Threads is Ruth Beckett, a young woman who is pregnant at the time of the blast and must raise her daughter in the post-apocalyptic hellscape. Karen Meagher, the actor who portrays Ruth, had this to say about Mielke's book: "We are genetically predisposed to survive. It is a primal necessity. The irony is not lost on me that it is 'we' who have laboured, researched, and refined instruments of destruction throughout our existence to essentially obliterate ourselves from existence! I hope the reader will consider every word Mielke has written in this comprehensive and considered, yet easily accessible, book. It took me right back to the visceral experience and time that was Threads."
 
Combining decades of nuclear activism and hands-on research at ground-zero sites with a background in film and cultural studies, Bob Mielke examines Threads through the lens of history, pop culture, and horror. Mielke’s impeccable research, sharp analysis, life experience, and gallows humor bring new insight into exactly what makes this film so disturbing—and disturbingly enduring.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Bob Mielke has been a scholar and activist in the field of nuclear research for over four decades. He lives in Kirksville, Missouri, where he is a Professor of English at Truman State University, teaching literature, film, and cultural studies. His other publications include works of poetry, playwriting, music criticism, and a co-authored work of photojournalism on atomic imagery. A native cheesehead, Mielke is currently co-directing a seven-part documentary on the Milwaukee musician Sigmund Snopek III.

Friday, December 16, 2022 | 5-7PM
The Chrysanthemum Project Zine Launch Party!
With Xueyou Wang

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Come celebrate the launch of The Chrysanthemum Project, Xueyou Wang's thesis zines for the Women's and Gender Studies department at UW-Milwaukee. Print and digital PDFs of the three zines will be available for purchase and perusal!

Saturday, December 3, 2022 | 3-5PM
Book Talk & Character/World-building Workshop
With Jenny Benjamin, author of Corrupted: Book Two of the Terrian Trilogy

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Milwaukee author Jenny Benjamin will be at Lion's Tooth for a book talk about her novel Corrupted: Book Two of the Terrian Trilogy. Jenny will also be leading a character and world building workshop for fantasy and science fiction. This workshop is good for ages 13 and up, especially those interested in writing, drawing, or role-playing games. Book talk starts at 3:30PM.

Friday, December 9, 2022 | 5-7PM
Book talk with Milwaukee author Jennifer DK
Refrigerator Girl, with art by Katelyn Windels

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Join us for an evening with Milwaukee author Jennifer DK to celebrate her graphic novel Refrigerator Girl, with art by Katelyn Windels. Book talk starts at 5:30PM.

ABOUT THE BOOK
Refrigerator Girl is a response to the trope common to comics (movies, tv) known as "fridging" or "girls in refrigerators." These and related terms were coined by Gail Simone to call out the storyline of the wife/ girlfriend/ partner of superheroes being murdered in order to advance the story of the hero, give him emotional depth, make him sad, whatever. OUR Refrigerator Girl finds out she's the girlfriend of a hero, but she resists that narrative and writes her own story.

Saturday, December 10, 2022 | all day, 10AM-8PM
Fundraiser for The Bay View Historical Society

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Shop at Lion's Tooth on Saturday December 10 and 10% of the sales will be donated to the Bay View Historical Society.

Saturday, December 10, 2022 | 5-7PM
Book talk with Dmitry Samarov
Paint By Numbers

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Join us for an evening with Chicago-based author and artist Dmitry Samarov, in celebration of his latest book Paint-by-numbers. Book talk starts at 5:30.

Friday, November 25, 2022 | 5-7PM
Zinester mixer led by Ladasia Bryant

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​Come hang out with other zinesters at Lion's Tooth in an informal mixer led by Ladasia Bryant of Braided Magazine.

Saturday, November 26, 2022 | all day, 10-8PM
Small Business Saturday! 

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Discounts, prizes and surprises all day at Lion’s Tooth. Support your favorite tiny bookstore!!!

Also Saturday, November 26, 2022 | 6-8PM
Special event for author Andy Tyra, in partnership with Milwaukee Record

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Author and illustrator Andy Tyra will come to Lion’s Tooth to read a portion of his book Caverns Below Milwaukee, answer questions about his book, and discuss Cream City creatures. Milwaukee Record will also be on hand to lead a Q&A and talk about some other bits of localized lore. Andy will be selling copies of his book, as well as some prints and other goodies.
Read the Milwaukee Record article about the event here:
https://milwaukeerecord.com/arts/join-us-for-a-caverns-below-milwaukee-conversation-with-andy-tyra-on-november-26/

Friday, November 18, 2022 | 6pm to 8pm
Author event with LGBTQ+ author Anne E. Terpstra (Chicago)

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​Join us for an evening with Chicago author Anne E. Terpstra. Her novel Beyond Any Experience is an intimate, emotional debut that explores grief, parenting, neurodiversity, and the vulnerability of love after loss, all through a queer lens.

Saturday, November 19 | 5-7PM
Author event with local author Geoff Carter

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​Join us for an evening with author Geoff Carter as he discusses his newest book Thicker Than Water, an eco-thriller set in the Northwoods of Wisconsin.

Friday November 11, 2020 | 6-8PM
Poetry reading with Sujash Purna

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Join us for an evening of poetry with Sujash Purna, a Bangladeshi poet and photographer based in Madison, Wisconsin.
A first-year PhD fellow at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Sujash is the author of “Biriyani” (Poet’s Haven) and "Epidemic of Nostalgia'' (Finishing Line Press). His poetry has appeared in California State Poetry Quarterly, Reed Magazine, South Carolina Review, Hawai`i Pacific Review, Kansas City Voices, Poetry Salzburg Review, Gutter, Stonecoast Review, and others. A 2022 Anaphora Residency Fellow and Moon City Review Creative Nonfiction Award Winner, he is the poetry editor for Pyre Magazine. “Azans for the Infidel,” his hybrid chapbook of essays and poems, will come out from Mouthfeel Press in 2023. His photography piece “Enamored with the Unknown” is forthcoming in the Ilanot Review. Sujash and his photography can be found on Instagram @poeticnomadic

Saturday November 12, 2022 | 1PM
Spanish Book Launch Party for author Mandy Reilly

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​Join us for the launch for the Spanish version of Mandy Reilly’s I Know I Am, a kid’s book about body positivity. There will be readings of the book in English and Spanish, an affirmation activity, photo ops, free swag and more! Meet the author plus illustrator Amy Kleinhans and translator Verónica Davis-Quiroz.

Also Saturday November 12, 2022 | 5-7PM
Live music with Sam Rodewald and Jorge Vallentine

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Come check out some live music by live humans! Music will start promptly at 5:30.
Jorge Vallentine draws on a variety of influences to bridge the gap between indie folk singer-songwriter and gritty indie rocker. 
Sam Rodewald takes his influences from operatic aria, classical art songs, and modern pop and folk music and writes new songs that interrogate the absurdity of living and making music in a temporary world.

Saturday November 5, 2022 | 10-7PM
Fundraiser for Fernwood Montessori School

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​Shop the store all day to benefit Fernwood PTO with 10% of our sales.

Also Saturday November 5, 2022 | 2-3PM
Signing with Rob Weiland

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​Milwaukee’s own Rob Weiland will be at Lion’s Tooth signing his comic Girl’s Heist Out

And again Saturday November 5, 2022 | 5-7PM
Mural release party with artist Chandler Hougan

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​Come celebrate the newest addition to our building!

​Special event | Thursday, October 27, 2022 | 5pm to 7pm
Milwaukee Drag: Seven Generations of Glamour, by Michail Takach and B J Daniels  
Presented by the Wisconsin LGBTQ History Project

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Why has Milwaukee been a breeding ground for drag talent since the 1880s? What were the seven generations of glamour? What was the Pansy Craze? Was there really a mid-century drag craze in downtown Milwaukee? When was the Golden Age of Milwaukee Drag?
Get answers to all these questions and more at this book talk by the Wisconsin LGBTQ History Project honoring National LGBTQ History Month!
All book purchases will directly benefit COURAGE MKE.
Questions? Contact wislgbtqhistory@gmail.com

Special Halloween Party with Molly Roberts
Friday, October 28, 2022 | 6pm to 8pm

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Join us for an evening of ART MAGICK: Book signing, art magick crafts, bewitching treats and more. Free and open to the public (like all Lion's Tooth events). Costumes encouraged!

​Kids event | Saturday, October 22, 2022 | 1pm to 2pm
Reading with local children's book author Ceara Milligan

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Bring the kids out to Lion's Tooth for a fun story time with local author Ceara Milligan. Ceara will be reading from her book Penny the Pepper. Like all Lion's Tooth events, this is free and open to the public.

Saturday, October 15, 2022 | 5pm to 8pm
Unmissable release party for Luke Geddes' zine TV Grime

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Join us to celebrate the release of TV Grime's inaugural Halloween issue, a 100+ page compendium of author Luke Geddes's reviews of and personal reflections on every Halloween-themed television episode he has ever seen (along with bonus comics by such cartoonist luminaries as Beth Heinly, John Sammis, and Andy Weiland). Geddes is a local writer who has earned international acclaim for both his Simon & Schuster-published novel Heart of Junk (named one of NPR's Best Books of 2020) and his self-published Chick Tract-style zine about The Velvet Underground's Doug Yule. His latest project, TV Grime, is a deeply personal and yet broadly practical treat, centered on TV Guide-style listings of Halloween-themed programming from throughout the medium's long history. It is sure to be an essential aid in planning readers' spooky-time viewing in years to come. This release event will be accompanied by one-of-a-kind entertainment and will include a "least favorite Halloween candy" buffet. To miss this once-in-a-lifetime treat would be to pull a cruel trick on yourself. Be there!

Tuesday, October 11 to Sunday, October 16, 2022
Window exhibit of post-it ghosts by Zack Pieper
Come meet the artist on Sunday, October 16 | 3pm to 5pm

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You must visit us to check out this gorgeous installation, up only until Sunday Oct 16! Milwaukee's own Zack Pieper covered our windows with his amazing post-it ghosts and it's stunning! Lion’s Tooth will be CLOSED Wednesday, Thursday and Friday (Oct 12-14), this is our present to Bay View while we are away. We resume regular hours on Saturday, and on Sunday Oct 16 the artist will be in attendance from 3-5PM - come say hello!!
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BVGN Double Feature | Friday, September 30, 2022 | 5pm to 9pm
Live screen printing with Living Shadow c/o INVIS
​Plus art by Francisco Ramirez

Live screen printing with Living Shadow c/o INVIS and art by local artist Francisco Ramirez. Bring shirts to print or buy one from Lion’s Tooth: $5 for printing your own shirt, $10 to get a shirt + printing. Fun for kids and adults, come hang out with us!
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Live screen printing with Living Shadow c/o INVIS and art by local artist Francisco Ramirez. Bring shirts to print or buy one from Lion’s Tooth: $5 for printing your own shirt, $10 to get a shirt + printing. Fun for kids and adults, come hang out with us!

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Join the Alliance Française de Milwaukee for a French-speaking happy hour at Lion's Tooth bookstore in Bay View. Free and open to the public, beer and wine available for sale.

Kids event | Saturday, October 8, 2022 | 11am to 1pm
Because Cockroaches Rule by John Janezic
Reading and show with comedy, magic and puppets

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Author John Janezic will be at Lion's Tooth will read from his book Because Cockroaches Rule, based on his cockroach puppet Louie the Roach. This will be a show with comedy and magic. Free and open to the public - bring your kids!
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John Janezic has been an educator for the last 23 years. Originally from Milwaukee, John now resides in Mesa, AZ. He is an award-winning actor and storyteller and has been involved in numerous theatre productions, both in Milwaukee and Arizona, as well as film, television commercials, and professional wrestling. Learn more at Johnjanezic.com

​Gaming party | Saturday, September 24, 2022 | 5pm to 8pm
Word Games! With indie game developers
Celebrating Space Raft and Orebody Binder's Tale coming to Nintendo Switch

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Come support your local bookstore and indie game developers in a unique and intimate video game creator hang out!
Grab a drink, buy a book and play some locally-developed Milwaukee retro games. Play on the NES or try out the Nintendo Switch ports!

​​Poetry reading | Friday, September 23, 2022 | 6:30pm
Poets Stephen Anderson and Barbara Wuest

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Reading and book signing by the authors of High Wire (Anderson) and Rhythms All Aquiver (Wuest).

​Poetry reading | Thursday, September 22, 2022 | 6pm to 7pm
Milwaukee poet Carrie Voigt Schonhoff
Author of The Liminal Space and The End of the Beginning

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Join us for an evening of poetry reading and book signing with local author and poet Carrie Voigt Schonhoff.
Free and open to the public ​

Zine party | Friday, September 2, 2022 | 6pm to 8pm
Lauren Hamell releases their new zine
Lion's Tooth August featured artist

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Milwaukee zinester and artist Lauren Hamell will read from their new zine about The Twilight Zone creator Rod Serling and display their art dolls. More info about Lauren in our Subscriptions page

Thursday, September 8, 2022 | 6pm to 8pm
Books Not Bombs event with Jeff Winkowski and Andy Frye
A benefit for Midwest Books for Prisoners

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Join us for a benefit for Midwest Books To Prisoners. 
Hear two authors and old punks talk about music, zines, pop culture and how the state of the world changed through punk rock and alternative music in the 1990s.  
Jeff Winkowski and Andy Frye will share secrets and perspectives about the Milwaukee and Chicago music scenes, and talk about their inspiration for writing books about the '90s. 

About the authors
Jeff Winkowski is a Milwaukee based writer and teacher, and author of Time of Your Life: Hardcore, Punk, Indie, Rock and a Life of Well Begun in Milwaukee.
Andy Frye is a Chicago-based writer and author of the new novel Ninety Days In The 90s: A Rock N Roll Time Travel Story. 
There will also be 90s trivia and prizes. 
Free admission. All ages welcome. Please bring gently used and unwanted books for donation if you can.

Friday, August 26, 2022 | 4pm to 8pm
Brazilian Portuguese Happy Hour
Special guest DJ Isabella Gargiulo

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Calling all* expats da terrinha and anyone who wants to practice their Brazilian Portuguese!! Happy hour na língua de Camões and DJ-ing by São Paulo riot grrrl (and birthday girl!) Isabella Gargiulo. 
* This will be an anti-fascist good time, so no Bolsominions please, sorry-not-sorry :)
Free and open to the public, all ages.

Friday, August 19, 2022 | 6pm to 8pm
In the Park with Olmsted: A Vision for Milwaukee catalogue discussion

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Join a variety of local authors for an event celebrating the publication of In the Park with Olmsted: A Vision for Milwaukee, a catalogue for a current exhibition of the same name currently on display at the Villa Terrace Decorative Arts Museum (through September 25th). This first concerted look at renowned landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted’s work on parks in Milwaukee features contributions from Michael Carriere, Martha Chaiklin, Lee Hall, Annemarie Sawkins, and Virginia Small. Texts on the history of the public parks movement in Milwaukee and Olmsted’s continued relevance for today’s city combine throughout the catalogue to fill gaps in existing scholarship on these timely topics.

6:00 p.m. – 6:30 p.m.: Gather and enjoy pre-event conversation
6:30 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.: Catalogue discussion with authors
7:30 p.m. – 8:00 p.m.: Post-discussion chatting
Free and open to the public

About In the Park with Olmsted:
This 68-page full-color catalogue, designed by Jena Sher, includes a wide variety of images from the exhibition. Historical texts and maps accompany vintage postcards along with modern and contemporary works of art in a rich presentation of Olmsted and his ability to inspire others. Curated by Martha Chaiklin and Annemarie Sawkins, the exhibition and its accompanying publication mark the 200th anniversary of Olmsted’s birth and tell the story of his profound influence on the greening of America’s cities through his ideal of “parks for all people.”

Kids event | Sunday, August 21, 2022 | 1pm-2pm
Wes Tank live storytelling

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Milwaukee'w own Wes Tank will perform his Books, Beat & Life musical readings live at Lion's Tooth. Free and open to the public, fun for children of all ages!

Friday, August 12 at The Sugar Maple, 2022 | 6pm to 8pm
Zine release party and reading by QZAP co-founder Milo Miller

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Join us for an evening with Milo Miller, Milwaukee-based zinester extraordinaire and co-founder of QZAP (the Queer Zine Archive Project). Milo will be reading from several of their recent zines, including the newly released "I'll Have an 'E', Please, Bob".
Free and open to the public, all ages.

Music at Lion's Tooth | Friday, August 5, 2022 | 6pm to 8pm
Vectors of Resonant Prescients Album Release Show
With special guest Rum Revere

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Join us for the album release show of Kevin DeMars' Vectors of Resonant Prescients with special guest Rum Revere (Brock Gourlie). Music starts at 6:30PM.

SPECIAL EVENT | Thursday, June 9, 2022 | 5pm to 8pm
Discussion of The City Creative: The Rise of Urban Placemaking in Contemporary America
By Michael H. Carriere and David Schalliol

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Join TRUE Skool Co-Executive Director Fidel Verdin and other local not-for-profit leaders, Milwaukee-based historian Michael Carriere, and Minneapolis-based sociologist David Schalliol for an event about how artists, activists, and neighbors are creating community-based programs that are changing the way that cities work.
The discussion will be framed by Carriere and Schalliol’s book, The City Creative: The Rise of Urban Placemaking in Contemporary America (The University of Chicago Press, 2021), for which the pair collaborated with local organizations and visited more than 200 groups in more than 40 cities around the country. The book draws from these experiences, combined with archival research, interviews, original photographs, and more to better understand what is often called “creative placemaking” and to anchor it neighborhoods for a more just and equitable future.
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5PM-6PM Show up when you want, hang out, and enjoy music DJed by Sahan
6PM-7PM Discussion and Q&A
7PM-8PM Post-discussion chatting with music DJed by Sahan
​Free and open to the public
Click for more details

SIGNING PARTY | Tuesday, June 7, 2022 | 4pm to 7pm
Laetitia Barbier signs Tarot and Divination Cards: A Visual Archive​

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Click to Buy
A stunning visual history of tarot! This 400-page book presents--for the first time--a close look at 500 years of figurative card decks created or used for fortune telling, divinations, and oracle purposes, and explores, one card at the time, their iconographic roots at the crossroads of the medieval imaginarium, Western esoteric wisdom, folklore, and also contemporary art and pop culture.
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Photo by Shannon Taggart
French born Laetitia Barbier is an independent scholar, a curator and a professional tarot reader and teacher. She earned a Bachelor Degree in Art History from La Sorbonne University in Paris. Laetitia has worked with Morbid Anatomy in NYC since 2010 as Programming Director and Head Librarian.
Follow Laetitia on Instagram

BAY VIEW GALLERY NIGHT | Friday, June 3, 2022 | 5pm to 9pm
New works on paper by Milwaukee’s Polar Ghost
With special performances of Moustache Bride, Rum Revere and Illiciteagle

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Follow Polar Ghost on Instagram
Check out Moustache Bride, Rum Revere and Illicit Eagle

SPECIAL EVENT | Friday, May 6, 2022 | 6:30pm to 8pm
Chicago Boys - Working Class Readings about Chicago as Place and Character
With Martin Billheimer (Mother Chicago) & Theodore Van Alst (Sacred Smokes & Sacred City)

Martin and Ted are lifelong friends with the City of Chicago in their blood. The City informs and infuses their very different books.  They will read pieces from their respective books and discuss how cities become characters in fiction and non-fiction. Moderated by Feral House publisher, Christina Ward.

Join us for an evening of history writ large and small. Martin Billheimer tells stories about how the great Midwestern cities attempted to "cure" poverty and disease. While Theodore Van Alst, Jr. weaves riveting stories about growing up in Chicago as a "city Indian." The authors, friends and comrades, will discuss their work and how Chicago has influenced their writing.

Beer and wine available for purchase at the Lion's Tooth bar. Complimentary light hors d'ouerves and snacks available. 
Free and open to the public 
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Click to buy MOTHER CHICAGO
Mother Chicago is the story of three institutions – an obscure juvenile experiment called the Chicago Parental School, the great Municipal Sanitarium, and Dunning, the amalgam of poor house, asylum, and cemetery that occupied the far northern
boundaries of the City. This sector of quarantine and detention built on stolen lands acted as a limiter on the production of dreams and an orphan zone for people cast adrift by societal decree.

The book tells the story of the corporeal specters used against the working class: redlining, property speculation, and racism. Like the game of snakes and ladders, the City lays her traps for the unlucky on a numbered grid – easy to navigate yet
impossible to escape.
Martin Billheimer was born in 1970 in Chicago’s working class Uptown neighborhood, then a hotbed of radical activism. His family moved to Bradford, England, a city in the industrial north, where he spent his childhood, before returning to Chicago in the early ‘80s. There, he founded the semi-notorious noise-punk band the Devil Bell Hippies in 1983 and participated in anti-fascist organizing in the music scene. After dropping out of high school, he continued his education by finding work as a dishwasher, house painter, construction worker and furniture mover. He continues to perform and record music in various projects around Chicago and has acted in pantomimes, puppet theater and agit-prop. He writes on culture, art and politics at Counterpunch online and at the Chiseler.
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click to buy Sacred City
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Click to buy Sacred Smokes
Growing up in a gang in the city can be dark. Growing up Native American in a gang in Chicago is a whole different story. Sacred Smokes takes a trip through that unexplored part of Indian Country, an intense journey that is full of surprises, shining a light on the interior lives of people whose intellectual and emotional concerns are often overlooked. This dark, compelling, occasionally inappropriate, and often hilarious linked story collection introduces a character who defies all stereotypes about urban life and Indians. He will be in readers' heads for a long time to come.

Sacred City is an incomparable follow-up to Van Alst's award-winning debut collection, Sacred Smokes. Our young narrator now heads deeper into the heart of the city and himself, accompanied by ancestors and spirits who help him and the reader see that Chicago was, is, and always will be Indian Country. Part love song and part lament, Sacred City explores what options are available to an intelligent, smart-assed young man who was born poor and grew up in a gang. Van Alst's skillful storytelling takes us on a journey where Chicago will never seem the same.
Theodore C. Van Alst, Jr. is a professor and the chair of Indigenous Nations Studies at Portland State University. Hi's mosaic novel about sort of growing up in Chicago, Sacred Smokes, winner of the 2019 Tillie Olsen Award for Creative Writing, is now in its second printing. His follow up, Sacred City, was published November 2021, also by the University of New Mexico Press, who released his 2015 edited volume The Faster Redder Road: The Best UnAmerican Stories of Stephen Graham Jones. His writing and photography have been published in Southwest Review, The Rumpus, Red Earth Review, The Journal of Working-Class Studies, Apex Magazine, Electric Literature, Indian Country Today, and The Massachusetts Review, among others. 

MUSIC | Tuesday, April 19, 2022 | 5pm to 8pm
Teething Veils and special guests

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TEETHING VEILS [Washington DC] | Chamber folk by chamber folk. Featuring members of Silo Halo and The Antiques. Old friends returning to MKE for the first time since 2012!
https://teethingveils.bandcamp.com/

MILDEW | Milwaukee's finest experimental noise duo
https://mildew1.bandcamp.com/

SITUATIONS | Singer/songwriter Ashley Altadonna of Milwaukee's Vacancy Chain
https://situationsmke.bandcamp.com/

**PROOF OF VACCINATION REQUIRED FOR ENTRY. WE'LL ALL BE WEARING MASKS AND WOULD LIKE IT IF YOU WOULD TOO.**

RECORD STORE DAY| Saturday, April 23, 2022 | 11am to 7pm
Fundraiser for Lilliput Records

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On this Record Store Day we will donate 10% of all our sales to effort to turn Milwaukee's Exclusive Company (which will be closing soon) into a new shop called Lilliput Records. Read more about the project and make a direct donation to their gofundme campaign.

Saturday, April 30, 2022 | 11am to 7pm
Independent Bookstore Day

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A nationwide celebration of Bookstores! Shop at Lion's Tooth and enter our raffle to win a specially-curated selection of  cool swag, exclusive gifts and signed books. Promoted by the American Booksellers Association.
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Also don't forget to pick up your free copy of the Midwest Indie Bookstore Roadmap. Organized by the Midwest Independent Booksellers Association and with awesome art by Kevin Cannon, this is an old-school roadmap that allows you to explore nearly 200 bookstores throughout the region.

BOOK RELEASE PARTY | Thursday, December 9 2021, 6PM
Brady St. Pharmacy: Stories and Sketches
​By Tea Krulos 

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Come celebrate Tea Krulos' new memoir "Brady St. Pharmacy: Stories and Sketches" out from Vegetarian Alcoholic Press. Bring proof of vaccination to have drinks.
​ABOUT THE BOOK: Amongst sacred institutions lost to time, the drug store lunch counter remains one of the most lamented and revered pieces of true americana. The community and chaos generated within the walls of these one-stop mom & pops is legendary. Tea Krulos recounts tales from the last days of one of Milwaukee’s finest.
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 Tea Krulos  is a freelance journalist and author from Milwaukee, WI. Some of his favorite subjects to explore include subcultures, weird news, and strange personalities. He writes about local art and entertainment, lifestyle, and food/drink for publications like Milwaukee Magazine, Shepherd Express, and Milwaukee Record.  His books, American Madness, Heroes in the Night, Monster Hunters and Apocalypse Any Day Now explored the driving beliefs and lives of the people who choose to reject accepted reality and substitute their own. 
​Tea writes a weekly column called “Tea’s Weird Week” on teakrulos.com.

OUTREACH | Saturday, December 11, 2021
Support Highland Community School

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On December 11 a percentage of our proceeds will be donated to the Highland Community School, a parent-directed, Montessori Charter school.

ARTIST VISIT | Saturday, December 18 2021, 4-7PM
Rachal Duggan, aka RADILLUSTRATES

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Join us on Saturday December 18 for a special art pop-up. Rachal Duggan, aka RADILLUSTRATES, will be here drawing butt portraits during our vaxxed happy hour.

ART OPENING | Friday, November 19 2021, 5-8PM
Clark Rendall's Spomenik Series

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Join us at the store on Friday, November 19 from 5 to 8PM CST, for an art party celebrating Milwaukee’s own Clark Rendall and his new series of prints inspired by Yugoslav “spomeniks”. We'll be serving drinks but please be prepared to show proof of vaccination - card or photo in your phone. Come have some fun while staying safe and protecting our community. More info about Clark's work here.

BOOK EVENT | October 13, 2021 7:30PM CST 5:30PM PST | 8:30PM EST
Encyclopaedia of Hell II
​The Conquest of Heaven

​By Martin Olson

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Join us for a celebration of Martin Olson’s new book Encyclopaedia of Hell II: The Conquest of Heaven, in partnership with Feral House. This will be an exclusive online event for everyone who buys the book from us, with special guests, signed bookplates, swag and more!
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Buy the book and attend the event | $24.95
YES PLEASE
Emcee/Host: Comedian Jimmy Tingle
Special guests: Olivia Olson (Queen Marceline from Adventure Time), legendary cartoonists and 
Encyclopaedia of Hell illustrators Tony Millionaire and Mahendra Singh plus surprise appearances by comedians you will know
The event is LIVE and interactive! Q&A opportunity for attendees
 
WHEN
Wednesday, October 13, 2021 7:30PM CST (5:30PM PST | 8:30PM EST)

WHAT YOU GET
  • Signed bookplate
  • A chance to win some amazing Encyclopaedia of Hell and Feral House swag, raffled live during the event
  • Grand Prize: one winner--chosen at random beforehand--will have a short song written about them performed live for the attendees
 
HOW TO ATTEND
Buy the book from Lion’s Tooth HERE
We will contact you by email with the details for the event
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About the book:
Evil Readers, as ye partake of Encyclopaedia of Hell, rejoice! The hateful sequel written by Satan has arrived!
After Hell's army conquers Insignificant Earth and devours the human race in a celebratory feast, Lord Satan reveals that he will now journey deep into the universe to find the throne of the despised Creator. There Satan will depose God and take his rightful place as Emperor of Existence. 
However, hellish complications quickly arise: exposed to the rays of the Celestial Sun, Satan's horns and claws become brittle and his undercarriage breaks out in a rash. And a hypnotic, ghostly nun named Debbie seduces the naïve King of Hate into taking a wrong turn. Now Lord Satan must face Oblivion when he enters Heaven's labyrinthine Library, from which there is no escape.
But when the Armies of Hell arrive to find Lord Satan and conquer Heaven, instead they find a disturbing secret at the core of Creation too shocking for even a demon to stomach.
Behold it all in Encyclopaedia of Hell II, a disgraceful tour de force of literary Blasphemy! Pickled with paradoxy, puzzles and paranoia, herein lie terrible cosmic secrets stolen from God's Library, including the mystery of why God created Satan, never mind mosquitoes, cellulite and murder hornets.
Coming someday to a film palace near you: Encyclopaedia of Hell--The Movie! The pernicious production rights have been most evilly obtained by the creative demons at Warner Brothers.
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About the author: 
Martin Olson's savage wit provides the firepower for a preposterous literary feat unaccomplished since Mark Twain and Ambrose Bierce passed--channeling the real voice of Satan. As a satirist, Olson has inflicted numerous comedy series on the populace via HBO, CBS, Showtime, Comedy Central, Disney, and FX. He has most infamously appeared as the Lord of Evil (Hunson Abadeer, father of Marceline the Vampire Queen) on the Cartoon Network series Adventure Time.
In partnership with Feral House
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ARTIST VISIT | August 11-15, 2021
Pacolli's week at Lion's Tooth

Art party and bar mural reveal: Saturday August 14, 2021 4PM CST

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On the week of August 11-15 Lion's Tooth received a special visit from Pacolli, the incredible artist who designed our logo. During her time here Pacolli painted a mural on our bar.
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San Francisco based artist Pacolli is originally from São Paulo, where she was a producer at MTV Brazil and curated and ran an art space called Bendgy. Self taught and with a strong DIY ethic, Pacolli works in a variety of media and styles, including painting, silk screening and collage. In addition to the original pieces, her amazing compositions can be found in prints, zines, and an array of one-of-a-kind gear and objects -- and now also at Lion's Tooth!
Follow Pacolli on Instagram
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Pacolli installing her art at Banksy's legendary print shop and gallery Pictures on Walls, in London.

POETRY READING | Wednesday August 11, 2021 5PM CST 
Holding My Selves Together: New & Selected Poems ​
​By Margaret Rozga

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Join us for an evening with poet Margaret Rozga to celebrate her book Holding My Selves Together: New & Selected Poems. In person at Lion's Tooth and broadcast on Instagram Live @lionstoothmke

About the book:

In Holding My Selves Together: New & Selected Poems, her fifth volume of poems, Margaret Rozga brings together some of her best-loved poems about Milwaukee’s fair housing marches and her concern for issues of peace and social justice with new poems that identify with Alice in Wonderland and imagine new Alice adventures. New poems also grapple with issues of recent political turmoil and pandemic-induced uncertainty. They seek and sometimes find the words, the moments of calm, needed to hold oneself together.
​

About the author: 
As 2019-2020 Wisconsin Poet Laureate, MARGARET ROZGA edited the anthologies Through This Door: Wisconsin in Poems and On the Front Lines // behind the lines. She is an emeritus professor of English at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee at Waukesha and was recently chosen the first scholar / artist in residence at the UWM at Waukesha Field Station.
CLICK HERE TO BUY THE BOOK

BOOK EVENT | Thursday August 5, 2021 5PM CST 
Punks in Peoria: Making a Scene in the American Heartland ​
​By Jonathan Wright and Dawson Barrett

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Lion's Tooth presents a celebration of Punks in Peoria: Making a Scene in the American Heartland, by Jonathan Wright and Dawson Barrett. In person at Lion's Tooth and broadcast on Instagram Live @lionstoothmke
The authors were present virtually for a discussion, reading and Q&A.

About the book: 
Synonymous with American mediocrity, Peoria was fertile ground for the boredom- and anger-fueled fury of punk rock. Jonathan Wright and Dawson Barrett explore the do-it-yourself scene built by Peoria punks, performers, and scenesters in the 1980s and 1990s. From fanzines to indie record shops to renting the VFW hall for an all-ages show, Peoria's punk culture reflected the movement elsewhere, but the region's conservatism and industrial decline offered a richer-than-usual target environment for rebellion. A raucous look at a small-city underground, Punks in Peoria takes readers off the beaten track to reveal the punk rock life as lived in Anytown, U.S.A.
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About the authors: 
JONATHAN WRIGHT is a writer, editor, musician, and longtime veteran of the Peoria music scene. He is editor in chief at Peoria Magazines.

DAWSON BARRETT is an associate professor of history at Del Mar College. His books include The Defiant: Protest Movements in Post-Liberal America.
CLICK HERE TO BUY THE BOOK

February 2020 Pop-up Extravaganza
Sugar Maple • February 15, 2020 

​​Kids subscription book clubs and activities
​The Nile Club (teen band) and Ravi/Lola

​January 2020 Pop-up Extravaganza
Sugar Maple • January 18, 2020 

Our first kids' book club!
​Featured artist Luke Chappelle signs Arcana de Flora
​Justin Kern reads from The Milwaukee Anthology (watch clips in our YouTube channel).
​The Golden Grenades (teen band)
​Blue Unit

Brew City Crafters' Second Annual Holiday Art & Craft Fair

American Serb Hall
5101 W Oklahoma Ave
Saturday, December 14, 2019 • 10AM-4PM
Free admission
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RRRAGS | Riverwest Random Recycled Art and Gift Show

Falcon Bowl
801 E Clarke St
Saturday & Sunday, December 7-8, 2019 • 12-6PM
Free admission
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Punk Rock Rummage Sale

Small Business Saturday
Club Garibaldi
2501 S Superior St
Saturday, November 30, 2019 • 12-4PM
Free admission
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Hovercraft

The Pritzlaff Building
325 N Plankinton Ave
Sunday, December 1, 2019 • 12-6PM
Admission $5, kids free
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Cactus Patch Holiday Pop-up

Cactus Club
2496 S Wentworth Ave
Sunday, November 24, 2019 • 2-6PM
Free admission
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Launch Party and pop-up

With shows by Scrimshaw and Negative/Positive
Sugar Maple
441 E Lincoln Ave
Saturday, November 23, 2019 • 12-6PM
Free admission, kids welcome with parents or guardiansThank you Troy Freund and other friends for the beautiful pics!

​Beet Street Fall Harvest Festival

Block party by Cactus Club
2496 S Wentworth Ave
October 12, 2019 • 12-6PM
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2421 S Kinnickinnic Ave,  Milwaukee WI 53207
Open Mon-Wed 11-5, Thu-Fri 11-6, Sat 10-6 and Sun 10-5 | closing times may vary in event nights
​(414) 455.3498 | Contact Us lionstoothmke@gmail.com
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