Rebecca Skloot November 16, 2010

Contact: Kate Hughes/Lianne Wiker/Brenna O’Leary FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
773.969.5200



Lecture, Book signing and Dinner with
Best-Selling Author Rebecca Skloot
Featuring Special Guest, Veteran Journalist Bill Kurtis,
on November 16

Co-Sponsored by



and



Learn more about the new book that has The New York Times, Publisher’s Weekly, The Washington Post, The New Yorker, People and Science Magazine
buzzing at this one-night-only event

Chicago— The Chicago Council on Science and Technology and Children’s Memorial Research Center will host a lecture, book signing and special dinner, featuring Veteran Journalist Bill Kurtis and Rebecca Skloot, critically acclaimed author of the New York Times bestseller The Immortal Life of HEnrietta LAcks, on Tuesday, November 16, 2010. The one-night-only event will be held at Thorne Auditorium at Northwestern University’s Chicago Campus, 375 East Chicago Ave. A Members-Only cocktail reception will be held at 5 p.m., followed by a 6 p.m. presentation and Q & A, a 7 p.m. book signing and an invited guest dinner at 8 p.m. This not-to-be-missed presentation is made possible by the Bea Schriesheim Memorial Research Fund. Tickets to the presentation are $10 for Members and $15 for Non-Members; tickets to the dinner are $50. Limited seating is available. For reservations or more information, visit www.c2st.org, call 312-567-5829 or email crhodes@c2st.org.

Named a Barnes and Noble “Discover Great New Writers” Pick, Skloot’s searing non-fiction work is now being made into an HBO movie produced by Oprah Winfrey and Alan Ball. Skloot takes readers on an extraordinary journey that explores the complicated legacy of one woman’s priceless contribution to modern science and the medical revolution that followed. Critics have raved that The Immortal Life of HEnrietta LAcks is “Provocative,” (Dwight Garner, The New York Times) and Eric Roston of The Washington Post said the book is “Vivid... A deftly crafted investigation of a social wrong committed by the medical establishment as well as the scientific and medical miracles to which it led.”

Rebecca Skloot is a science writer whose work has appeared in The New York Times Magazine; O, The Oprah Magazine; Discover; and many other publications. She specializes in narrative science writing and is the guest editor of The Best American Science Writing 2011, a contributing editor at Popular Science magazine, and has worked as a correspondent for WNYC’s Radiolab and PBS’s Nova ScienceNOW. She has been featured on numerous television shows, including CBS Sunday Morning, The Colbert Report, Fox Business News, and others. Skloot served for eight years on the Board of Directors of the National Book Critics Circle, where she was a vice president and judge for their yearly book awards. She has a B.S. in biological sciences and an MFA in creative nonfiction and has taught in the creative writing programs at the University of Memphis and the University of Pittsburgh; she’s also taught science journalism in NYU’s graduate Science, Health and Environmental Reporting Program. She currently teaches writing workshops and gives talks on subjects ranging from bioethics to book proposals at conferences and universities nationwide.
Bill Kurtis, veteran journalist and co-anchor of the CBS 2 news at 6 p.m. in Chicago and current host of A&E crime and news documentary shows, including Investigative Reports, American Justice, and Cold Case Files. Previously, he anchored CBS Morning News.
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Established in 2006, C²ST seeks to be the preeminent regional consortium for science- and technology-related education and policy and a prominent voice nationally. Through its public programs C²ST brings together Chicago’s scientific leaders – academic, corporate, government, museums, universities and national laboratories- to provide a forum for the discussion of current issues of scientific interest. Visit www.c2st.org for more information.
Established in 1986, Children's Memorial Research Center is the research arm of Children's Memorial Hospital, the pediatric teaching hospital for Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine. The research center is also one of 29 interdisciplinary research centers and institutes of the Feinberg School, where principal investigators who are part of the research center are full-time faculty members. Over 200 investigators, 500 staff and numerous trainees contribute to the six growing Programs in Basic Research and Translational Medicine. In addition, there are ten Centers of Excellence.