Even if July and August are the sleepiest months of the publishing calendar, Northwest authors have been an industrious bunch. The stack of recent local releases is over a foot high, and several writers have Seattle readings and events on the calendar. Let’s begin our mid-summer slush pile with bestselling Bainbridge Island scribe Rebecca Wells, whose 1996 Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood put her on the map. Her latest bears an even longer, more whimsical title: The Crowning Glory of Calla Lily Ponder (Harper, $25.99), and there’s an adorable child jumping for joy on the cover–not unlike Ya-Ya Sisterhood, come to think of it. What’s it about? A young girl’s coming of age in rural Louisiana during the 1950s and ’60s. Written in the first-person, Crowning Glory has its heroine eventually move to New Orleans, in pursuit of her dream of becoming a hairdresser. Sample sentence: “The best way to travel from the tiny, sleepy hamlet of La Luna down to the bustling city of New Orleans is to float among a few high, scattered clouds along the waterways that wind their way south toward the great dark expanse of the Gulf of Mexico.”But, wait, could that be a hurricane blowing in from the great dark expanse of the Gulf of Mexico….? Slush Pile! continues after the jump…Wells will read from Crowning Glory at the Seattle Central Library, 7 p.m. Fri., July 10.And from the Big Easy, we travel to Tanzania, Bolivia, Rwanda, and points beyond in Matt Harding’s Where the Hell Is Matt? Dancing Badly Around the World (Skyhorse, $14.95). If you own a computer, you may already be acquainted with the viral videos from the globetrotting former videogame designer. The book is basically his illustrated travel diary, postcards from around the world, envy-provoking evidence that a lucky few do strike it rich–or at least get small book deals–from the Internet. And the dude gets to travel to the Galapagos Islands. Where, he observes, “Something I didn’t expect to find in the Galapagos: a castle-themed karaoke discotheque.” Who says travel isn’t broadening?Making movies of a different nature is the irrepressible Karl Krogstad, who scored introductory remarks from Tom Robbins and Gus Van Sant for his Shot to Death (Why Not, $19.95), a memoir/manifesto on his many years of sub-indie filmmaking in Seattle. It’s available through his Web site, and the dust jacket blurb calls it, with typical modesty, “the best book ever written about truly independent film and video making.” Which provides a useful reminder to Harding (above) and other authors: There’s never, ever such a thing as too much self-promotion.Taking a more wry, humorous approach to her subject is Jillian Venters. Her Gothic Charm School: An Essential Guide for Goths and Those Who Love Them (Harper, $13.99) offers useful advice on topics including:• Why friends don’t let friends dress like The Crow• How to reassure people you aren’t a Satanist, drug fiend, or psycho killer• The difference between snarkiness and cattinessSample wisdom: “Goth wardrobe is not ideal for all weather conditions. Summer is the obvious problem season for Goths; not only does all-black clothing absorb the heat very efficiently, but it’s hard to maintain an air of otherworldliness and mystery when you’re a peeling, sunburned mess.” We like this woman. Venters will read at Bellevue Regional Library, 7 p.m. Mon., June 29.A woman with a very different view of the outdoors is Amy Waeschle. In Costa Rica, she writes, “After my first wave, when everything fell into place again and I was soaring, gliding, flying forever; I was in the Zone.” Yes, she’s a surfer, one whose memoir, Chasing Waves: A Surfer’s Tale of Obsessive Wandering (Mountaineers Books, $16.95), documents just that. She may not have quite the same travel budget (or Web site) as dancing Matt Harding, but she’s considerably more graceful on the water. She reads with fellow surfer Jaimal Yogis at Eagle Harbor Books (on Bainbridge Island), 7:30 p.m. Thurs., June 25.Closer to home, the jacket flap of Sonic Boom: The History of Northwest Rock, from “Louie, Louie” to “Smells Like Teen Spirit” (Backbeat, $19.99) informs us that, “Pete Blecha was crowned Seattle’s unofficial curator of rock ‘n’ roll by Seattle Weekly.” Really? I can’t find that reference, probably because it predates our online archives. But the book, which covers the last half-century (not just the Sonics, Hendrix, and Cobain) is well researched and comprehensive. The jacket photo is by Charles Peterson, certainly a badge of authenticity. This Seattle music history ends in the post-grunge era, but not before mentioning two current SW bloggers: Duff McKagan (well, meaning his very non-grunge band Guns N’ Roses) and Krist Novoselic.Proudly and defiantly stuck in the early-’90s grunge era is Buddy, one of cartoonist Peter Bagge’s music-world characters. But his new collection Everybody Is Stupid Except for Me, And Other Astute Observations (Fantagraphics, $16.99) takes a national and political view. These are strips that first appeared in Reason magazine. Among his satiric subjects with local ties are “My Very Own Monorail” (that from 2005) and a strip on subsidized sports stadiums called “Let’s All Give Money to the Rich Man” (from 2007). The latter, of course, followed the new Mariners and Seahawks facilities; and it preceded the final negotiations with the Sonics’ out-of-state owners. And we all know how that turned out.Maybe it’s time to take up surfing. Or dancing. Or, this being summer, reading.