Amaze your friends with Santa Fe facts

What does “Santa Fe” mean? At least four flags have flown over Santa Fe. What are they? When was Santa Fe first called “the City Different,” and by whom?

Those are three of the hundreds of questions (with answers) in Elizabeth West’s new book, “Santa Fe: 400 Years, 400 Questions.” West will be reading from the book at 6 p.m. Monday, Aug. 27, at Collected Works, 202 Galisteo, Santa Fe.

West served on the History Task Force that planned Santa Fe’s 400th birthday celebration in 2010.

Also at Collected Works, Doug Fine will discuss his book “Too High to Fail: Cannabis and the New Green Economic Revolution” at 6 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 30. The book contains, among other issues, a brief history of cannabis and an insider’s perspective on a growing season in California’s Mendocino County, where it drives an estimated 80 percent of the economy.

Fine, a New Mexico resident, wrote the book “Farewell, My Subaru.”

AT BOOKWORKS: Award-winning political cartoonist Ted Rall discusses his new book, “The Book of Obama: From Hope and Change to the Age of Revolt,” at 7 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 30. Rall’s book traces the arc of Obama’s political career and the emergence of the tea party and the occupy movement.

SOUTHWEST WRITERS EVENT: Carolyn Flynn talks about “Get Off the Map To Get On the Map: The Art of Originality in Writing” from 10 a.m.-noon Saturday, Sept. 1, at New Life Presbyterian Church, 5540 Eubank NE.

Flynn, editor of the Journal’s Sage magazine, will discuss fresh techniques for telling timeless stories and will give share her insights into creating a writing life that cultivates originality. $5 general public.

IN OLD TOWN: Michael Gray of Albuquerque signs copies of his two new books, the sci-fi novel “Asleep at the Wheel of Time” and the memoir “The Flying Caterpillar,” on Saturday, Sept. 1, from 1-3 p.m. at Treasure House Books & Gifts, 2012 South Plaza NW.

IN RIO RANCHO: Placitas author Bill Dunmire will give a talk from 10 a.m.-1 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 1, at the Cafe Bella, 2115 Golf Course Road in Rio Rancho. Dunmire’s slide-illustrated talk will be based on his new book, “New Mexico’s Living Landscapes: A Roadside View.”

RECENT BOOK: The University of Nevada Press has published “Atomic Comics, Cartoons Confront the Nuclear World.” The author is the late Ferenc Morton Szasz, who was Regents professor of history at the University of New Mexico, where he taught for 43 years.

The book references comic book superheroes like Spider-Man and Captain Atom and comic strip characters like Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon in examining how comic books, comic strips and other cartoons addressed the Atomic Age from the 1920s to the present, with a special focus on post-World War II. The book primarily samples comics and cartoons in the United States but also some in Japan and in Europe. Retail price is $34.95.

Among Szasz’s other books were “Larger Than Life: New Mexico in the 20th Century” and “The Day the Sun Rose Twice: The Story of the Trinity Site Nuclear Explosion, July 16, 1945.”

BOOK ON KINDLE: Albuquerque author Bill Pinnell has recently published his Western novel on Amazon Kindle. The book, “Alma de la Gente,” is set in the New Mexico Territory in the late 19th century. A stranger arrives in the village of Alma de la Gente just in time to prevent a young vaquero from being gunned down. The stranger, who calls himself Tyrone, learns that villagers are in the midst of a range war pitting farmers and ranchers against a newcomer. Tyrone puts down roots, makes friends with the Hispanics and Anglos of the community, and finds romance. To survive he must choose sides in the range war.