Congratulations to San Francisco’s T.J. Stiles, whose nonfiction book The First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt has just been named among five finalists for the National Book Award. Here’s the New York Times review of the book, from May. Trivia: according to his website, Stiles is also a karate black belt.

Joining Stiles is Adrienne Mayor and her book The Poison King: The Life and Legend of Mithradates, also a nonfiction finalist. Mayor is currently a visiting professor at Stanford.

The whole list of finalists is here.

Thanks to a tweet from former Metblogger Michelle Richmond, I saw a nice writeup by another local author, Frances Dinkelspiel, on the San Francisco Chronicle changing its ways when it comes to publishing a list of locally best-selling books. Due to staff cutbacks, the Chronicle’s own bestseller list is no more. Instead they’re publishing the list compiled by the Northern California Independent Booksellers’ Association.

“A San Francisco Chronicle bestseller” has a nicer ring to it than “A Northern California bestseller,” but Dinkelspiel makes the point that the NCIBA’s list is more comprehensive and draws from a wider and more diverse list of independent bookstores.

Natasha Wimmer, translator of Roberto Bolaño’s two major novels The Savage Detectives and 2666, will be the featured guest at 12:30 pm Tuesday, October 6 at the Center for the Art of Translation’s lunchtime reading and lecture series. Wimmer will read from her translations of Bolaño, the Chilean author who died in 2003 who has become the new superstar of Latin American literature, thanks in part to Wimmer’s sensitive, fluent translations.

Wimmer and Jeffrey Yang are guest-editing the Center’s journal of translation studies, Two Lines, with the deadline for submissions of 17 November 2009. Wimmer will also be appearing at 6 pm on Oct. 7 at the Lone Palm bar on 22nd St. in conversation with Daniel Alarcón.

Read this Publisher’s Weekly article, Translator helps turn a Latin American novelist into a U.S. sensation. And read interviews with and articles by Wimmer:

• The Quarterly Conversation
• NYT’s Paper Cuts blog
• the Village Voice
• A short statement by Wimmer on the Words Without Borders site from December 2008
• Wimmer’s own biographical essay on Bolaño (PDF)
• A Jan. 16, 2009 interview in the Christian Science Monitor

Courtesy the beautiful and generous Michelle Richmond, here’s a nice piece on Associated Content, “Five books that make me want to travel to San Francisco.” They include Richmond’s own novel The Year of Fog as well as the Zuni Cafe Cookbook and the classic coffee table collection of pictures of Victorian houses, Painted Ladies.

It’s deep summer, which means neighborhood street fairs — the usual long rows of booths with obscure nonprofit groups, greasy food, and crafts of questionable provenance, with a stage at either end cranking out music that is quickly swept off by the strong breeze.

Two events which should be different:

The Street Food Street Fest, which will happen Saturday from 11 to 7 on Folsom St. between 25th and 26th. Why there? It’s the block where you’ll find La Cocina Community Kitchen, a four year old nonprofit business that incubates community food-oriented businesses run largely by immigrant women. Among the food vendors will be Sabores del Sur and Laiola.

On Saturday and Sunday, visit the San Francisco Zine Fest from 11 to 6, at the Hall of Flowers (known also as the County Fair Building) off Lincoln Way and 9th Avenue in Golden Gate Park. Not just an exhibition, the event features panels of all kinds for DIY publishers, journalists and artists. Admission to the whole event is FREE.

Fiction deity Tobias Wolff (1996 interview on Salon; 2008 profile at the Guardian [UK]) will join author, activist and blogger Stephen Elliott to celebrate the release of Elliott’s new “true crime memoir” The Adderall Diaries.

Admission to the party, which is at the Amnesia bar [map] on Thursday, Aug. 27 at 7:00 pm, is $20 and includes a hardcover of the book. Frequently-seen writer and presenter Bucky Sinister MC’s. Buy advance tix.

Picture: Wolff at left, Elliott at right. Elliott photo by Katherine Emery from LA Times

Novelist Dorothy Allison (Bastard Out of Carolina, Cavedweller, Trash) headlines Writers with Drinks this Saturday. She is an amazing live reader and you will be a better person for hearing and seeing her.

Also on the bill is “Mythbusters” star Adam Savage — not sure what he’ll be up to, but maybe he’ll be able to duplicate his goofy screen presence. Also appearing are science fiction author Steven Barnes, author Mary Miller, and Clint Catalyst.

Dreamboat Beth Lisick guest hosts. Writers with Drinks is Saturday, Aug. 8 at 7:30 pm at the Makeout Room on 22nd St. near Mission.

Sacramento author William T. Vollmann, whose last novel “Europe Central” won the National Book Award in 2005, brings out a new book this week about the California-Mexico border. Titled Imperial, the non-fiction tome has a length of 1344 pages and a weight of 3.8 pounds. In a Twitter message, author Luis Alberto Urrea, who has also written extensively about the border and the human and cultural traffic that crosses it, called it “a monster.” The New York magazine reviewer referred to it as “Moby-Dick in the desert.”

Also being released is a photographic companion to the book, also titled “Imperial,” with 200 photographs Vollmann took of the border region during his years of research for the non-fiction tome.

Vollmann appears in the Bay Area this week to read from and talk about “Imperial,” on Wednesday at 7:30 at Moe’s Bookstore in Berkeley, on Thursday at 12:30 pm at the Mechanic’s Institute, 57 Post St. in San Francisco, and at 7:30 pm at Booksmith on Haight St. in San Francisco. More tour dates on booktour.com.

Just to show Writers With Drinks still rocks the San Francisco literary scene, here are last night’s tweets from novelist Luis Alberto Urrea, author of Into the Beautiful North, who ended his national book tour at the Makeout Room last night. The reference to the Chronicle refers to a negative review the paper is about to give his novel.

Musical guest Thao Nguyen, pictured at right at an Austin gig in 2008, heads the lineup Monday at the first monthly live event sponsored by The Rumpus, writer and editor Stephen Elliott’s website.

The evening also features readings from authors Peter Orner, Andrew Greer, Damion Searls, and poet Barbara Jane Reyes, performance by Word for Word Performing Arts Company, films by Wholphin, and music by The Yellow Dress.

The show starts at 8:00 pm Monday at the Makeout Room (map). Get information and advance tickets.