A book by a UWindsor graduate has been selected as the subject of a city-wide read-a-thon next week.

Windsor Reads will feature public readings of Alexander MacLeod’s bestselling first book of short stories, Light Lifting, short-listed for both the Booker and the Giller Prizes.

“It’s a celebration of Windsor’s literary talent and the written word,” says Sarah Jarvis, a volunteer with Literary Arts Windsor. “We’re bringing book readings to where Windsor’s citizens live, work, study -- and even heal.”

On the prescribed day and time, volunteer readers will introduce themselves to passersby, introduce the concept of Windsor Reads, and invite them to sit back, relax and listen to some great literature for 10 or 15 minutes.

The readings run September 26 to 30:

• Monday 11 a.m., Windsor Public Library Central branch by CBC broadcaster Bob Steele
• Tuesday 2:30 p.m., Windsor International Airport by CEO Federica Nazzani
• Wednesday 2 p.m., Windsor Regional Hospital – Western campus by author Paul Vasey
• Thursday noon, St. Clair Centre for the Arts by poet Mary Ann Mulhern
• Friday 1:30 p.m., Windsor Regional Hospital – Met campus by lawyer Elizabeth Musyj

Jarvis calls MacLeod, who graduated in 1995 with a BA in creative writing, a “talented young writer” and notes his book is set in Windsor and was published by local press Biblioasis.