VESUVIO READING SERIES TO EXPAND WITH WORK BY LOCAL AUTHOR M. CAZADORES

SAN FRANCISCO - Vesuvio in North Beach will expand its series of free readings on Tuesday, September 28 with selections from "Nothing Left for the Dead," the first novel by M. Cazadores of Berkeley, who will be a featured participant. Accompanying music will be provided by David & Joanna, the up-and-coming duo whose sound has been described as "the Everly Brothers meeting the Velvet Underground."

For several years, the celebrated bohemian barroom at 255 Columbus Ave. has presented readings of work by writers long associated with the place, from Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg to Richard Brautigan . This will be the first time a promising new author will be in the spotlight - and himself one of the readers, along with Vesuvio bartenders, waitresses and denizens under the direction of James Reese. It also will be the first time a local band is part of the program.

"Nothing Left for the Dead" is a novel that begins as a mystery and "degenerates" - the author's word - into a form of neo-existential literature. Its themes are indentured servitude, technology, American corporate plutocracy, racism, sheep, sex, love, music, drugs and time.

The reading will be free and open to anyone 21 and older, starting at 7 p.m., and will be followed by Cazadores taking questions from the audience.

For more than 60 years, Vesuvio, located where Columbus Avenue meets Jack Kerouac Alley, has been a hangout for writers, artists and actors, cab drivers and chess players, exotic dancers and seamen, business people and barflies - bon vivants from all walks of life, who have come from as close as the next street over and as far away as Mars.