Neilly Series offers two upcoming talks

Ropeik

Novelist Ann-Marie MacDonald will begin the North American tour for her new book, The Way the Crow Flies, at 7 p.m. Monday, November 3, in Hoyt Hall, and David Ropeik, a writer who specializes in studying how people interpret risks, will speak at 5 p.m. Thursday, November 13, in the Welles-Brown Room of Rush Rhees Library. Both talks are part of the 2003-04 Neilly Series.

MacDonald

MacDonald will read excerpts and take questions on her latest novel about a Canadian military family threatened by the father's secret mission. The author of the best-selling Fall on Your Knees, MacDonald, a Toronto-based writer, gained international attention when the novel became a 2002 Oprah Book Club choice as well as the winner of the Orange Prize and the Commonwealth Prize. Her work in the theater as an actor and playwright has attracted numerous awards. A book signing will follow the event.

Ropeik's talk will center on "Risk Perception: Why Our Fears Don't Match the Facts." Ropeik believes humans subconsciously "decide," based more on emotional than factual information, either being too afraid of a lesser risk or not afraid enough of the bigger ones. To respond to these emotions, Ropeik wrote (with coauthor George Gray) Risk: A Practical Guide for Deciding What's Really Safe and What's Really Dangerous in the World Around You (Houghton Mifflin, 2002). The book is based on the scientific understanding of a wide range of issues and does not advocate for any group.

A television journalist for more than 20 years, Ropeik is director of risk communication at the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis, a center that provides information for informed public discussion on health, safety, and environmental issues. He has written extensively on risk perception and risk communication and has lectured at the White House and to numerous government, corporate, and consumer groups worldwide.

Neilly Series events are supported by a major gift from Andrew Neilly '47 and his wife, Janet Dayton Neilly. The series is produced by the River Campus Libraries. For more information, call x5-4461.

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