Author Deborah Madison will sign her new book “Vegetable Literacy” from 6-9 p.m. Tuesday at Santoro’s Books, 7405 Greenwood Ave. N. The bookstore is donating 15 percent of sales from all books during that time to City Fruit, which uses volunteers to harvest extra fruit from neighborhood trees to donate to food banks and other hunger programs. Guests are encouraged to donate $5 to City Fruit at the event.

Her new book, Vegetable Literacy, has been called her crowning achievement — “a massive well of knowledge that makes you want to read and learn as well as cook.” Madison, who started her career at Chez Panisse and then opened The Greens in San Francisco, will discuss the fascinating relationships between vegetables and herbs within the same botanical families. She will be on hand all evening to sign her cookbooks and chat. Stumbling Goat Bistro is preparing snacks, and there will be wine and hard cider served.

If you can’t make it . . . Santoro’s will donate 15% of all books ordered and prepaid on April 30 (Vegetable Literacy or any other book) to City Fruit. Call or e-mail your order and be sure to mention City Fruit.

Santoro’s Books, 7405 Greenwood Ave. N., is celebrating its 8th annual Holiday Party from 6-9 tonight with food, wine, and cookbook author Jess Thomson, who will autograph her new cookbook “Dishing Up Washington.” Nibble on food made from some of the book’s recipes.

Party-goers will receive $5 off any purchase over $25, and a free bag of Chukar Cherries with every purchase over $75.

More than two dozen local authors will sign their books at Saturday’s annual Holiday Book Signing from 3-6 p.m. at the Phinney Neighborhood Center, 6532 Phinney Ave. N.

The event, by Seattle7Writers, showcases 26 local authors. Santoro’s Books will be selling the authors’ books onsite, with a portion of the proceeds from each purchase benefiting TeamReads and the PNA. The authors are even baking up cookies to share, and there will be an author reading every half-hour.

Authors on hand: Jamie Ford, Jim Lynch, Erik Larson, Garth Stein, Erica Bauermeister, Stephanie Kallos, Kevin O’Brien, Jennie Shortridge, Carol Cassella, Randy Sue Coburn, Laurie Frankel, Bob Dugoni, Sean Beaudoin, Dave Boling, Lynn Brunnelle, Suzanne Selfors, Deb Caletti, Boyd Morrison, Bernadette Pajer, Bharti Kirchner, William Dietrich, Mike Lawson, Tara Austen Weaver, Kaya McLaren, Clare Meeker, and Peter Mountford.

If you bring a gently-used book to donate to “pocket libraries” at food banks and homeless shelters, you’ll receive a free Seattle7Writers book bag.

Santoros Books is one of 23 independent bookstores around the state that are collecting books for children in need.

The Books for Kids Book Drive is sponsored by Page Ahead Children’s Literacy Program and Northwest Book Lovers. From now through Friday, purchase or bring in a new children’s book to donate.

Page Ahead partners with preschools, Head Start programs, elementary schools, libraries, and social service programs to identify children in need and give away books. Page Ahead has given away more than two-million books in the last 20 years.

Santoros Books is at 7405 Greenwood Ave. N.

Santoro’s Books staff and volunteers will be standing in front of the Greenwood Space Travel Supply Co., 8414 Greenwood Ave. N., starting at 6 p.m. today, handing out free books as part of World Book Night.

Bookstores all over the country are passing out 500,000 specially printed books at hospitals, nursing homes, ballparks, restaurants and elsewhere. Santoros will be passing out several dozen books.

The date of World Book Night was chosen to coincide with Shakespeare’s and Cervantes’ birthdays. It started last year in England and Ireland. This is the first year in the U.S. The books were donated by publishers, printers, distributors, and authors.

Author Kris Saknussemm is celebrating the release of “Reverend America” at Naked City Brewery & Taphouse, 8564 Greenwood Ave. N., at 7 p.m. Wednesday.

Join Dark Coast Press and Santoro’s Books in celebrating the release of Reverend America by Kris Saknussemm. Come partake in a menagerie of albino preachers, pregnant prostitutes, Southern soul and the surreal glory of true American strangeness!

Interviewer extraordinaire Litsa Dremousis (as featured in Esquire, Huffington Post, and McSweeney’s) will host a live conversation with Kris about Reverend America, his career, the craft of fiction, living in Las Vegas, and his love affair with American music. Kris will read from Reverend and then showcase the release of the original album, Reverend America, featuring Christopher O’Reilly, Eric Wyatt, the late Dennis Hopper, and more. Have some pints and laughs with us!

Santoro’s Books will be selling copies of the book.

We’ll continue to update this post throughout the day.

Update 11:14 a.m.: According to KING 5, Gov. Gregoire has declared a state of emergency, 100,000 people are without power across the state, and one man died near Issaquah when he was hit by a falling tree.

Update 11 a.m.: If anyone has driven on neighborhood roads or taken the bus, please put a note in comments and tell us about it. We’re curious to know how well the buses are running.

One man took to his skis to get around the neighborhood (thanks to Lynn for the picture!)

Update Thursday 8:30 a.m.: The National Weather Service has issued an ice storm warning for the Seattle area until 12 p.m. today.

According to the NWS, an ice storm warning means “severe weather conditions are imminent or occurring. Significant amounts of ice accumulation will make travel dangerous or impossible. Travel is strongly discouraged…Ice accumulations will likely lead to snapped power lines and falling tree branches that add to the danger.”

On traffic cameras, television or from your window, streets may appear bare and wet but they may still be covered with ice. The Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) continues to treat major arterial roads with salt brine and granular salt. Some secondary or neighborhood streets are very slick and changes in conditions between treated and untreated roadways can be very sudden. Four wheel drive is not a solution – vehicles need chains to have traction. Keeping the roads clear of traffic is extremely helpful for emergency vehicles.

Many sidewalks are icy. Pedestrians should use caution while walking and crossing streets. It is the responsibility of property owners to keep their sidewalks clear of ice to protect pedestrian safety. SDOT is dispatching 22 crews to activate the Pedestrian Safety Element of the Winter Response plan to clear and salt pedestrian landings, crossings, and intersections.

Seattle Public Utilities will not pick up garbage, recycling and yard waste today as planned, because the roads are too icy.

Weather permitting, garbage, recycling, and food/yard waste service will resume Friday, on a revised schedule — with customers scheduled for pickup today collected Friday, and Friday customers collected Saturday.

If your materials are not picked up this week, please put them out on your next regularly scheduled pickup day. Missed customers will be allowed to set out double their normal amount of garbage, recycling and yard waste at no additional charge.

All Seattle Public Library branches are closed on Thursday.

Woodland Park Zoo is closed again on Thursday.

Many King County offices are closed today, including District and Superior Court, Council offices, the Prosecutor’s Office and the Department of Assessments. For a full list of county closures, click here.

Someone created some great snow creatures in front of Santoro’s Books on Wednesday. (Thanks to LS for the pictures!)

Earlier: Wednesday was a very fun snow day of sledding and drinking hot chocolate. Unless, of course, you had to drive somewhere. The roads will likely be very icy on Thursday, so please drive carefully if you must go somewhere.

Here’s what’s on tap for Thursday:

Seattle Publish Schools are closed again.

Seattle Public Utilities will pick up Wednesday’s garbage, recycling and yard waste on Thursday, weather permitting. That means regular Thursday pickups will now happen on Friday, and Friday customers should set their refuse out on Saturday by 7 a.m.

If your materials are not picked up on the revised schedule, please put them out on your next regularly scheduled pickup day. Missed customers will be allowed to set out double their normal amount of garbage, recycling and yard waste at no additional charge.

Metro Transit will continue to operate on snow routes, with 27 routes canceled. Other routes may experience significant delays, so check Metro’s Snow & Ice page for updates before you head for the bus.

Greenwood Hardware was all out of sleds on Wednesday, but they’re getting more on Thursday.

We may be out of sleds for today, but we’ve seen a lot of creative solutions: garbage can lids, cardboard+rope+tarp… Send us pictures of your ad-hoc sled-like device and whichever we think is the most creative we’ll hold a sled for you from tomorrow’s truck!

Lexy sent us a photo of the hordes of sledders at Woodland Park on Wednesday.

Next door, at the Woodland Park Zoo, the animals frolicked in the snow.

Photo by Kirsten Pisto, Woodland Park Zoo.

Assemble Gallery & Studio at 7406 Greenwood Ave. N. is celebrating its second birthday with a special event to collect children’s books for kids in need.

“Milk + Bookies” is from 5-9 p.m. Friday. Drop by for some milk and cookies, and bring a children’s book to donate to the Denise Louie Education Center, which provides multi-cultural early learning services to vulnerable children and families in Seattle.

Santoro’s Books, just across the street from Assemble, is offering a 20 percent discount on any children’s books you purchase to donate at Milk + Bookies.

Denise Louie Education Center needs multicultural books for ages 0-5 in all languages, and discourages books with Disney or other corporate characters.

Santoro’s Books at 7405 Greenwood Ave. N. is participating in the Books for Kids Book Drive, sponsored by Page Ahead Children’s Literacy Program and Northwest Book Lovers.

More than two dozen independent bookstores across the state are collecting new children’s books that will be distributed to children in need through Head Start programs, elementary schools, libraries, and social service programs.

Besides Santoro’s, three other independent bookstores near our neighborhood are participating: Mockingbird Books, 7220 Woodlawn Ave. NE in Green Lake, University Book Store, 4326 University Way NE, and Queen Anne Books, 1811 Queen Anne Ave. N.

Santoro’s will give you 20 percent off if you purchase the donation book from them. The book drive runs through July 31.

Santoro’s Books at 7405 Greenwood Ave. N., is celebrating its sixth anniversary from 6-9 p.m. Thursday. Join owner Carol Santoro and her staff as they share food and wine and good book picks. Enter a drawing to win a $60 gift certificate, receive a $6 refund on purchases more than $25, and get a free bag of Chukar cherries with every purchase more than $60.

Carol also wanted to share the good news that the store has renewed its lease for another year.

Santoro’s also just began its Summer Reading Program.

From June 21st until September 21st we are offering a special frequent buyer account for our young readers. Buy 8 books from our middle readers and/or young adult sections and you will receive the average price of what you purchased as a store credit. Start turning pages!

City Fruit, a local organization that provides volunteers to harvest fruit from neighborhood trees and give it to food banks, is having a fundraiser Thursday night at Santoro’s Books, 7405 Greenwood Ave. N.

Amy Pennington, a local cookbook author and gardening expert, will sign her newest book, “Apartment Gardening.”  City Fruit board members will talk about the organization, and a representative from the Greenwood Food Bank, which receives some of the fruit, will talk about feeding people in need.

The event from 6:30-8:30 p.m. is free, but donations will go to support this year’s fruit tree harvest.