Elaine Viets is as St. Louis as winning baseball teams and hockey squads -- whoops, correction: almost-winning hockey squads. The former Post-Dispatch star columnist was born and raised in St. Louis and achieved her first run of media celebrity here, but it's her more recent second career as a mystery writer that's really made her name. Tonight she visits Left Bank Books (399 North Euclid Avenue; 314-367-6731 or www.left-bank.com) to promote the brand-new novel in her Dead-End Job mystery series, Catnapped! (Viets also pens another sleuthing line called Josie Marcus, Mystery Shopper.) A $30 fee gets you one copy of Catnapped!, along with a beneficial dose of feel-good if you're an animal-lover; a portion of the evening's total book sales benefit the Animal House Fund cat shelter, an independent, nonprofit, no-kill organization aiding the homeless cats and kittens of our city. Tickets for the 7 p.m. event are at catnapped.brownpapertickets.com.
Thu., May 8, 7 p.m., 2014