Good Time at Wine and Define

Boston’s literary stars gathered at Cloud Place last night for Wine and Define, a Define-a-Thon held to support Grub Street and First Literacy. We chatted with Yael Goldstein Love, author of The Passion of Tasha Darsky. She had never played the game before, so we described our Define-a-Thon experience to her.

“It sounds like there’s a lot of shame involved,” Goldstein Love worried as she and teammate Ryan Scharer had some pre-competition snacks. “But I’ve been told we’re the favorites to win.”

Poet Regie Gibson was less optimistic. “No way, man,” Gibson said of his chances. “I’m here because they told me there’d be free drinks.”

The event got underway as Open Book Club hosts and Wine and Define emcees Christy Scott Cashman and Debbie DiMasi took the stage and thanked the authors, editors, and literary agents for coming. “Have a little more liquid courage,” DiMasi advised, “and we’ll get started.”

Cashman and DiMasi didn’t compete, but stood in the back of the room and made snarky comments about the words projected on the screen.

“‘Astringent?'” Cashman crowed, “I think I caught that in college.”

The book-loving duo told us they’re happy with the reception Open Book Club has received, and is open to doing more than one show a month. “We’d need to get some killer sponsorship,” DiMasi added.

House Speaker Sal DiMasi showed up in time to catch the last couple of rounds. During a break in the action, the Speaker told us he didn’t get to read much for pleasure.

“But she makes up for it,” DiMasi said, nodding toward his wife.

Mr. DiMasi also suggested we should add a couple of tracks to the CD we compiled for his North End dinners with Gov. Deval Patrick.

“We started out singing, ‘regrets, we’ve had a few. . .,” DiMasi told us. “And by the end of it, we were singing ‘love, love will keep us together.'”

At the end of the event, we checked in with Goldstein Love, who’d been knocked out of the competition on a definition about an oily Brazilian nut.

“I guess I should read the ingredients on my shampoo bottle more carefully,” Goldstein Love lamented. Tell us about it. We lost on “quiescent,” which appears on Popsicle boxes.