It's not every week that a Seattle novelist celebrates his new book with a launch party. And never before has the new novel in question been about a vice president of the World Bank. Peter Mountford's The Dismal Science follows the spectacular self-immolation of Vincenzo D'Orsi as he transforms a minor argument into a flameout that threatens one of the most powerful institutions in the modern world. Tonight's party features booze, free appetizers, and a conversation between Dismal Science's author and publisher that will stretch from economics to literature and back again. (Hugo House, 1634 11th Ave, hugohouse.org, 7 pm, free)