RC creative writing alumna and Detroit freelance journalist Anna Clark discusses her new book on the Flint water crisis.
7-8:30 p.m., AADL Downtown multipurpose rm., 343 S. Fifth Ave. Free. 327-4200.
Rolling Stone contributing editor Jeff Goodell reads from his acclaimed new book. Signing. Refreshments. Proceeds from sales of the book benefit Detroiters Working For Environmental Justice. The program begins with a reception.
6:30 p.m., Bookbound, Courtyard Shops. Free. 369-4345.
Literati is pleased to welcome author Brooks Rexroat who will be sharing his collection Thrift Store Coats.
About Thrift Store Coats:
Brooks Rexroat’s Thrift Store Coats transports readers to the postindustrial Midwest and explores the lives of those living on its quiet edge. Interwoven with themes of love, lineage, poverty, and survival, the characters in these stories grapple with the idea of identity — not only of where they fit into the world, but of how their origins impact their place in the future.
The collection’s titular story of focuses on a couple’s navigation of poverty after the recession leaves each of them suddenly unemployed. In “Waiting Out the Apocalypse”, characters from all walks of life are forced into action by that which is out of their control: the decisions of local lawmakers, and the devastating effects of a hurricane’s landfall. “Five Meals in Paris” explores themes of solitude and circumstance by following a factory worker from Ohio as he fulfills his lifelong dream of traveling to Paris, France.
While Brooks Rexroat’s prose possesses the power to break the hearts of readers, he establishes himself as a voice to be heard by masterfully repairing what has been broken — with unflinching honesty, and with a stunning sense of empathy.
Brooks Rexroat was raised near Cincinnati, Ohio at the intersection of the Rust Belt and Appalachia: the crossing point of mountain and farm field, boarded mine and shuttered factory, the water that splits north from south. The importance of place has always surrounded him, and it deeply inhabits his characters.
After earning a Master of Fine Arts Degree in creative prose from Southern Illinois University Carbondale, he embarked on a journey in higher education that has included teaching opportunities at open enrollment community colleges, regional public universities, and rigorous private liberal arts colleges. Now based at Brescia University in Western Kentucky, Rexroat spent the 2016-2017 academic year as a Fulbright U.S. Teaching and Research Scholar at Novosibirsk State Pedagogical University in Siberia, Russia. He was a 2014 Bread Loaf Bakeless Camargo Fellow in Cassis, France and his stories and essays have appeared in more than 30 journals and magazines on three continents.
All invited to read and discuss their poetry or short stories. Bring about 6 copies of your work to share.
7-9 p.m., Crazy Wisdom, 114 S. Main. Free. 665-2757
Every Wed. Members read and discuss poems around themes TBA. Followed by collaborative writing games and exercises. Attendees invited to read their poems. Snacks & socializing.
8-10 p.m., Argus Farm Stop greenhouse, 325 W. Liberty. $5 suggested donation. onepausepoetry.org, 707-1284.
Literai is pleased to welcome author Wendell Mayo who will be sharing his new story collection Survival House.
About Survival House:
Often humorous, always resonant, the ten stories in Survival House not only look back to the collective mind of doom in the atomic age of the 1950s and 1960s, but also address its legacy in our time–the emergence of new nuclear powers, polarizing politics, and the ever-tightening grip of corporations. In contemporary stories, such as “Doom Town,” a festival annually celebrates the survival of the human race by conducting riotous air raids. In “The Trans-Siberian Railway Comes to Whitehouse,” a bar owner desperately clings to a new all-things-Russian theme to save himself from financial ruin. Other stories, set in the 1960s, recast the Cuban Missile Crisis, Kennedy assassination, and Space Race in personal histories of the human heart that remind us what it takes to endure–both then, and now.
Wendell Mayo is also author of three more full-length story collections: Centaur of the North; B. Horror and Other Stories; and a novel-in-stories, In Lithuanian Wood. He’s recipient of the Premio Aztlán, an NEA fellowship, and a Fulbright to Lithuania. Over one-hundred of his short stories have appeared widely in magazines and anthologies, including Yale Review, Harvard Review, New Letters, Missouri Review, Prism International, and others.
Join us for a panel presentation featuring accomplished authors from the state of Michigan! Detroit author Michael Ferro is celebrating the release of his debut novel Title 13, named a “Most Anticipated Small Press Book of 2018” by literary blog Big Other. Kelly Fordon is a former writer-in-residence at InsideOut LIterary arts in Detroit, whose collection of interconnected stories, Garden for the Blind, was named a Michigan Notable book. Joining them will be University of Michigan creative writing professor Laura Hulthen Thomas, speaking about her acclaimed short story collection States of Motion
Michael A. Ferro‘s fiction and essays have appeared in numerous literary journals and anthologies. He won the Jim Cash Creative Writing Award for Fiction, received an Honorable Mention from Glimmer Train for their New Writers Award, and been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Born and bred in Detroit, Michael has lived, worked, and written throughout the Midwest; he currently resides in rural Ann Arbor, Michigan. TITLE 13 is his first novel.
Prior to writing fiction and poetry, Kelly Fordon worked at the NPR member station in Detroit and for National Geographic magazine. Her fiction, poetry, and book reviews have appeared in The Boston Review, The Florida Review, Flashquake, The Kenyon Review, and various other journals. She is the author of two poetry chapbooks, On the Street Where We Live, which won the 2011 Standing Rock Chapbook Contest, and Tell Me When It Starts to Hurt, which was published by Kattywompus Press in 2013. She received her MFA in fiction writing from Queens University of Charlotte and worked for InsideOut Literary Arts in Detroit as a writer-in-residence.
Laura Hulthen Thomas’s work has appeared in The Cimarron Review, Nimrod International Journal, Epiphany and Witness. She received her MFA in fiction writing from Warren Wilson College. She currently heads the undergraduate creative writing program at the University of Michigan’s Residential College, where she teaches fiction and creative nonfiction.
Poets invited to read their own work along with a favorite poem by another writer. In celebration of National Poetry Month. Tea & light refreshments.
7 p.m., Bookbound, Courtyard Shops. Free. 369-4345.
Join us for an evening in Ann Arbor with author Lindsey McDivitt. McDivitt will discuss the research and writing process for her new picture book NATURE’S FRIEND: THE GWEN FROSTIC STORY.
Gwen Frostic is one of Michigan’s most beloved artists whose nature-inspired artwork has captivated fans for generations. After a debilitating illness as a child, Gwen sought solace in art and nature. She learned to be persistent and independent-never taking no for an answer or letting her physical limitations define her. She was inducted into the Michigan Women’s Hall of Fame and May 23rd is official Gwen Frostic Day in Michigan.
Books will be available for purchase at the event through Literati Bookstore.
This event will focus on the author’s writing process, targeted towards older writers and readers but children are welcome!
Morgan & York, 1928 Packard Street. Free. 7346196226. julia.hlavac@sleepingbearpress.comhttps://www.facebook.com/events/391308184611065/
Sunday, July 15 at 2 PM we’ll be hosting a launch party for Dianne Freeman, whose first book is The Lady’s Guide to Etiquette and Murder.
7 p.m., Aunt Agatha’s, 213 S. Fourth Ave. Free. 769-1114.
