Unterberg Poetry Center at Seventy-Five
This year the storied Unterberg Poetry Center at the 92nd Street Y in New York City celebrates its seventy-fifth anniversary. The first in a series of events to mark the occasion, an exhibition called Love the Words—which includes more than eighty...
The Isle of Youth by Laura van den Berg
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Laura van den Berg reads a story excerpt from her forthcoming collection, The Isle of Youth, published in November by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. I Looked For You, I Called Your Name The first thing that went wrong was the emergency landing. My...
Milk and Filth by Carmen Giménez Smith
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Carmen Giménez Smith reads two poems from her latest collection, Milk and Filth, published in October by University of Arizona Press. Happy Trigger Off-season and inthe burnt forestof my nightgown, a feralundergrowth that marksme as burial site—to...
Matt Kish's Heart of Darkness
In November Tin House Books will publish artist Matt Kish's illustrated adaptation of Joseph Conrad's inimitable novel Heart of Darkness. Kish, whose first graphic adaptation, Moby-Dick in Pictures, was published by Tin House in 2011, has created...
Son of a Gun by Justin St. Germain
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Justin St. Germain reads from his debut memoir, Son of a Gun, published in August by Random House. I was riding my bike home from class when a plane roared overhead, a green A-10 flying so low I could read its markings. I took my eyes off the road...
The Forage House by Tess Taylor
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Tess Taylor reads four poems from her debut collection, The Forage House, published in August by Red Hen Press. Big Granny When they found Emeline, a nailheld her sack dress together at the neck. She lived by gathering herbsfor curing leather, lived...
The Color Master by Aimee Bender
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Aimee Bender reads two story excerpts from her newest collection, The Color Master, published in August by Doubleday. Appleless I once knew a girl who wouldn't eat apples. She wove her walking around groves and orchards. She didn't even like to look...
3 Sections by Vijay Seshadri
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Vijay Seshadri reads three poems from his latest collection, 3 Sections, published in September by Graywolf Press. Imaginary Number The mountain that remains when the universe is destroyedis not big and is not small.Big and small are comparative...
Poetry of the Wild
For ten years ecological artist and sculptor Ana Flores has been bringing "Poetry of the Wild"—a project that combines poetry, visual art, and nature in an effort to connect people to the land around them—to locations both public and wild. Each...
The Joker by Andrew Hudgins
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Andrew Hudgins reads two excerpts from his memoir, The Joker, published in June by Simon & Schuster. Catch It and Paint It Green I was slow to delight in disorder, in which words didn't mean what I'd understood them to mean and in which phrases...
Bobcat and Other Stories by Rebecca Lee
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Rebecca Lee reads an excerpt from her story collection, Bobcat and Other Stories, published in June by Algonquin Books. Bobcat It was the terrine that got to me. I felt queasy enough that I had to sit in the living room and narrate to my husband...
Thunderbird by Jane Miller
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Jane Miller reads four poems from her latest collection, Thunderbird, published in July by Copper Canyon Press.EcstasyAs the ancients detail it ecstasy passes over usin a mist of particlesit lives baredies unburiedI finally understand it is...
The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman
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Neil Gaiman reads from his most recent novel, The Ocean at the End of the Lane, published in June by William Morrow and featured in the July/August issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.
How Food Writing Fed My Fiction
Join fiction writer, dessert blogger, and baker Aaron Hamburger at Whole Foods Market in New York City as he prepares his delicious limoncello cupcakes and talks about what the art of food writing has taught him about fiction writing. Watch via...
Al-Mutanabbi Street Inventory Project
In 2010 San Francisco poet and bookseller Beau Beausoleil founded the Al-Mutanabbi Street Inventory Project to commemorate the 2007 bombing of Baghdad's famous bookselling thoroughfare, which left thirty people dead and the city's literary center...
The Exchange by Sophie Cabot Black
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Sophie Cabot Black reads three poems from her third poetry collection, The Exchange, published in May by Graywolf Press. Afterlife I could only close my eyes on the blueShirtsleeve of leaving and understandI was to make my own sentence. No...
Wreck Me by Sally Ball
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Sally Ball reads from her second poetry collection, Wreck Me, published in April by Barrow Street Press. No Threat, Nuthatch Tiny presence in the pines,hold still. Upside down—right side up—flock of nervesand fretful hunger. Hold still. Your...
Snapper by Brian Kimberling
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Brian Kimberling reads from his debut novel, Snapper, published in April by Pantheon.Some Old Horses I got my job by accident. A sycamore tree landed on the roof of my predecessor's 4 x 4 during a thunderstorm. He spent six months in a neck brace. "...
The Third Son by Julie Wu
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Julie Wu reads from her debut novel, The Third Son, published in April by Algonquin Books. 1. My journey began when the Americans bombed us, in 1943, because it was during the bombings that I met the girl. I was eight years old. In the weeks before...
Smile at Strangers by Susan Schorn
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Susan Schorn reads from her debut memoir, Smile at Strangers: And Other Lessons in the Art of Living Fearlessly, published in May by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Fall down seven times, get up eight. I'm pondering this phrase, a traditional Japanese...
A Long Day at the End of the World by Brent Hendricks
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Brent Hendricks reads from his memoir, A Long Day at the End of the World: A Story of Desecration and Revelation in the Deep South, published in March by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Because a picture is a sort of dream, the big moon circles the ...
Natural Takeover of Small Things by Tim Z. Hernandez
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Tim Z. Hernandez reads the poems "Home" and "Brown Christ" from his collection, Natural Takeover of Small Things, published in February by the University of Arizona Press. HomeFresno is the inexhaustible nervein the twitching leg of a dogthree hours...
This Close by Jessica Francis Kane
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Jessica Francis Kane reads from her short story collection, This Close, published in March by Graywolf Press.Lucky BoySomething about New York City makes a lot of people understand you should try to look your best. Tourists, for example, often wear...
The Nantucket Book Festival
For the opener of The Spring 2013 Guide to Inspired Writing Retreats, contributing editor Jeremiah Chamberlin traveled to Nantucket to get a feeling for an exciting new book festival that is growing on a beautiful island known primarily as a summer...
The Revolution: Report From Literary Egypt
For his article "The Revolution: Report From Literary Egypt," contributing editor Stephen Morison Jr, who lives in Madaba-Manja, Jordan, traveled to Cairo twice—first in late August 2012 and again in early October—and spoke with writers, publishers...