Join the libraries of Johnson County for the latest Local Libraries LIT author event featuring Virginia Sole-Smith. This is a free virtual event, with registration required. As a journalist, Virginia Sole-Smith has reported from kitchen tables and grocery stores, graduated from beauty school, and gone swimming in a mermaid’s tail. Virginia’s latest book, Fat Talk: Parenting in the Age of Diet Culture, investigates how the “war on childhood obesity” has caused kids of all ages to absorb a daily...

National Book Foundation “5 Under 35” award-winner Sarah Braunstein will read from her new novel, Bad Animals. She will be joined in conversation by author Rachel Yoder. "Bad Animals opens with a delightful shock, and then the fun begins. With deft, sly, loving insight into the human animal and its genius for self-deception, Braunstein ratchets up and sustains this extraordinary novel's elegance and complexity until the last, beautiful sentence." —Kate Christensen Sarah Braunstein is the author...

The Writers' Workshop presents a reading by Ida Beam Visiting Lecturer, Karen Russell. Karen Russell is the author of five books of fiction, including the NYT bestsellers Swamplandia! and Vampires in the Lemon Grove. She is a MacArthur Fellow and a Guggenheim Fellow, and the two-time recipient of the National Magazine Award for Fiction, the Shirley Jackson Award, the 2023 Bottari Lattes Grinzane prize, the New Yorker's "20 under 40" award and the National Book Foundation's "5 under 35" award...

Free copy of Design Social Change: Take Action, Work Toward Equity, and Challenge the Status Quo for the first 30 attendees! What motivates you as a changemaker? What forces are preventing you (and others) from thriving? These questions are essential to the work of creating social change, and they are exactly what Lesley-Ann Noel asks you to explore in her new book, Design Social Change: Take Action, Work Toward Equity, and Challenge the Status Quo (Ten Speed Press, 2023). In the book and at...

A Virtual Curator Talk with Eric Ensley and Emily Martin Join Eric Ensley and Emily Martin, co-curators of Making the Book, Past and Present, for a behind-the-scenes look at their Main Library Gallery exhibition. Find out how they decided which Special Collections & Archives materials to share with visitors, discover more about some of the curators' favorite items, and learn why it is so important to show modern book art in conversation with historic books.  Registration is required to attend...

The Writers' Workshop presents a Q&A with bestselling author, James Patterson From https://www.jamespatterson.com/landing-page/about-james/ James Patterson is the most popular storyteller of our time. He is the creator of unforgettable characters and series, including Alex Cross, the Women’s Murder Club, Jane Smith, and Maximum Ride, and of breathtaking true stories about the Kennedys, John Lennon, and Tiger Woods, as well as our military heroes, police officers, and ER nurses. Patterson has...

The Ancient Exchanges speaker series presents poet and translator Dan Beachy-Quick, who will talk about his work. Dan Beachy-Quick's translations from ancient Greek include the lyric collection Stone Garland and The Thinking Root, a collection of fragments of early philosophy (both from Milkweed Editions), as well as most recently Wind--Mountain--Oak: The Poems of Sappho (Tupelo Press, 2023). Of his approach to translation, Beachy-Quick writes, "There are depths within the denotative life of...

The Mission Creek Festival Presents Cindy Juyoung Ok and Thea Brown, who will read from Ward Toward and Loner Forensics. This is a free event, all are welcome! Cindy Juyoung Ok is the author of Yale Younger Poets Prize-winning Ward Toward, selected by Rae Armentrout. A MacDowell Fellow, Kenyon Review Fellow, and poetry editor at Guernica magazine, she is a former high school science teacher and now teaches creative writing at Kenyon College. Her poems are out now or soon in New England Review,...

This special 7:30 p.m. Mission Creek Festival event celebrates something you may not know some of your favorite authors are interested in: gaming. Critical Hits: Writers Playing Video Games, published by Graywolf, celebrates this sophisticated medium and considers its lasting impact on our culture and ourselves. “[Video games] raise profound questions for the humans who find themselves enraptured by these digital puzzles, adventures, and battles lighting up their computers, televisions, or...

The annual Lit Walk returns to MCF this year with three rounds of speakers at your favorite local hotspots! Bringing Iowa City to life in new ways, hear an unexpected variety of work from a mix of talented local and out-of-town writers. For complete lineup, check the 2024 Mission Creek Festival Website! Lit Walk Round 1 Featured literary event: Literary crawl through downtown Iowa City Venues: Willow & Stock / Revival Date: Friday, April 5 Doors: 5 p.m. The annual MCF Lit Walk returns in...

Writer Deborah Taffa, a graduate of the Nonfiction Writing Program and MFA director of the Institute of American Indian Arts, will read from her debut book Whiskey Tender at Prairie Lights Books on Friday, March 31 at 5:30 p.m. This event, which is open to the public, is part of the NWP Alumni Reading Series.

The Writers' Workshop presents a Q&A session with Latasha N. Nevada Diggs. A writer and sound artist, LaTasha N. Nevada Diggs is the author of TwERK (Belladonna, 2013). Her interdisciplinary work has been featured at the Museum of Modern Art, Brooklyn Museum, the Whitney Museum of American Art and the Walker Art Center. A Cave Canem fellow, Diggs is the recipient of numerous awards, including ones from the New York Foundation for the Arts, Jerome Foundation, and Lower Manhattan Cultural Council...

Professors Natalie Lira and Angela Hume will talk about their new books, Laboratory of Deficiency and Deep Care. They will engage in conversation about reproductive justice on the topics of abortion and the history of sterilization. Natalie Lira is Assistant Professor of Latina/Latino Studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She is the author of Laboratory of Deficiency. "Lira's multilayered research and analysis provide a powerful model for understanding and challenging the...

Agricultural and antitrust policy expert Austin Frerick will read from his new book on the titans of today’s food industry, Barons: Money, Power, and the Corruption of America's Food Industry. He will be joined in conversation by Gazette reporter Erin Jordan. Hailed as “An urgently important book,” by Eric Schlosser, Publishers Weekly says, “In this eye-opening debut study, Frerick, an agricultural policy fellow at Yale University, reveals the ill-gained stranglehold that a handful of companies...

Writers' Workshop graduate Jane Huffman will read from her new book of poetry, Public Abstract, winner of the APR/Honickman First Book Prize selected by Dana Levin. "In Jane Huffman’s poems, I feel the impassioned psychic venturing of Emily Dickinson, the wit of Kay Ryan, the fragmented surreal of Jean Valentine, and the playfulness and bravado of Gertrude Stein. Public Abstract is a striking debut." —Dana Levin Jane Huffman is a doctoral student in poetry at the University of Denver. She is...

Sarah Rose Etter will read from her best selling novel, Ripe, which was named a Best Book of the Year by Time, Huffington Post, and Kirkus. This novel, now available in paperback, has been A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice, a Roxane Gay Audacious Book Club Selection, and a Marie Claire Book Club Pick. Etter will be joined in conversation by author Carmen Maria Machado. “Sarah Rose Etter is electric on everything from tech culture’s toxic absurdities to bone-deep loneliness to the...

Join us monthly to generate new creative writing inspired by works in the Stanley collection. Each session will be led by a different talented writer from our area, who will be offering a new prompt and a new approach to ekphrastic writing (writing inspired by visual art). Bring your own notebook and pencil or computer and leave with the beginning of a newly written piece. Co-sponsored by Iowa City Poetry. Teen and adult writers in all genres are welcome. Write at the Stanley meets every fourth...

Writers' Workshop alum Cristina Henríquez will read from her powerful new novel about the construction of the Panama Canal, The Great Divide, which was named a most anticipated book by The Washington Post, Elle, Book Riot, Electric Literature, Goodreads, The Everygirl, Lit Hub, The Millions, and Reader’s Digest.  She will be joined in conversation by author and Writers' Workshop Director Lan Samantha Chang. "Against the backdrop of the construction of the Panama Canal, Cristina Henríquez’s...

The Writers' Workshop presents visiting poetry instructor Shane Book, who will give a talk on film adaptation and screen three short films. Shane Book's first volume of poetry, Ceiling of Sticks (University of Nebraska Press, 2010) won the Prairie Schooner Book Prize and the Great Lakes Colleges Association New Writers Award and was a Poetry Society of America “New Poet” Selection. Excerpts from Ceiling of Sticks received The Malahat Review Long Poem Prize and a National Magazine Award. His...

Join us for a reading and discussion, co-hosted by Prairie Lights, to celebrate Christopher Goetz’s recent book, The Counterfeit Coin: Videogames and Fantasies of Empowerment. Goetz is an associate professor and head of film studies in the Department of Cinematic Arts. After the reading, Corey Creekmur, associate professor in the departments of Cinematic Arts and English, will join Goetz for a conversation and Q&A with the audience. A reception will follow the event. Thursday, March 21, 2024 7...

Join the libraries of Johnson County for the latest Local Libraries LIT author event featuring Grace M. Cho. This is a free virtual event, with registration required. Grace M. Cho's work sits at the crossroads of creative nonfiction and interdisciplinary scholarship, exploring the ways in which residues of state violence and historical trauma permeate the intimate spaces of the here and now. As a sociologist, she approaches storytelling as an opportunity to broaden the lens through which...

Writers' Workshop alumni Nam Le and Daniel Khalastchi will read from their new books of poetry. Nam Le will read from 36 Ways of Writing a Vietnamese Poem. "With a cool outsider’s eye, Nam Le takes the English language to pieces and reassembles it with a virtuoso ease not seen since Finnegans Wake. There is wit aplenty, of a dancing, ironic kind, but the fury and the bitterness that underlie 36 Ways come without disguise, as do its moments of aching love and loss. Nam Le is a poet working at the...

Writers' Workshop graduate and New York Times bestselling author of Olga Dies Dreaming Xochitl Gonzalez will read from her new novel, Anita de Monte Laughs Last. She will be joined in conversation by author Kevin Brockmeier. Anita de Monte Laughs Last has been called by LitHub, "a dynamic exploration of love, art, and power," and has been called "incandescent" by Publisher's Weekly. "Funny, piercing, and full of moxie, Anita de Monte Laughs Last is unsparing in its assessment of what goes on...

Join co-editors Ryan Allen and Brain Hazlett along with contributors Connie Mutel and John T. Price for a fascinating evening on western Iowa's Loess Hills. On Common Ground: Learning and Living in the Loess Hills examines the many sides of this rare wind-borne natural area found only in Iowa and China. The evening discussion will be moderated by former University of Iowa Press Director Holly Carver. "On Common Ground is a rich mix of insightful natural history, visual arts, poetry, and...

Carolina Hotchandani and Kelly Rose Hoffer will read from their debut poetry collections. Carolina Hotchandani will read from The Book Eaters. “Carolina Hotchandani’s The Book Eaters is that rare debut: one that satisfies the heart and head in equal measures. In these subtle, lyric poems, Hotchandani explores the loss of a father’s language and memory, a loss complicated by Partition, emigration, and the body’s own failures, even by narrative itself, which threatens to revise and reimagine the...