Readings! Live music! Antics! Beer!
The Writer’s Center LIVE! is a celebration of literature that doesn’t take itself too seriously. Attendees are treated to 5 exceptional readings, plus a generous serving of tomfoolery. Featuring acclaimed writers E.A. Aymar, Dan Brady, Lena Crown, Gabrielle Lucille Fuentes, and R.E.I.L. Hosted by Amy Freeman and Emily Holland, with music by Zach Powers.
FREE and open to the public (RSVP below). Open bar for the 21+ crowd. Donations appreciated.
About the Performers
Anthony Award-nominated E.A. Aymar’s most recent thriller, No Home for Killers, is coming out in 2023 by Thomas and Mercer. His previous thriller, They’re Gone, was published to rave reviews in Publishers Weekly, Kirkus (starred), and named one of the best books of 2020 by the South Florida Sun Sentinel. He is a former member of the national board of the International Thriller Writers and is an active member of Crime Writers of Color and Sisters in Crime. He runs the DC Noir at the Bar series, was born in Panama and now lives and writes in, and generally about, the DC/MD/VA triangle.
Dan Brady is the author of the poetry collections Strange Children (2018), Subtexts (2022), and Songs in E—— (2023), winner of the Barclay Prize for Poetry, along with two poetry chapbooks. He is the poetry editor of Barrelhouse. Previously, Dan served as the editor of American Poets, the journal of the Academy of American Poets, and worked in the Literature Division at the National Endowment for the Arts, where he received a Distinguished Service Award for his work on the Big Read, the largest community reading initiative in US history. He lives in Arlington, Virginia with his wife and two kids.
Lena Crown is a writer from Northern California. Her work has been published in Guernica, Narratively, Gulf Coast, Sonora Review, Hayden’s Ferry Review, The Offing, and elsewhere. She currently serves as the PEN/Faulkner Writer in Residence, as the programs manager for The Inner Loop, and as an editor for Autofocus, a small press. She is working on a memoir and an essay collection.
Gabrielle Lucille Fuentes is a writer and teacher. She is the author of the forthcoming short story collection Are We Ever Our Own, winner of the BOA Short Fiction Prize and The Sleeping World (Touchstone-Simon & Schuster, 2016). She has received fellowships from Hedgebrook, Willapa Bay Artists in Residency, Yaddo, the Millay Colony, and the Blue Mountain Center and was a Bernard O’Keefe Scholar in Fiction at Bread Loaf. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Strange Horizons, New England Review, The Common, One Story, Cosmonauts Avenue, Slice, Pank, The Collagist, NANO Fiction, Western Humanities Review, and elsewhere. Her story “The Elephant’s Foot” was a Distinguished Story in Best American Short Stories 2016. Gabrielle holds a BA from Brown University, an MFA from the University of Colorado, Boulder and a PHD from the University of Georgia. She is an Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Maryland.
R.E.I.L. started her poetry career at open mics in the DC area and at 16 competed in the Brave New Voices slam in New York City. A poetic performer, visual artist, and arts educator teaching in D.C. schools, R.E.I.L. seeks inspiration from past and present life experiences to help the lives of other unsung souls. R.E.I.L.’s first book, Ashes to Justice, was published in 2022.