Many D.C. readers will recognize the name Tara Campbell: For years, she was a mainstay in our city’s literary scene. Known for what she calls “crossover sci-fi,” Campbell’s work tends to contemplate “what happens when an ordinary person (or creature) faces extraordinary circumstances,” she says on her website.

Before she taught creative writing at American University, she graduated from the school with a masters in fine arts. In 2016 she won two awards for DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities: the Larry Neal Writers’ Award in Adult Fiction and the Mayor’s Arts Award for Outstanding New Artist. From 2018 to 2002, Campbell was part of the D.C. Arts and Humanities Fellowship Program. A blow to the local writing scene—she’s also led creative writing classes throughout the DMV—Campbell moved to Seattle last summer. Luckily for us, she’ll be back in town this month to launch her sixth book, City of Dancing Gargoyles, at two local institutions: Politics and Prose and the Writer’s Center—where she’ll once again lead a mini writing workshop.

Washington City Paper recently spoke with Campbell to discuss speculative fiction, novels in stories, and, of course, gargoyles.

Washington City Paper: Tell us about City of Dancing Gargoyles.

Tara Campbell: It’s an eco-fantasy novel featuring two sentient gargoyles named E and M who are searching for water and a new home. After their church crumbles, they have to make their way north through a 22nd-century American West that’s been ravaged not only by climate change, but also by the aftermath of some secretive alchemical testing that has resulted in anomalies like kissing dragons, wrestling kudzu, and bleeding books. 

WCP: When hearing the phrase “speculative fiction,” most readers will immediately think we’re referring to either science fiction or fantasy, and there are elements of both in your novel. But this work leans strongly in to literary writing, with beautiful, sometimes even lyrical storytelling and far less of the extensive worldbuilding than we’d normally see in the aforementioned genres. How do you approach “speculative literary” writing?

TC: Before I stumbled upon the term “speculative fiction,” I used to say that I write science fiction for people who don’t think they read science fiction. But that was only an approximation of what I was doing, and I’m glad that more people are discovering the depth and breadth of fantastical writing beyond strict genre definitions. 

I love the way “speculative literary” opens up narrative by allowing us to go beyond the bounds of realism to get at emotional truths. If something feels surreal, why not try to capture that cognitive dissonance by portraying it as something palpably unreal? Certain parts of American culture are indeed surreal to me, like our relationship with guns, or our lack of reckoning with history, or our income inequality, and those areas of disconnect came out indirectly in stories about sneaking needles striking us everywhere from home to school to church, or screaming ropes howling in the darkest corner of a dusty barn, or sword fighting robots protecting the bunkers of the uber-wealthy.

But hitting people over the head with sociopolitical commentary is not the point. Above all else, I want it to be either beautiful or funny (or both). It is possible to write speculative work that also pays attention to language and character development. It is possible to write literary work that escapes the bounds of realism. That’s what I hope to do.

WCP: You’ve always been a rebel when it comes to form, and this book is no exception—you’ve pushed the boundaries of traditional narrative structure throughout this story. How do you approach form? Do you think of experimenting from the start, or is it more about listening to the story as it develops on the page?

TC: Most of the elements in this book began as individual stories, and because I experiment, they all took different forms: monologues, reports, traditional third person narratives, charts, poems, etc. I feel like each story will tell you what format it wants to be in, and if it doesn’t work the first way you try to tell it, you can try a different path. So yes, I’m very much in the camp of letting things develop as they hit the page.

When I began thinking about how to combine the stories beyond a simple collection, however, that’s when I had to become more intentional. I charted the stories, categorizing them in terms of theme, tone, setting, format, subject matter, point of view, and began strategizing how to integrate all the potential perspectives. I wound up having to morph some of them from story to setting, and had to decide who would be likely to tell which kind of story.

WCP: Many writers struggle to effectively convey different points of view when their novels have multiple main characters. You seem to do this effortlessly. How do you create such defined, unique characters while working within one project?

TC: E and M came about because I started with the concept of [the short story] “In the City of Digging Gargoyles,” and they just kept digging. And digging. And they weren’t telling me what the heck else they were doing, so I just had to keep coming back to them and have them encounter more parts of this world I was creating. As they journeyed, one gargoyle revealed themself to be more trusting and curious, whereas the other one was more skeptical of humanity, and I realized that those are my two figurative wolves warring inside me. It was like getting to see how things would work out if I cultivated one side of my nature vs. the other. 

Two of the human characters, Dolores and her mother Rose, were inspired by the mother-daughter dynamic of one of the individual stories, where a mother becomes so obsessed with accumulating wealth for their security that the daughter fades into the background. That’s not exactly how things work between the characters in the novel, but I wanted to examine the tension between a mother trying to keep her child safe while that child just wants to live her life—and how that dynamic changes when they’re climate refugees in a postapocalyptic world.

WCP: In your opinion, is this a novel in stories?

TC: Yes, I can see that way of describing it, though because I can’t do anything the standard way, it’s more like a novel in stories with connecting narrative tissue. I’ve always been obsessed by the idea of stories within stories, so maybe it’s more like a Matryoshka novel? A pomegranate novel? A bunch of bananas? It’s impossible to say.

WCP: Who are some authors that have influenced you, particularly in relation to City of Dancing Gargoyles?

TC: Well, I always like to give Michael Moorcock props for the idea that initially sparked the stories. He wrote a list of suggestions for how to write a novel, and one of them was a pre-writing technique that involved putting together a list of images, deliberate paradoxes like “In the City of Screaming Statues.” I was so fascinated by that example image, I made a list of verbs and nouns that fascinated me and smashed them together in ways that made no sense. His idea of deliberate paradoxes was the key. It gave me permission to not line everything up in logical terms before beginning. Sometimes starting with the impossible makes things possible.

I’ve begun describing my work as the love child of Margaret Atwood and Douglas Adams (yes, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Douglas Adams). I know, it’s an unlikely—frankly ludicrous—pairing, his kaleidoscopic wackiness with her verbal restraint, but like E and M warring away inside me, I am a study in contradictions. I’m aware of how supremely messed up the world is, but I can’t succumb to the darkness entirely. I always need a little laugh to make it through my dystopia, so here we are.

Tara Campbell reads from City of Dancing Gargoyles at 5 p.m. on Oct. 6 at Politics and Prose’s Connecticut Avenue NW location. politics-prose.com. Free.

Her second local event—a reading followed by a mini workshop—starts at 7 p.m. on Oct. 8 at the Writer’s Center in Bethesda. writer.org. Free.

In my opinion, every season is reading season, but there’s something about fall that makes you want to nestle down with a good book and a good drink. And with the new season comes an abundance of new books all vying for your attention. Below, City Paper’s book critics have dug into some upcoming and recent releases with local ties that span genres and styles to give you a head start on your fall reading list. It’s also another reminder that great things come from D.C. —Sarah Marloff

Her Own Happiness by Eden Appiah-Kubi

Release date: Sept. 5, via Montlake Romance

Genre: Romance

From Amazon Publishing’s Montlake romance imprint comes Her Own Happiness, a cheerful sophomore effort from the D.C.-born Maryland native Eden Appiah–Kubi, loosely inspired by Jane Austen’s Emma. (Appiah-Kubi’s first novel, 2021’s The Bennet Women, also bears the imprint of another, even better known, Austen classic.) In Her Own Happiness, best friends Maya, a plus-size, pansexual artist, and Ant, an asexual lover of plants and nature, exemplify the beauty and strength of platonic Black love … at least, at first. But can their blossoming, romantic feelings survive the machinations of celebrity “girlboss for good” Emme Vivant, who sets Maya in her mentorship sights?

Emma is perhaps more of a launching pad for Her Own Happiness than a direct blueprint. If Austen is an arch, at times cynical, witness to societal foibles, Appiah-Kubi is perhaps the sweeter sister, critical of class inequality but earnest and broadly optimistic when it comes to human behavior. All the same, Austen fans will seize on the references; in (fictional) coverage, Vivant is described by Washingtonian as “handsome (WTF?), clever, and rich,” while Maya muses, “Truth was, there’s no perfect place for a Black queer woman, especially one without a small fortune.” 

At heart, Her Own Happiness is a cozy, good-natured tale of love and friendship, following characters who do not define themselves by their hip body piercings or artsy tattoos but, rather, through kindness toward others. Appiah-Kubi combines escapist descriptions of fashion and travel with an honest look at how so many of our lives have been shaped by COVID-related isolation and uncertainty. Residents of the DMV will delight in regionally specific callouts, including Rock Creek Park, Takoma Park, and Washington City Paper (hey, that’s us!). —Annie Berke

Unreliable Narrator by Aparna Nancherla

Release date:  Sept. 19, via Viking Press

Genre: Memoir 

Who am I to hold forth on comedian Aparna Nancherla’s new essay collection Unreliable Narrator: Me, Myself, and Impostor Syndrome? This debut book is an insightful, savvy read. It recognizes up front that “impostor syndrome—like probiotic yogurt—does primarily get marketed toward women and minorities.” Clearly, Nancherla’s wholesome and society-critiquing voice deserves the pop cultural space to be understood as panoramically human. “I’ll never find all the answers. But there’s meaning in trying, and meaning can be everything,” she writes.

Now based in Los Angeles, the D.C.-born, McLean-raised Nancherla was perceived by her physician parents and older sister as a shy, passionate kid who didn’t quit, who first told jokes in public at an open-mic night in Tysons. She turned 30 before her first big break as a writer-performer on the 2012–2013 TV show Totally Biased With W. Kamau Bell. With her ever-bigger jobs and personality-specific opportunities that followed, she explains, “Every day was Take Your Doubter to Work Day!” 

Deemed a “unicorn” in show business, Nancherla has built a versatile career as a second-generation Indian American woman who leans into onstage jokes about treating her anxiety and depression. “I think it’s hard, in comedy, or in any field maybe, to not have people put you in a box,” she said in a 2017 interview with the Asian American Writers’ Workshop. “But I don’t think of myself as ‘the Mental Health Comic.’” 

Her wide-ranging book also delves into her creative process, being online, and finding love that feels like home, as well as filler bits of uneven quality. Some major pieces stay on thematic task by dissecting her experiences through an informed lens of destigmatizing all mental illnesses. While documenting her eponymous topic was “an extremely agitating and disorienting process,” Nancherla stays brave because she can. “Being completely, painfully honest is the only worthwhile place I know to begin,” she writes. “Life can so often be a grotesque maze of smoke and mirrors.” 

Everybody hurts, even as the era shapes any humor in our public responses to that private fact. Way back in 2012, Nancherla tweeted, “Any pizza can be a personal one if you cry while you eat it.” Seemingly reasonable self-doubt in a world this duct-taped may indeed be an unreliable narrator. But that voice inside, the one that wants to dream and do, is reliable. It’s all we’ve got.  —Diana Michele Yap

Scenic Overlook by Anne Ray

Release date: Oct. 1, via Awst Press

Genre: Fiction, Novel-in-stories

Recalling a childhood memory of her father digging in the front yard, the protagonist of Anne Ray’s evocative Scenic Overlook explains, “I think of that day now and half of it has the flatness of looking into a television, a projection. The other half has the roundness, sharpness, of looking through a telescope.” This novel-in-stories from independent, Austin-based Awst Press follows Katie, a college dropout with a bone-deep loneliness and a penchant for wandering, as she grows up, moves away, and makes various homes for herself in the American West. Scenic Overlook, as the title suggests, is more about what Katie sees than who she is, and her desire to become more than an absence, a void, in her own life, carries across the book’s 13 chapters. 

Of these installments, “Answering Machine” stands out as a topical treatment of abortion that delves deeply into the intricacies of women’s friendships. Of her relationship with her friend Yahlie, with whom she lives and shares not just expenses but emotional intimacy, Katie says, “These days we’re more like two pioneer women who’d met face to face on the Oregon Trail and became traveling companions after losing their wagon trains in a snowstorm.” 

Characters like Yahlie and Katie’s brother, Danny, are delicately rendered; together with the snapshot quality of the collection and the reflective quality of the narration, Scenic Overlook reads more like a memoir than a novel. An Elliott City native currently working as a digital archivist of radical and historical press materials, Ray has produced a skillful debut that will appeal to readers and viewers of Into the Wild and Nomadland. —Annie Berke

Company by Shannon Sanders

Release date: Oct. 3, via Graywolf Press

Genre: Short stories

D.C.-area writer Shannon Sanders won the 2020 PEN/Robert J. Dau Short Story Prize for Emerging Writers with her story “The Good, Good Men.” It’s a stunner of a piece, an exploration of the growing distance between two brothers as they prepare to run off yet another opportunistic boyfriend from their mother’s life. The story was originally published in Puerto del Sol’s Black Voices Series in 2019, and it’s the opener for her new short story collection, Company, that comes out from Graywolf Press on Oct. 3.

“The Good, Good Men” is the perfect introduction to Sanders’ writing. Her voice and style are reminiscent of Elizabeth Strout and Deesha Philyaw, with her beautiful, layered plotlines and character-based world building. This is not a loud collection, but instead a deeply moving one. The stories are linked, the feel almost novel-like, with every character offered the chance to step into the spotlight. Each story becomes a hero’s tale—even characters we were sure, earlier on, were the villains. Sanders’ craft is precise, her writing absolutely gorgeous, but it’s this care and love for the flawed humans she’s created that captures our hearts as we read. Her work is quietly propulsive, the collection a fast, often funny read despite its thorny subject matter. Families are complicated, loving, and sometimes even terrible, Sanders shows us, but also funny as hell.

We’re right there with her the entire time. It’s not hyperbole to say that I laughed, cried, and was completely devastated by the end of this collection. I’d fallen so in love with this world, and with Sanders’ writing, that it was very hard to put Company down. (Sanders will read from Company at 7 p.m. on Oct. 12 at Politics and Prose.) —Hannah Grieco

Bad Questions by Len Kruger

Release date: Oct. 3, via Washington Writers’ Publishing House

Genre: Fiction

Novels that are very funny and truly sad are rare, but Washington metro area writer Len Kruger’s Bad Questions is one. Set in Silver Spring and Rockville, Maryland, in the late 1960s, it traces the mistakes, confusion, and above all questions of seventh grader Billy Blumberg, whose father, his Hebrew school principal, has just committed suicide. It’s impossible to read this book and not get frustrated with Billy—the way you get frustrated with any stubborn adolescent, especially one who won’t stop asking questions that turn into, and turn their answers into, pretzels. “I could think of plenty of questions,” Billy tells the reader. “I was the Albert Einstein of questions. They came to me when I blinked my eyes, when I heard houses settling and telephones ringing, when I shoveled macaroni and cheese into my mouth.”

But then, given the strangely unexpected plot, it is really very fitting that this kid would make so many unlikely inquiries. To avoid a spoiler, all I’ll say is that the plot involves a junior high teacher, who tells her class, “At some point in your lives your minds will snap. All of you. Do you understand? Snap. Crackle. Pop … You—each and every one of you—will enter the Kingdom of Madness. It may be for the briefest of seconds. It may be for a week. It may be for a year … But it will happen … And there’s not a thing you can do about it.”

This somewhat crazed teacher delivers this oration at the novel’s beginning, then pops up later, weirder than ever, and alters the course of Billy’s interior life. He also gets into trouble, but that’s to be expected of a solitary, introverted, somewhat wacky teenager, whose very depressed father has just killed himself. Suicide looms over the book and, naturally, Billy’s entire life. Indeed, the novel begins with Billy lighting his father’s yahrzeit, the candle in memory of the dead, and ends with it. In between, the story is filled with narrator Billy Blumberg asking, as always, lots of questions. —Eve Ottenberg

Hitchcock’s Blondes: The Unforgettable Women Behind the Legendary Director’s Dark Obsession by  Laurence Leamer

Release date: Oct. 10, via G.P. Putnam’s Sons

Genre: Biography 

In Hitchcock’s Blondes: The Unforgettable Women Behind the Legendary Director’s Dark Obsession, Washington, D.C.-based author Laurence Leamer (Capote’s Women) peels away the glamour of Hollywood to detail the director’s troubling relationships with eight high-profile blonds who starred in his movies. These actors include Ingrid Bergman (Notorious), Grace Kelly (Dial M for Murder, Rear Window, To Catch a Thief), Janet Leigh (Psycho), Kim Novak (Vertigo), Eva Marie Saint (North by Northwest), Tippi Hedren (The Birds, Marnie), Madeleine Carroll (The 39 Steps), and June Howard-Tripp (The Lodger).

Readers unfamiliar with Alfred Hitchcock’s methods will learn about his obsession with these women and, explicitly, how he controlled every aspect of their lives including what they wore and how they styled their hair. On set, Hitchcock made his stars uncomfortable. During the filming of Vertigo, he placed a plucked chicken inside Novak’s dressing room, and he bombarded Hedren with dirty jokes throughout a lunch date. But he really crossed the line when he made “a sexual proposition so unspeakably crude that for the rest of her life [Tippi] could not even repeat his words,” Leamer notes in the book.

Leamer also guides readers through the actors’ personal lives starting with Bergman’s divorce from Petter Lindström and her marriage to Italian director Roberto Rossellini. He then delves into Novak’s battle with bipolar disorder and Kelly’s marriage to Prince Rainier III of Monaco. 

Hitchcock was a master craftsman, but his seedy behavior, which would not be tolerated today, diminishes his accomplishments. Hitchcock’s actions, which Leamer so astutely documents, would make a cogent horror film—no editing required.  —Wayne Catan

Already Gone: 40 Stories of Running Away, edited by Hannah Grieco

Release date:  Nov. 14, via Alan Squire Publishing

Genre: Short stories

There’s something deeply human about the urge to run away. We all, at one point or another, have longed for escape—be it from the mundane, the stress, or the fear that exists in our daily lives. Those feelings are captured succinctly, and sometimes beautifully, in the new release of short stories from Alan Squire Publishing. Edited by City Paper contributor Hannah Grieco, Already Gone: 40 Stories of Running Away is a compact collection, totaling just over 200 pages, which means most of the aforementioned 40 stories are on the extreme end of short. Though the quick reads make it difficult for the reader to submerge themselves in, they offer brief moments of that craved escapism: We can run away in these pages and come back however quickly we like.

The collection features 40 writers (for the 40 stories), including local fiction author Amber Sparks, whose 2020 short story collection And I Do Not Forgive You was named a best of the year by NPR and the Washington Post; Aubrey Hirsch, whose byline frequently appears in my email via Roxane Gay’s The Audacity and Lyz Lenz’s Men Yell At Me newsletter. Hirsch’s story in Already Gone is a haunting and sexually gruesome reimagining of the biblical tale of Lot’s wife; like the bruises mentioned in the pages, the story lingers. However, it’s Deesha Philyaw’s “Mother’s Day” that stands out most for me. Author of the debut short story collection The Secret Lives of Church Ladies (being adapted for television with Tessa Thompson executive producing), Philyaw’s short is a beautiful story of a mother choosing herself over her adult children. It pulls you into the bright colors of Miami and offers thoughts on family and commitment that are worthy of reflection. If you long for a quick kind of escapism, this collection is for you. —Sarah Marloff

Tonight: Punk Rock Vegan Movie at sPACYcLOUd

sPACYcLOUd, in partnership with DC Veg Restaurant Week, is hosting Food Revolution, an outdoor summer film series aimed at finding solutions to the problems in our modern food system. Every Thursday from late July through the end of August, as the sun sets, a big screen and projector are set up along 18th Street NW in front of the Adams Morgan cafe to show the films included in the series. An eclectic venue featuring an art gallery and a skate shop, sPACYcLOUd is an immigrant- and woman-owned community hub. Tatiana Kolina, the shop’s owner, tells City Paper that she’s proud to be one of the three spots in the nation offering plant-based adaptations of Eastern European cuisine. And she takes the cafe’s role as a community space very seriously. “There’s so many different divisions and I think it’s important to bring everybody together,” she explains. “We can work as a village to spread the message, to ask questions, to educate, and to be more impactful in this world. We cannot make change by ourselves, you have to have a community.” This Thursday, Aug. 17, is the second to last screening with the feature-length documentary, Punk Rock Vegan Movie, scheduled. Written and directed by Moby—yes, that Moby—the 2023 film looks at the surprising history of punk rock and animal rights activism. The series concludes with a screening of The Invisible Vegan on Aug. 24. Released in 2019, this independent documentary by filmmaker Jasmine Leyva explores harmful dietary patterns present in the Black community while offering plant-based lifestyle changes as a potential path to health and wellness. sPACYcLOUd and DC Veg Restaurant Week’s Food Revolution film screenings start at 8 p.m. on Aug. 17 and 24 at sPACYcLOUd Lounge, 2309 18th St. NW. spacycloud.com. Free. —Jamaica Kalika

Friday: Oneida and Insect Factory at Rhizome

Anyone lucky enough to catch Oneida at Rhizome this week will understand their past collaborations with Yo La Tengo, Portishead, and Godspeed You! Black Emperor. A cult favorite among indie rock fans, the band have been putting out music since 1997. Though the group have recently ventured into experimentation, their latest album, Success, brings their sound back to ’60s garage rock and related influences. According to Rhizome’s website, band member Bobby Matador has said of Sources, “We wanted to play very, very simply in our own idioms and own vocabularies.” He continues, “But it’s funny. It’s a record of rock songs. Some of which have two chords. Some only one.” The tracks play between psychey spaciousness and fuzzy grit, evoking Velvet Underground and other shoegaze predecessors. Insect Factory will provide local support for Oneida’s show. Fronted by Silver Spring guitarist Jeff Barsky, the ambient act foster a meditative headspace that will carry into the headliner. Oneida and Insect Factory play at 7 p.m. on Aug. 18 at Rhizome, 6950 Maple St. NW. rhizomedc.org. $10–$25. —Dora Segall

Friday: Verse Vortex: A Celebration of Language and Expression, virtual

On Aug. 18, Genesis Poets and Rock Creek Conservancy presents Verse Vortex: A Celebration of Language and Expression at Carter Barron Amphitheatre. This online DC Poetry Festival event will feature a diverse array of both emerging and established poets, and will combine the energy of an open mic night with the visual artistry of local painter Luther Wright, who will accompany the evening’s spoken-word artists. The lineup is an exciting one, including 13 of Nazareth, Miko Reed, Eddie Oliver, Devorah Major, and Dr. Khadijah Ali–Coleman. The celebration promises to be both interactive and engaging, and supports the Rock Creek Conservancy and Carter Barron, which has housed the DC Poetry Festival for more than a decade. Genesis Poets, a group of spoken-words lovers dedicated to promoting the arts and nurturing creative expression, says in their press release, “Whether you’re a seasoned poetry enthusiast or just beginning to discover its charm, Verse Vortex promises to captivate and leave you inspired.” Verse Vortex starts at 7 p.m. on Aug. 18 via Zoom. rockcreekconservancy.org. Free. —Hannah Grieco 

Sunday: Screaming Females at Songbyrd

Screaming Females arose in the thick of early 2000s punk, out of the basements of New Brunswick, New Jersey’s DIY scene. The band have stayed loyal to their roots over the past 20 years while staying consistently innovative, concocting lyrics and guitar riffs that prove they still have something new to say. This week, the group will play at Songbyrd, as part of a tour on the heels of their latest album. In Desire Pathway, out since Feb. 17, frontperson Marissa Paternoster deals with a breakup, something she has shied away from in previous years. Screaming Females wrote the album in 2019, but held off on recording it until post-pandemic. Once released, Stereogum featured it as an album of the week, and other critics have noted that the work showcases the hard-hitting rock for which the band are best known. Opening for Screaming Females are Lung, a two-piece from Cincinnati that Spotify describes the band as “powerhouse art-punk cello rock.” The duo’s support, like the hand-drawn tour poster on Screaming Females’ website, suggest a show rich with nostalgic scrappiness. Screaming Females with Lung play at 8 p.m. on Aug. 20 at Songbyrd, 540 Penn St. NE. Sold out, but a wait list is available. songbyrddc.com. $25.24. —Dora Segall

Monday: The Furious Fists of Bruce Lee at AFI

Bruce Lee’s body of kung fu films are surprisingly slight and yet his cultural impact is epic. In the early 1970s, the same time that Richard Nixon visited China, thawing out four decades of frozen relations, Lee may have been the best unofficial diplomat: His blockbuster films bridged East and West in set locations, languages, styles, and philosophies. Along with the Chinese American Museum, which is cohosting the event, AFI Silver celebrates Lee’s tragically short career in his five starring roles. From his starring debut in Lo Wei’s The Big Boss (1971) to the even more successful Fist of Fury (1972); his self-directed and written The Way of the Dragon (1972)—in which he famously defeats a young Chuck Norris in one of the best silver screen showdowns; the juggernaut Enter the Dragon (1973)—widely regarded as the greatest martial arts film of all time; and the posthumously finished Game of Death (1973)—featuring the film debut of basketball legend Kareem Abdul–Jabbar, Lee proved himself a global superstar and one of the most charismatic screen presences of all time. The poetry of Lee’s movements, the philosophy of his mixed martial arts form, and the politics of his films that elevated Asian and Asian American directors, actors, and martial arts practitioners while breaking racial stereotypes still resonate across all of contemporary popular culture. Lee not only changed cinematic fight sequences forever, his cultural impact is seen in everything from manga and anime (Dragon Ball), video games (Mortal Kombat), contemporary mixed martial arts (Ultimate Fighting Championship), hip-hop (Wu-Tang Clan’s oeuvre), contemporary dance (breakdancing), and comic books (Stan Lee was a huge fan). The Furious Fists of Bruce Lee starts on Aug. 21 with The Big Boss (6:30 p.m.) and runs through Sept. 18 at AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Center, 8633 Colesville Rd., Silver Spring. afisilver.afi.com. $10–$13. —Colleen Kennedy

Tuesday: Katie J. Wells and Kafui Attoh on Disrupting D.C. at Politics and Prose

It took less than a decade for rideshare companies such as Lyft and Uber to become a staple for the mobility of urban residents. When Uber officially launched in 2010, it seemed that the company would be a solution for failing transit systems and underemployment globally. The newly published book Disrupting D.C.: The Rise of Uber and the Fall of the City asks, at what cost? If you have recently become privy to what a low-star rating can mean for a rideshare driver—and especially if you still have not—this book is for you. More than just a story of the rise of Uber in the District, Disrupting D.C. uses interviews with gig workers, policymakers, Uber lobbyists, and community organizers to analyze the rideshare boom, and considers what the surge tells us about the failures of urban politics. D.C. specifically, argue authors Katie J. Wells, Kafui Attoh, and Declan Cullen, became a blueprint for how Uber conquered cities around the world, and explains the problematic role the political economy plays in shaping urban public policy. Wells, Attoh, and Cullen tell City Paper that the goal of the book is not to convince readers to give up rideshares. Rather, it seeks to explain why Uber emerged as a default yet faulty solution to urban issues, and how cities can demand better—and why they should. Wells and Attoh join author, writer, and D.C. resident Michael Harris at Politics and Prose in Chevy Chase to discuss Disrupting D.C., published Aug. 15. The authors tell City Paper that they hope to hone in on how its contents can function as a tool for “activists and legislators concerned about the gig economy and the future of cities.” Katie J. Wells and Kafui Attoh discuss Disrupting D.C.: The Rise of Uber and the Fall of the City with Malcolm Harris at 7 p.m. on Aug. 22 at Politics and Prose, 5015 Connecticut Ave. NW. politics-prose.com. Free. —Camila Bailey

Somewhere on the outskirt

of Santa Cruz, down a side road

out of town, gravity is reversed. 

I’m not making this up.

—From “GRAVITY” by Yvette Neisser

Yvette Neisser is an award-winning poet and translator. A fixture in the local literary scene since 2000, she is an organizer, a writer and, in addition to writing and translating a variety of poetry collections, Neisser is also the founder of the DC-Area Literary Translators Network, a group that meets monthly for readings, workshops, lectures, and conferences.

Neisser’s newest poetry collection, Iron into Flower, published in October 2022 with Finishing Line Press, is a stunning manuscript of narrative exploration. Sometimes whimsical, other times heartbroken by the world and its trajectory, these poems remain both confident and accessible. Neisser is a poet who understands the vulnerability in simplicity, in avoiding the ornate, and each section of the book resonates because of her clean lines and precise breaks.

Iron into Flower is a collection of stories-in-poems, which dive into loss and reflection, growth and recovery. By the end, we are changed with the poet-protagonist.

You’d think nothing could penetrate

that bark, silvered and solid as a wall— 

yet flowers burst 

straight from the trunk: 

first a tiny shoot, 

a spray of buds, 

then bouquets of blossoms.

—from “YOSHINO CHERRY”

City Paper spoke with Neisser about her new collection, her work with the DC-Area Literary Translators Network, and the evolving D.C. literary scene.

Washington City Paper: Tell us about Iron into Flower.

Yvette Neisser: For me, the title Iron into Flower represents transformation—both literal and metaphorical. At the literal level, it is the miraculous transformation of bark into blossom—see the poem “YOSHINO CHERRY”—and at a metaphorical level, the transformation of personal and cultural identities. For example, the poems explore the shift in a woman’s identity after divorce, from wife/mother to “fireball”—see “DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE FROM MY FORMER SELF.” I think the title also resonates with the writing of poetry itself—the struggle of taking a difficult experience and making it bloom in beautiful language.

WCP: Your narrative style makes your poems so accessible. Beautiful, with such movement, these stories in verse! How do you approach writing poetry? Do you think about the story first? Or do you begin with form or imagery?

YN: Each poem comes about in a different way. Sometimes it starts with an image, a memory, or a feeling. Sometimes it may be an observation of nature, art, or current events. For example, “Dayenu” was sparked by the conflict between Israel and Hamas in 2021. “Tea” was a meditation on my grandmother’s lifelong obsession with tea drinking. 

Once I have the image or spark of an idea, I focus on developing the trajectory of the poem—the arc of the poem from start to finish. Usually this means writing everything that comes to mind without any filtering. And that is the first draft. Often, I don’t know what the poem is really going to be about until I start writing it.

Then in revision, I focus on honing the language and chiseling—cutting unnecessary words, lines. Usually, the form emerges in this stage, when I see how the lines naturally group themselves into stanzas, or where a pause is needed.

WCP: You’re the founder of the DC-Area Literary Translators Network. Can you tell us a little about that work?

YN: Yes! As a poet and lover of languages—Spanish, Hebrew, Arabic—I think literary translation is the best thing since sliced bread. When I began seriously translating poetry—my first book of translations from Spanish came out in 2009—I felt a desire to share this new passion with fellow translators. So I reached out to all the translators I knew, and in 2012 we began meeting monthly to discuss translation issues and share our work. We also invited speakers—both local and from out of town—to present their books in translation.

Over time, we expanded our activities to partner with other organizations to further our mission of promoting the art of literary translation in the greater D.C. area. Ongoing partnerships include the annual Confluence translation conference held at Montgomery College and the annual translation reading with the Café Muse reading series. DC-ALT also is a local affiliate of the American Literary Translators Association.

Since the pandemic, DC-ALT has shifted to primarily online events. Every other month, we host a program featuring two translators, usually from different languages, on Zoom, followed by lively discussion. Occasionally we hold in-person translators’ happy hours. All these events are open to the public. For more info, see our website. 

WCP: What are your thoughts on the D.C. literary scene? How has it changed—and/or how has your own writing changed—as a result of the pandemic?

YN: One of the reasons I have stayed in the area for so long is the incredibly supportive and active local writers’ community. In a city where the professional and political worlds can be fiercely competitive, there is a wonderful lack of competitiveness among writers. We encourage each other and celebrate each other’s accomplishments. Furthermore—before the pandemic—you could find a poetry reading somewhere in the area every night of the year.

This year, I’ve been delighted to be able to start attending readings in person again. Over 20-plus years, this is how I have developed and sustained my own community of writers.

Yvette Neisser reads from Iron into Flower at 6 p.m. on Jan. 14 at the Writer’s Center in Bethesda. writer.org. Free, but registration is required.

There is a variety of poetry to explore on bookstore shelves, from classical closed forms, such as William Shakespeare’s sonnets, to open forms, also known as “free verse,” which don’t follow a specific set of rules related to line groupings or meter. But one of the more complicated, and misunderstood, forms of contemporary poetry is erasure poetry. Dan Brady, an Arlington poet well-versed in more traditional fare, explores this unique form in his new collection Subtexts, released on Feb. 22 from Publishing Genius. 

“I was ready to show a new side of myself with this book,” Brady says.

His previous collection, Strange Children, was a beautiful exploration of the way poetry can feel both narrative and lyrical. A deeply personal look at love, Strange Children offered a conversation about the poet’s marriage, his wife’s stroke, and their experience with adoption. Brady is a poet who tells stories, and his first collection lingered in that space. Subtexts continues to draw on his gift for storytelling, but with an exciting, layered new approach.

Erasure poetry usually involves a previously written text, such as a newspaper article, where the poet removes, or erases, certain words and phrases to create an entirely new work with a new meaning. It is sometimes called blackout poetry or newspaper poetry, and has been used to highlight everything from social and political causes to the smallest of moments.

Erin Dorney’s book I Am Not Famous Anymore is one of the better-known examples of an erasure collection, published by local indie press Mason Jar in 2018. Dorney took interviews from actor Shia LaBeouf, erasing and borrowing his own words to discuss plagiarism and the distance between celebrity and reality.

In Subtexts, Brady modifies the form, writing the original work himself, adding in more and more words and phrases to create new poems.

In “Face to Face,” we see this process clearly:

Now that you can read 
my eyes, there is nothing 
between us, just a feeling 
we cannot know.

***
Now that we are here 
you can read 
everything in my eyes. 
Misunderstanding us. 
There is no us, 
no speech, 
just a feeling, 
a sense we 
cannot know 
each other.

***
Now that we are here
face to face, you can read 
everything I mean 
in my eyes. 
There can be no 
misunderstanding 
between us when 
there is nothing 
between us, no 
hazy medium 
of speech, just 
presence and feeling 
and a quiet sense 
that we truly 
cannot know 
each other.

This continues, step by step, adding layers of nuance and meaning, a modified erasure that takes us by surprise at each stage. Brady plays with the form, sometimes adding and then taking away in all new explorations. In “Cabin Fever,” he writes about a snowstorm and a weeklong stay at home, beginning with one line: 

how magical it had been

He builds this up, poem after poem, page after page, into a short essay about the mundane experience itself and the subsequent transition back to regular life. Then he erases—words and lines, phrase after phrase—until he leaves us with:

we were

our

everything

What was mundane becomes an unexpected emotional journey.

“I stumbled into using erasure because I was really thinking about layering in visual art, how you can apply different layers to create a sense of distance and physical depth in a 2D object,” Brady says. “I wanted to see if I could do something like that in poetry and erasure was a natural fit.”

Brady uses these layers to talk about both the personal and broader world in Subtexts, expanding on the microcosm of his immediate experience, unlike his previous collection. Here he writes about government surveillance, the climate crisis, the relationships in his life, and more.

“[The collection’s] real concern is the gap between what we say and what we mean,” says Brady. “How language can come so close to meaning, but always falls short of our intention.”

That yearning is pervasive throughout the collection, with each series of poems feeling like a search for one’s place within the larger world. Whether it’s who we are at home versus our community, the speck of humanity within the geologic time scale, or even an examination of a dismantled argument between lovers, Brady highlights and elevates the spaces between—both literally and figuratively. The big and little pictures collide, and the result is transformative.

From “A Disagreement”:

Brady wrote Subtexts before any of us had heard of COVID-19. It was scheduled to come out in early 2020, but he and his press decided to wait for what they hoped would be a quick resolution and recovery to the virus and the literary scene. Then that wait extended, as it did for all of us. Brady, like many writers, found it difficult to create much of anything during that first pandemic year, and he knew that selling a poetry collection would be nearly impossible. Now, two years later, it finally feels like the right time to get Subtexts onto bookstore shelves.

“That first year was so tough,” he says. “I’m glad—now as things start to open up and, hopefully, we’ve put the worst of this pandemic behind us—Subtexts has its chance to find its audience.”

In addition to writing poetry, Brady is also the poetry editor for the indie press Barrelhouse, and he currently works as the literary specialist for Arlington Cultural Affairs. You can often find him teaching workshops, in conversation at events at The Writer’s Center in Bethesda, and attending panels, such as Day Eight’s conference on Book Reviews held last month. He’s a well-known member of the D.C. literary community, and a big fan of local poetry.

Brady is, himself, an exciting addition to this list, with Subtexts adding an important new voice to the evolving form of erasure poetry.  

“People need to recognize that the D.C. area has some of the best, most exciting poets working right now!” says Brady, naming Alexa Patrick, Courtney LeBlanc, Jenn Koiter, Kyle Dargan, Sandra Beasley, Teri Cross Davis, Kelly Forsythe, Holly Karapetkova, and Paul Killebrew.

Brady reads from Subtexts at Readings on the Pike on March 19 at 7 p.m., virtual.

Imagine reading your poetry in front of 130 faces on your computer screen—the largest audience you’ve ever stood, or sat, in front of. Imagine competing with established poets, round after round of speaking your words, and the nerve-wracking wait for votes from strangers. Then imagine winning and being chosen to publish your first full poetry collection, as Jenn Koiter did just this year, with Day Eight’s DC Poet Project.

Day Eight is a young, exciting nonprofit that began with a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. The small arts organization was founded in 2007 and is responsible for publishing a literary magazine, anthologies, and poetry chapbooks. It’s a diverse organization that offers a variety of programming to the writers and readers of our city, including the DC Poet Project, which is both an annual open mic competition and local reading series. The project, founded in 2017, is designed to support local poets, and it results in publication of a new book of poetry each year by the winning author. 

Koiter won 2021’s competition, and her resulting collection, So Much of Everything, was published on Oct. 31 by Day Eight. Koiter, a 44-year-old Edgewood resident, learned about the DC Poet Project from a friend, and decided on a whim to enter. She advanced to the finals, competing with four other finalists, and was voted the winner on May 22 by the large virtual audience. She was awarded $1,000 and a book contract.

So Much of Everything explores the complicated grief and loss that Koiter experienced after her ex-boyfriend died by suicide nine days after their breakup. She spent a decade writing the poems, but had only a month to put the collection together after winning the competition.

“[The collection] was written over a period of more than 10 years, so it’s a crazy quilt of a book!” Koiter says. “It’s got found poems made from mid-century women’s beauty literature, poems about travel, poems about religion, persona poems, a long sequence of elegies—and that’s not even a comprehensive list. In a weird way, though, it definitely hangs together.” Koiter’s poems are compelling and modern, and she surprises readers at first with a delicate mixture of vulnerability and humor. In “AFTER THANKSGIVING,” she writes:

I am eating

leftover brandied cranberries

mixed into plain yogurt

not because I

particularly like them

but because

my mother does

& I feel closer to her

when I eat them

than I do when we talk…

Koiter is right at home where whimsy meets sadness. Voices and characters thread through the collection, offering us an unusual narrative feeling for a work of poetry. It’s as if she’s whispering to us: “I have a story to tell.” In “THE MESSY GIRL FORGETS HER DREAMS,” Koiter writes as a young schoolgirl:

You dreamed

you were falling? You know,

if you hit the ground,

you won’t wake up.

Later in the collection, Koiter hits hard. “THE SURVIVOR” lets readers begin to see where the collection is headed—into the deeply personal journey of someone who has been through the unthinkable.

The detective shut your front door behind him

and walked calmly toward us

across the lawn. He did not hurry

because he had no reason to hurry.

This collection is crushingly honest, daring in its proximity to ugliness, yet still so beautifully and skillfully rendered. Koiter’s words linger, her voice clear and strong. She fits right in with the other DC Poet Project winners, including Kevin Wiggins, John Johnson, and Susan Meehan, all of whom wrote and published distinctive collections for Day Eight.

Koiter’s win—and book—however, charted a lesser known path due to the realities of the pandemic. As Day Eight board member and literary arts editor Gregory Luce explains, “The major impact [of the pandemic] was that we had to hold the Poet Project virtually this year, and we have just published a very fine book by the amazing winner, Jenn Koiter!” Luce co-founded the project with Day Eight’s Executive Director Robert Bettmann and has continued through the past 18 months to edit the anthologies and literary journal that Day Eight is known for. He expects the organization to continue to grow and evolve in the coming year.

“We are currently in the planning stages for moving poetry publishing into its own journal and launching a twice-yearly print version. We’re hoping to have this project completed early next year,” says Luce.

Bettmann has worked hard to expand Day Eight’s impact over the past 14 years, though the organization has struggled, like most arts nonprofits, to push through and continue providing programming during the pandemic. 

“It’s really hard for us to stay connected to donors when we don’t see people in person,” Bettmann says. “Theaters are going through the same thing. It’s not just ticket sales, but the fact that people who attend an event are the same people who end up donating.”

Bettmann worries about the ability to fundraise (and thus provide programming) as a small nonprofit stuck, for now, in the virtual arts world. In addition to the poetry competition and reading series that the DC Poet Project offers, Day Eight works as a creative team to develop and get funding for programs such as the Eco Arts Project, dance performances, and even a publishing collaboration with the new Anacostia Swim Club.

The organization relies primarily on private funding to develop its arts programs and to publish books, and is overseen by an active board of directors that includes Luce along with noted D.C. writers Grace Cavalieri, Ori Z Soltes, E. Ethelbert Miller, among others.

Both Bettmann and Luce are thrilled with Koiter’s So Much of Everything, as well as the upcoming anthology The Great World of Days, due out in March 2022. The two are also hopeful that the D.C. literary scene will be back to in-person events sooner than later, so Day Eight can keep doing what it’s always done: support and elevate the city’s arts and artists.

Jenn Koiter reads from So Much of Everything at 5:30 p.m. on Jan. 30, 2022, at Reston Readings, at Reston’s Used Book Shop, 1623 Washington Plaza, Reston.  

Leslie Pietrzyk is known throughout the D.C. area for her award-winning prose. Her short story collection, This Angel on My Chest, won the 2015 Drue Heinz Literature Prize, and her 2019 novel, Silver Girl, received a Publisher’s Weekly starred review. She also won the Jeanne Charpiot Goodheart Prize for Fiction from Shenandoah, the Chris O’Malley Fiction Prize from Madison Review, and she was awarded the Pushcart Prize in 2020 for her story “Stay There” in The Southern Review.

After nearly three decades in the area, Pietrzyk recently moved away, but not before writing a collection of interconnected short stories related to Washington. Admit This to No One comes out November 9 from Unnamed Press, but already it’s gathering tremendous reviews for its authentic tone and deeply human lens. Pietrzyk loves D.C., even as she interrogates it—sometimes ruthlessly.

Pietrzyk sat down with City Paper recently to let us interrogate her back, discussing her craft, her inspiration, and what she’ll miss about the city now that she’s moved away.

Washington City Paper: How would you describe this collection?

Leslie Pietrzyk: Admit This to No One is a collection of linked-ish short stories set in official D.C. Recurring characters include [an imagined] Speaker of the House, his two daughters from various marriages, and Mary-Grace, his personal fixer. Family estrangement, race, gender, abortion—nothing is off the table as these characters grapple with the ways the pursuit of power ripples and informs personal, work, and societal relationships. Can anyone emerge unscathed?

WCP: Who did you write this book for?

LP: Myself, the toughest, most exacting audience I know. Everything I write arises from impossible-to-answer questions I’m trying to tease my way through. Here, I was thinking about various power dynamics.

WCP: What inspired you to dive into politics for Admit This to No One? What was it about D.C. that finally demanded to be written?

LP: Can it be as simple as running out of locations to write about because I’ve lived in D.C. for nearly 30 years? …  I wondered why I had never written an entire book set here. I know I didn’t have to turn to politics, but the challenge of the political novel interested me. How to find an arc that feels true without falling prey to the stereotypes? What is the arc, or the cycle, of someone immersed in official D.C. life? How does power become a currency, and what happens to the people who view their life through the lens of power structures? What are the unspoken rules that govern lives here, and what happens when those rules are broken?

WCP: One of the wonders of this collection is the specificity of the setting. Every story feels like home to those of us who live here. How did you decide where to place the stories?  

LP: As this book moved from casual idea to project, I knew I wanted to commemorate some of my favorite D.C. places, especially those that aren’t among the usual suspects of monuments, museums, etc. The Kennedy Center enthralls me; if I could go to one place the night before dying, it might be the opera on a fall evening that’s pleasant enough to stand outside as dusk settles. I’ll grab a Manhattan and appetizers upstairs before the performance, followed by a slow, lingering return to the parking garage at the end of the night. I love being alone in the dim light of that grand hall when the shows are over. So, yes, I wanted to try to find spots that people who live here would recognize but might see anew, as the special places they are.

I admit to thinking about stories and plots as I walked across the Wilson Bridge because that’s what I often do as I walk—distract myself from the sweat of exercising in 3H August (hot, hazy, humid). Honestly, I had about half of a murder mystery in my head one summer! Whenever I had to send characters to a particular place, I tried to think about iconic D.C. details, for example, the caricatures on the wall of the Palm or the way passengers eye other passengers at night in the reflections in the Metro windows. Many people visit D.C. and see the surface, but I wanted this book to observe real lives here.

WCP: Much like your novel Silver Girl, Admit This to No One’s first story, “Til Death Do Us Part,” pulls us into the daughter’s world completely. The teen angst, the layers of frustration and resentment; the realization, after the fact, that it’s all been an act. How do you tap in to that voice?

LP: Young girls are possibly my favorite characters to explore. Technically, they have no or little useful power—can’t vote, aren’t earning buckets of money—yet there’s nothing scarier than a group of mean teenage girls, or even one teenage girl, rolling her eyes with disdain. (Maybe that’s just me?) Physically, our youth-obsessed culture considers young women and girls to be at the peak of their beauty and “worth”—I’m speaking culturally; of course, beauty exists at all ages, in countless ways. Yet that fleeting physicality brings a dangerous power that often is misused or misunderstood or unwelcome. Or maybe squandered?

When I’m working with new characters for a big project like these linked stories, I often work with 30-minute writing prompts, pushing my evolving characters into difficult and troubling situations to see how they react, what they’ll say or do. “Til Death Do Us Part” started that way. I also need characters who lie, which teenagers are prone to do. All that said, young girls as characters make me work super-hard, trying to keep their voice on the page sounding current and relevant. In the end, I’m inventing a sort of slangy talk that sounds right without being true to life, since slang passes so quickly through the zeitgeist.

WCP: What was it like to publish a book with an independent press? Why did you choose that route?

LP: Each book takes its own individual journey with highs and lows. In this case, with Unnamed Press, I started with a bunch of stories that I’d basically shoved together because they were all “done.” But the editor took the time to share a vision of how she imagined the stories coalescing into a stronger arc. She left the “how” up to me, which is my favorite way to work: feeling inspired by great ideas and then spending the months ahead puzzling out the bigger picture for myself. […] And small presses can be quick: I’m grateful to insert an allusion to the January 6 insurrection at the Capitol into a book that appears less than a year later. Small presses make a writer feel her book matters; that books aren’t a commodity but a crucial part of the larger, ongoing conversation about why words matter, why art prevails. Talk about power!

WCP: What would you tell a reader who isn’t from D.C.?

LP: Visit your checklist of monuments and museums, but also take time to walk through the city, especially as the light is changing, or just find a place to sit and stare. Pre-COVID, I loved to park myself on a bench outside on Capitol Hill and watch busy people pass and cluster—that self-imposed aura of importance fascinates me. Know that D.C. is way wider and deeper and more diverse than those sites on the mall. Check out Old Town Alexandria, where my heart is. Above all, for the love of god, STAND TO THE RIGHT on Metro escalators.

WCP: You’ve recently moved away from D.C. What will you miss? What are you happy to let go of?

LP: Bye-bye, traffic! What I miss, along with some of the sites already mentioned, is that sense of being in an important place where important things happen. This realization is totally unexpected—the sensation must be part of my internalized landscape. But shortly after we left, there was mention of an upcoming march or protest, and I thought with a pang: Oh, I don’t live there anymore. I also miss feeling that the people around me devour books and publications and ideas and want to talk-talk-talk about what they’re think-think-thinking. I miss that paper copy of the Washington Post delivered to my door every morning, and I miss listening to WAMU or C-SPAN radio in the wee hours of the night when I can’t sleep. (Logistically, streaming means disturbing my husband.) I miss walking down Connecticut Avenue from Dupont Circle to Farragut West on a warm summer night. I’ll sob with abandon when it’s Scottish Walk weekend in Old Town come December. I’ll miss the elegant cocktails at the Columbia Room. And oh…the amazing community of D.C. writers, flourishing amid the backstabbing politicos. 

Pietrzyk reads from Admit This to No One at 5 p.m. on Nov. 13 at Politics and Prose.

Books in Bloom

Are you ready for an inspiring day of free author readings and literary fun? Then you’re in luck, because Books in Bloom is back on Oct. 10 with an in-person (and masked) festival, featuring Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter Nikole Hannah-Jones as the headliner. Returning to Columbia, Maryland, for its fifth year, this outdoor festival offers readings, panels, a pop-up bookstore from Busboys and Poets, and a wide variety of literary activities for children. Books in Bloom aims to be a progressive community event and, according to a press release, the 2021 festival will continue its activism through literature efforts by “encouraging open dialogue on themes of diversity, racism, inequality, and culture.” Executive Director of the Downtown Columbia Partnership Phillip Dodge says they’re “honored to welcome Dr. Nikole Hannah-Jones,” creator of the 1619 Project, as this year’s headliner. Hannah-Jones will discuss her new books, The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story and The 1619 Project: Born on the Water (the latter was cowritten with Renée Watson); both should be released in November. “This event is needed now more than ever, as communities like ours across the country are having important conversations about equality, justice, and race,” Dodge writes in the release. Other authors to appear at this year’s event include Jake Tapper, Laura Lippman, Stacey Vanek Smith, Ram Devineni, and Amy Argetsinger. Books in Bloom takes place Oct. 10 from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m., at Color Burst Park, 6000 Merriweather Dr., Columbia, MD. booksinbloommd.com. Free.

D.C. is waking up after a long pandemic year, cautiously but surely, and local writers are eager to connect—both with each other and with their readers, who they’ve often struggled to reach during such an isolating time.

Melissa Scholes Young, a D.C. area author and associate professor in literature at American University, has found herself facing these challenges at both ends of the COVID wave. On May 1, 2020, her Furious Gravity anthology was published—the most recent book in a series of anthologies by D.C. women writers that she edits and publishes. The timing was rough, but Young adapted and led the book tour into the virtual world, planning events everywhere Zoom allowed, from Politics and Prose to the Writer’s Center and beyond.

Now Young is preparing for another release: Her second novel, The Hive, came out on June 8, creating a buzz. It’s already been optioned by Sony Entertainment. Like in her first novel, Flood, Young revisits rural, working-class Missouri in her new book. “I’ve always written about my working-class roots and feminism in rural communities,” Young says. And she similarly explores identity, family, and the idea of home—this time through the lives and voices of five women grappling with the loss of the complicated, sometimes problematic patriarch of their family, along with their own evolving goals and dreams. 

Never one to lecture (outside of her university classroom), Young invites us into these women’s lives with the warmth of a true storyteller. Each character’s personality shines, from fierce prepper Grace, who reels from the loss of her husband, to the various daughters, all of whom loved their dad deeply even as they fought against traditional expectations within the family and community.

The title is a fitting metaphor, combining the family-run pest control company and “the hive” of the Fehler ladies, and the book is a fun, fast-paced read. Young is a masterful writer who keeps us hooked, delicately balancing tough dilemmas with humor and lighter family moments. 

But getting The Hive to its launch date wasn’t easy. Before the pandemic, Young had hoped that Flood’s success would pave the way for this new novel. Her editor at Hachette Books was gone by early spring of 2020, when she and her agent sent the The Hive out on submission, and publishing houses were nervous about the coming year. She knew she wanted to work with a team that focused on the new places that publishing could go. She found that opportunity with Keylight Books, a new imprint of the independent Turner Publishing Company.

Big houses were pulling back contracts, cutting publicity budgets, and delaying publication dates. But Keylight seemed different to Young. She liked how they were pivoting to reach readers and thinking creatively about marketing.

“My experience with Keylight Books at Turner has been more boutique and specialized than my first novel with Center Street at Hachette,” Young says. “I’ve felt autonomous as an author at Keylight. Every decision we’ve made from the art, cover design, editing, and publicity campaign has been cooperative.”

One interesting shift has been a new approach to getting the word out. With The Hive, Young has put out video content and an audio advance reader copy for reviewers and booksellers. ARCs help promote early sales via those reviews and bookstore advertising. Presale figures mean everything to publishers and help them determine how much time and money they’ll continue to spend on that book as it launches. It’s been difficult to get physical review copies out to people during COVID, and many bookstores are only now beginning to open to browsing customers, so digital tools have been a way that Young’s team could keep promoting the book.

“We need to meet readers where they are,” she says. “The Hive audiobook, podcasts, craft workshops, and a postcard preorder campaign at thehivenovel.com have been essential.”

The new directions Young has taken are paying off, despite the disruptions of the pandemic. The Hive was picked up by Sony Entertainment immediately after she signed the contract to publish with Turner—Keylight specifically focuses on publishing books that have the potential for screen adaptation—and it’s now being shopped as both a series and a film. 

Readers (and writers) often wonder about the mysterious page-to-screen process, which Young discusses in a recent article for Literary Hub: “When a story is authentic on the page, it translates well to screen. I write about working-class populations, which often include a conversation about the aestheticization of poverty.” That conversation with film and television professionals is ongoing.

“Poverty, for example, is sometimes portrayed in an unrealistic, stereotypical way to sanitize it for viewers with less experience with class struggle. I’m interested in truth rather than digestibility,” she says.

And while many writers dream of their book getting optioned for the screen, Young doesn’t write her novels with the screen in mind.

“I’ve never started a writing project thinking about the screen. I’m a storyteller and a novelist, so I do my work on the page,” Young says. Despite this, her books practically demand to be made into visual form. She says she has loved working with the screenwriters, who also have Midwestern and/or rural backgrounds. 

As a new challenge, Young is also writing a screenplay adaptation for Flood herself, hoping to see it join The Hive in visual form.

As her fans impatiently wait for her stories, both on screen and off, she’s also hard at work planning her summer book tour. Amy Freeman is the development director at the Writer’s Center, as well as a writer herself, and she’s excited to see and hear Young read from The Hive in person.

“I’m on the edge of my seat waiting for in-person readings! I’ve seen Melissa read on Zoom, and it’s always great, but I want to watch her sign books, including my copy, to have those little moments of warmth we just don’t get on Zoom,” she says.

Young and other local writers continue to make the most of primarily virtual book tours; on June 8, she spoke to an online crowd via Politics and Prose. Bookstores schedule authors for readings and panels well in advance, and they’re still facing the unknown with in-person gatherings. So most of The Hive’s summer PR events will continue to be online, and even if in-person events resume in the fall, Young hopes to keep those virtual options open in order to stay accessible to her readers. She’s also been able to attend more events than usual because there’s no travel involved, which is a perk.

Leslie Pietrzyk is another established area author whose new book is facing a circuitous path to its readers. Her new short story collection, Admit This to No One, comes out in October, and like Young, Pietrzyk appreciates what virtual events offer both writers and readers.

“While I’m definitely looking forward to live book events, I can’t deny that my literary world definitely widened with Zoom readings and workshops,” she says. “Everywhere we turn lately, there’s a new way of doing things, and I expect that book events are also evolving. Right now, I don’t think anyone can predict exactly how.”

Whether the venue is virtual or brick-and-mortar, it seems that readers will show up.

“Fostering and helping the literary community is so important and Melissa tries to do so much to support writers,” says Morgan Bluma, a student of Young’s at AU. “Her work motivates, inspires, and improves my own work.”

The pandemic forced writers and publishers (and everyone else, for that matter) to reconsider their daily actions. Canceled in-person events meant no book tours. Readers couldn’t meander through bookstores, or pick featured books off curated tables. Friends couldn’t linger at The Royal or The Coffee Bar chatting about books and couldn’t swing by a Tuesday night reading at Politics and Prose.

An abundance of well-known writers live in the D.C. area, and the city has an active small press scene, with many publishing houses collaborating and adding to the literary community. Beginning last March, these publishing houses, in concert with independent bookstores and literary organizations across the city, developed a thriving virtual literary scene. But since small presses lack the budgets and social networks of larger publishers, they rely on the local literary community and word of mouth to sell books. And all of the D.C. area presses faced a similar struggle: How could they get books into readers’ hands without in-person events? 

Washington Writers’ Publishing House, a small press that utilizes a cooperative, volunteer-based model to publish area authors, had to consider the reality of pandemic-year sales when it proceeded with publishing the new anthology This Is What America Looks Like. In a typical year, WWPH chooses two winning manuscripts from local writers to publish, and those writers later volunteer with the press to help publish others’ books. In early 2020, before the pandemic reached D.C., it temporarily shifted to an anthology format in order to highlight a wide variety of authors and poets. The coincidental nature of the timing whispers of fate. The call for submissions came in February, just a few weeks before the first lockdown. A few weeks later, the world seemed to explode and shut down simultaneously, and books weren’t on most of our minds. But writers process through the written word, and so editors decided to move forward.

“This Is What America Looks Like was a repeated chant at the 2017 Women’s March—an acknowledgement of the diversity, size and peaceful passion of the crowd on that cold January day. Every work of art, no matter the subject, is a portrait of its time. This theme, this title, declaims that truth self-consciously,” says Kathleen Wheaton, president of WWPH. “That writing keeps happening, even, and maybe especially, in times of crisis.”

But getting the word out has been tricky, and as is the case for many publishers right now, sales have been lower than usual. WWPH prints on-demand, which allows some flexibility when compared to ordering large numbers of books to sell at a time. It still has to sell at least 500 books to break even, however, and that’s incredibly difficult right now.

“For a small literary press, in-person readings and events are vital—it’s like a Tupperware party. You invite everyone you know, show them a good time, and hopefully they’ll buy something before they leave,” says Wheaton. “So COVID is really devastating for us—you can’t make the audience laugh or teary in the same way over Zoom. You can’t write personalized dedications in the books.”

Word of mouth is even more of a lifeline for small presses and authors now. One listener might hear a poet read at a Zoom event, such as The Inner Loop or The Literary Cypher, and then purchase their book through a link to the press itself or a local bookstore. From there, it’s all about the reader sharing their enthusiasm via social media. Without in-person book launches, tours, or even casual dinners with friends, readers aren’t able to connect over what we love in the same way. After much discussion, the team at WWPH made the decision to push ahead, hoping they wouldn’t regret it.

More than 500 writers submitted stories and poems, to the delight of volunteer editors Caroline Bock and Jona Colson, both of whom have published books with WWPH. They opened the submission window to the entire D.C. region, including writers who had lived, worked, or grew up here, and looked for a mix of new and established voices to create a spectrum of pieces from raw and edgy to reflective, sorrowful, and more.

“We were overwhelmed with submissions,” Wheaton says. “Writers were writing through this, channeling their grief, their worry, their rage. And the work was amazing. We finally settled on including 100 writers and poets, and the pieces are not only individually stunning but they reflect and build beautifully on each other.”

From start to finish, the entire process was done virtually—a new approach for the editors. The team met for regular Zoom meetings and sent hundreds of emails and texts as they navigated the difficulties of pandemic publishing.

“We worked through unexpected production delays due to the pandemic. Most notably, details that were ‘easy’ before the pandemic, such as registering copyright with the Library of Congress, were delayed weeks,” Bock says. “We went right down to the wire with our February publication date. Maybe all books are made this way, but I think we felt the weight of 100 writers on us.” 

This Is What America Looks Like is wildly diverse, with short stories exploring D.C.’s streets and landscapes and poetry speaking to relationships and experiences that redefine what identity means. In “Myrna,” the opening short story, author Mary Kay Zuravleff (a former City Paper contributor) dives into the immigrant experience and takes readers back to 1934 as a precocious girl faces her father’s declining health due to black lung. From there the anthology twists and turns—reminding us what America can, should, and shouldn’t be.

In “Trail Walk” by Robert J. Williams, two students discuss friendship and racism along the Metropolitan Branch Trail. When a woman jogs by, LaShawn tells his white friend, “Wasn’t but one of three things was going to happen for me, two of them bad. One of them really bad. Me, I got to stay paranoid like. Let’s see what happens to you with the next one.”

In “American Progress,” poet Venus Thrash compares photographs of Emmett Till and Tamir Rice: “Staring at the photos side by side / they could be brothers.”

In “Invisible Woman,” poet Mary Ann Larkin writes about growing older as a woman. “I am vanishing from men’s dreams, from their poems,” she tells us. “No one’s hot breath whispers: wait.” And in “Emergency Vehicles Coming Through,” Robert Herschbach cuts through the noise of this past year with: “Our roads are sized for catastrophe, /the cul-de-sacs like asphalt skating rinks, /built for firetrucks to turn in, / the layout in general a banner campaign /with a message for us all: look, look /someday you too.”

This Is What America Looks Like offers what Wheaton describes as “a refracted and kaleidoscopic picture of contemporary D.C.” Even in its hardest places, readers connect with the stories and poems it contains. This is our home, and we see its ugly truths side-by-side with its beautiful moments.

Tara Campbell, a D.C. writer whose prose poem “Lamentations for the Dead in a Barbaric Land” appears in the anthology, also launched her own book this past summer, Political AF: A Rage Collection. Her book’s press, Unlikely Books, faced the same challenges that WWPH faces now.

“I posted invitations on social media for authors with books launching in March and April [of 2020] to come do their belated launch events with me, thinking surely everything would be back to normal by the end of the summer. Now we’re all on Zoom, and author copies are gathering dust on the shelf,” Campbell says. 

One bonus of continued virtual events: The literary community itself has become more inclusive. With more bookstores hosting book launches, panels, and readings, more people can hear their favorite authors read from new books. Those who cannot attend in-person events are hoping that some events stay virtual and that all events continue to have the option of attending via Zoom or another online platform.

Advocates hope that continuing to offer virtual or hybrid events could increase book sales for everyone, despite sales being low this past year. But it might take some creative thinking on the part of booksellers offering incentives or personalized virtual author experiences, to make this happen. The real benefit is an expanding, inclusive community, which they hope, over time, supports everyone’s writing. Small presses exist at the heart of the literary community, offering publishing options for writers in all genres—focusing as much on art as on sales.

“Community is essential,” Wheaton says. “Most small presses function on tiny budgets, with staff that are in it for the love of literature rather than the money.”

More than 120 people attended the virtual release of This Is What America Looks Like, which WWPH co-hosted with The Writer’s Center on Feb. 5. That’s an enormous turnout in a Zoom weary world and proof that readers still care deeply about connecting with the writers they love.

This story has been updated with the correct spelling of Robert Herschbach’s name.