Spring Writes Literary Festival

Schedule of Events:

12:00pm to 1:00pm: Workshop: Stranger than Fiction

With E. C. Barrett. From Kafka’s “Metamorphosis” to Carmen Maria Machado’s “The Husband Stitch,” for over a century some of the most celebrated writers have found literary realism inadequate to the task of conveying certain experiences and emotional landscapes. Contemporary readers continue to flock to literary fiction that embraces the magical and surreal. And why not? The world hasn’t gotten less strange since Gregor Samsa woke to find himself transformed into a large bug. This workshop will give you the tools and plenty of writing time to practice playing with the surreal and fantastical in your fiction. We’ll read and discuss a few examples taken from writers such as Machado, Kelly Link and Haruki Murakami, before diving into exercises designed to help you explore your own strange imagination.

Please Register: (There’s one Registration Form for all May 2 to 5 events.)

Location: Buffalo Street Books / Dewitt Mall, 215 N Cayuga Street (enter from Buffalo St.)

1:00pm to 2:00pm: Group Reading

Join us for a reading with local writers Rob Costello (excerpt from his story collection “The Dancing Bears”), Carson Lopez (a horror flash fiction story), Candy Moore (a story about her childhood), and Aurora Rey (except from her novel “Good Bones”).

Please Register: (There’s one Registration Form for all May 2 to 5 events.)

Location: Community School of Music & Arts, 3rd Floor (there's an elevator) 330 E. State/MLK Jr. Street

2:00pm to 3:00pm: Blood City Rollers (middle grade novel)

Join V Park Anderson (she/they), the creator/writer of debut horror/comedy graphic novel series BLOOD CITY ROLLERS, and their Alternate Universe (AU) City Podcast co-host Rey Noble (they/he) as they discuss collaborative storytelling, the graphic novel creation process, roller derby, and teamwork as world-saving praxis. Bonus: get your book signed, win a signed hardcover copy, and/or learn more about local derby!

Please Register: (There’s one Registration Form for all May 2 to 5 events.)

Location: Buffalo Street Books / Dewitt Mall, 215 N Cayuga Street (use the Buffalo St. entrance)

2:30pm to 3:30pm: Reading with Finishing Line Press Poets

A reading featuring local poets Roger Hecht, Wren Tuatha, Jillian Barnet, and Tish Pearlman, whose recent books were published by Finishing Line Press.

Please Register: (There’s one Registration Form for all May 2 to 5 events.)

Location: Community School of Music & Arts / 330 E State St./ MLK, Jr. St., 3rd Floor (elevator is available)

4:00pm to 5:00pm: Group Reading

Join us for a group reading with local authors Mona Eikel-Pohen (lyrical prose about friends and friendships), Lushima Kuajo Lumumba-Kasongo (“Safe Haven”), Erica Steinhagen (Who Do I Think I Am: personal essays) and Cyepress Brathwaite (Poem, “The Role of a Poet”).

Please Register: (There’s one Registration Form for all May 2 to 5 events.)

Location: Ithaca Print Commons, (Center Ithaca), 171 E. State/MLK Jr. Street, on the Ithaca Commons

5:00pm to 6:00pm: Worldbuilding in Science Fiction and Fantasy - with Live Audience Globe-Making

How do you transport your reader to compelling communities with intriguing premises? One of the draws of science fiction and fantasy, and all kinds of speculative fiction, is the rich, layered worlds with imaginative fauna and flora, peoples, cosmologies, politics, economies, climates, religions, food, textiles and architecture. We’ll talk about elements such as palaces, forests, maps, space tech, hierarchical classes, religions, banquets and high and low fashion. What ideals do the cultures hold dear? What motivates people in this world? In this panel, we will discuss our approaches to worldbuilding with examples from speculative fiction literature. Audience members will be given individual blank globes (balloons) and the audience may participate in populating these globes with their own notes, pictures and landscapes to take home with them, as the panelists speak. One blank globe will be passed around for collective worldbuilding and we will share the results of this experiment in live world creation at the end of the panel! With Brian Hugenbruch, Will McMahon, Karen Osborne and D.A. Xiaolin Spires.

Please Register: (There’s one Registration Form for all May 2 to 5 events.)

Location: Lot 10 / 106 S Cayuga Street

6:30pm to 7:30pm: Speculative Works Reading and Live Art Show (with Volunteer Audience Art Participation)

Five speculative fiction authors and/or poets will share their works. One author/artist will render aspects of each of their readings in expressive strokes of sumi ink and calligraphic brush, as a live performative art show. Rather than “en plein air,” it will be “en plein… ear”–as we will open our ears to listen to the narrations and then see paintings come alive! Audience members will be asked if they want to volunteer to give the performative live “en plain ear” sumi painting a shot. All audience members are also welcome to sketch “en plain ear” drawings in their own sketchbooks or with provided paper at their seats as they listen if they’d like. With D.A. Xiaolin Spires, Jennifer Hudak, Leora Spitzer, Debbie Urbanski, and Risa Wolf.

Please Register: (There’s one Registration Form for all May 2 to 5 events.)

Location: Lot 10 / 106 S Cayuga Street

8:00pm to 9:30pm: Literary Jeopardy

This. Is. (Literary) Jeopardy. Teams of local literary luminaries face off in an ultimate test of novelistic knowledge. With puns. Booksellers versus Librarians versus Writing Professors. Who will emerge victorious? Who will suffer shameful defeat? Hosted by local author and trivia host Bob Proehl.

Please Register: (There’s one Registration Form for all May 2 to 5 events.)

Location: Lot 10, 106 S. Cayuga Street, Ithaca NY 14850