Partnered Reading with the Broader Community

This is a partnered reading between writers in the greater Portland area and AWP attendees/published authors. 6:00 p.m. to 9:30 p.m, better to come late than never, and we are serving food as part of a completely optional potluck! Each community member will read a piece onstage, then a conference attendee will read something they’ve written in conversation with their partner’s piece. We encourage everyone, including people from marginalized groups of all kinds, to contact us at cedeptula@sbcglobal.net if you’d like to participate. So far our lineup includes Leticia Garcia Bradford, Elyana Ren, Alice Lavender Love, Yolanda Clay, Cristina Deptula, Rebecca Smolen, Doug Hawley, Sherri Schultz, Crystal Stone and Gina DeVries. Open mic follows if time permits.
Contact: Cristina Deptula and Ross Robbins

[from AWP’s offsite events schedule]

All are welcome to attend this free public literary reading! It’s organized by the people speaking on the Beyond Publicity panel at the Association of Writing Programs conference and takes place from 6pm to 9 30 pm at OpenHaus Coworking Space in Portland’s North Alberta Arts neighborhood. This is on a bus line north from the convention center and the space is completely accessible (I directly asked a person over the phone about accessibility).

Coming for the whole time is wonderful and very appreciated, but coming later than 6pm or coming after an earlier offsite event is much better than not coming at all!

And this is an optional potluck. Bringing food and drinks is completely optional but great, and enjoying the food and drinks there is mandatory, lol 🙂 No need to bring anything but yourself to eat and come out. Not bringing anything isn’t a reason not to go 🙂

We are actively looking for people to read at this event! If this interests you, please contact myself at cedeptula@sbcglobal.net. You do NOT need to be published or attending AWP to come to this event or read here. If you do have a published book, including a self published book, you may bring copies of it to show off and sell.

This is a partnered reading where publishing and book marketing professionals create work in response to, and inspired by other writers and creatives around Portland, OR. Everyone who writes a piece for this event will read on stage at the OpenHaus.

I and my colleague Leticia Bradford will represent the Beyond Publicity panel and other literary professionals will likely come on board too as they let me know that they can make it!

Leticia Bradford, writing instructor, playwright, publishing entrepreneur with Bradford Productions, published poet and anthologist, and founder of B Street Writers, a large literary organization hosting readings and promoting the arts in Hayward, California.

Cristina Deptula, creator of Synchronized Chaos Magazine (synchchaos.com), an 10-year-old international cultural publication accepting writing every month and determining the theme based on what we receive. Also the founder of book PR firm Authors, Large and Small, (authorslargeandsmall.com) a green business hiring those with barriers to employment to do traditional and social media book PR.

For directions or questions, please feel welcome to reach me at 510-589-8252 or cedeptula@sbcglobal.net

The two, and possibly more, of us will read and create work in conversation with others in the writing community who are not already attending the conference. We’re open to having anyone from the community who will be able to attend the night of March 29th and read as part of our group to join the event! You don’t need to live in Portland to read, just be able to come to the event.

This is a chance for professionals to read and consider, then engage with, work from the greater community. We are actively recruiting and strongly encourage guest readers from the POC, neurodiverse, LGBT, disabled, homeless and low-income and other marginalized communities to reach out to us.

So far the lineup of community members includes local writers Elyana Ren, Alice Lavender Love and Melissa Russell, and performance artist and cultural worker Gina DeVries (who lives with fibromyalgia and has created a spoken word performance entitled How to Have a Body). Also, Bonnie Greene and others will come and read some pieces by Portland writer and artist Tony LeTigre, who lived, created, and struggled here – and sadly passed away in a traffic accident January 19th: https://www.marinij.com/2019/01/22/greenbrae-mans-circle-stunned-by-freeway-cycling-death/

We will order food to share! Please feel welcome to come join us!