LitPDX seeks to amplify marginalized voices, and welcomes all, their ideas, their events, and their words.

For details regarding specific events please contact the organizers or venues. If you are an organizer or venue and would like to reach out to us please feel free to contact us or submit an event using our submission form. We’d love to hear from you!

Visiting Writers Series: She Who Has No Master(s)

Reed College - Eliot Hall Chapel 3203 SE Woodstock, Portland

She Who Has No Master(s) is a project of multi-voiced collectivity, hybrid poetics, encounters, in-between spaces and (dis)places of the Vietnamese diaspora. Through a collaborative art process and social engagement interaction(s), they endeavor to bring into concert the voices of women writers of the Vietnamese diaspora. They define writing as art that has storytelling at its core, but may express itself in hybrid, performance, visual, musical/aural, and interdisciplinary forms. This event includes: Vi Khi Nao, Stacey Tran, and Dao Strom. Vi Khi Nao is the author of the short stories collection A Brief Alphabet of Torture (which won FC2’s Ronald Sukenick Innovative Fiction Prize in 2016), and a novel, Fish in Exile. Vi holds an MFA in fiction from Brown University. This Fall 2019, she is BMI Shearing…

Free

Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic Celebrates 15 Years with Rod Nelson

Angst Gallery 1015 Main St, Vancouver

Ghost Town Poetry Open Mic Hosted by Christopher Luna and Toni Lumbrazo Luna of Printed Matter Vancouver Featuring Rod "Kenny" Nelson Join us as we celebrate our 15 Year Anniversary! 7 pm Thursday, November 14 Open mic sign up begins at 6:30 and closes at 7 $5 Suggested donation No one turned away for lack of funds Angst Gallery 1015 Main Street Vancouver, WA 98660 angstgallery.com Food and libation provided by Niche Wine Bar, 1013 Main Street Sound provided by Briz Loan & Guitar: http://briz.us/ LGBTQ+ FRIENDLY, ALL AGES, AND UNCENSORED SINCE 2004 Rod Nelson is a spoken word poet in Central Washington. Rod Nelson’s work focuses on modern day social issues and addresses the divide between rural and urban America. He was born in…

Free – $5

Poetry Reading: Melanie Green, Margaret Chula, Carolyn Martin

Annie Bloom's Books 7834 SW Capitol Hwy, Portland

Annie Bloom's welcomes these three wonderful local poets. The poems in Melanie Green's A Long, Wide Stretch of Calm (Poetry Box) are an invitation to slow down, to rest deep into quiet and the contemplative. Melanie Green’s poetry explores the connection with the numinous—as well as speaking to the difficulty of living with a chronic illness. In Shadow Man (Poetry Box), Margaret Chula brings her father out of the shadows where he had been since 1957, the day her mother packed their five children—all under the age of ten—into the car and drove away. Over the years, Margaret comes to accept the differences between a mother who wants China cups with saucers and a father who’s content with a Budweiser. Through writing about these awkward,…

Free

The First Cell: And the Human Costs of Pursuing Cancer to the Last

Powell's Books at Cedar Hills Crossing 3415 SW Cedar Hills Blvd, Beaverton

We have lost the war on cancer. We spend $150 billion each year treating it, yet – a few innovations notwithstanding – a patient with cancer is as likely to die of it as one was 50 years ago. Most new drugs add mere months to one's life, at agonizing physical and financial cost. In The First Cell (Basic), oncologist Azra Raza offers a searing account of how both medicine and our society (mis)treat cancer, how we can do better, and why we must. A lyrical journey from hope to despair and back again, The First Cell explores cancer from every angle: medical, scientific, cultural, and personal.

Free

November 2019 SFWA Reading Series – Portland

Lucky Labrador Brewing Company 915 SE Hawthorne Blvd, Portland

Science Fiction and Fantasy Readings by Authors in Portland, Oregon The Pacific Northwest is home to a Tardis-Full of Science Fiction and Fantasy writers, a fact celebrated every quarter with the Pacific Northwest Reading Series. These free quarterly events provide the Northwest Science Fiction and Fantasy community a chance to gather, network and enjoy readings from local and visiting authors in Portland and Seattle. Each event features three authors who read from their latest work, interpreting and explaining their concepts and vision. In addition, space is provided for networking and conversation. Booksellers will be on hand with fresh copies of the authors’ books for you to buy and get autographed. Shanna Germain The co-owner and managing editor of Monte Cook Games, Shanna's work can be…

Free

Mark Z. Danielewski

Powell's City of Books 1005 W Burnside Street, Portland

We all have fears, but if we can’t face the small ones, how will we face the big ones? Kai is afraid to fly a little blue kite. But Kai is also very, very brave, and overcoming this small fear will lead him on a great adventure. Remember: all great adventures start with one little moment. You know the one. It’s like a gentle breeze whispering in your ear what you already know by heart: not even the sky is the limit. The Little Blue Kite (Pantheon) is the new book from Mark Z. Danielewski, author of House of Leaves and The Familiar series.

Free

Endangered Orcas: The Story of the Southern Residents

Powell's Books on Hawthorne 3723 SE Hawthorne Blvd, Portland

The critically endangered Southern Resident killer whales are the most watched and studied whales in the world, yet they struggle for survival in the waters of Washington State and British Columbia. These urban orcas, a Pacific Northwest icon, are at the center of human politics as we attempt to learn from the past and find a sustainable future. Our relationship to these whales, complicated by both the positive attachments and negative politics we have created around them, has changed dramatically over the last 50 years. With more challenges on the horizon, one question looms: Can we still create a sustainable future for humans and orcas in the Salish Sea? Monika Wieland Shields’s Endangered Orcas (Orca Watcher) is the story of the Southern Resident killer whales.

Free