Deborah Reed will read from her novel Carry Yourself Back to Me at the Manzanita Writers’ Series at 7pm on Saturday, April 21, 2012 at the Hoffman Center in Manzanita.

Both critics and fellow authors have praised the novel.

“Part whodunit, part romance, part family drama, and part childhood remembrance, Reed’s debut is a dense, psychologically complex meditation upon the flawed yet resilient nature of family and love that is simultaneously meditative and fast-paced.” —BOOKLIST

“Deborah Reed’s novel, Carry Yourself Back to Me, marries gorgeous and wise prose with a can’t-help-but-read-one-more-chapter plot. In it, Reed weaves a complex story of love and longing that’s mysterious, intelligent and full of heart. She had me from page one.” –Cheryl Strayed, author of the novel Torch, and Wild, a memoir.

In her first literary novel, Reed triumphs with this thoughtful, graceful story of singer/songwriter Annie Walsh. Readers will enjoy the novel’s engaging characters, intricate plot, and beautifully rendered sense of place. – Publisher’s Weekly

Carry Yourself Back to Me was selected as a Best Book of 2011 Amazon Editors’ Pick. It’s also inspired an original song by Zia McCabe of the Dandy Warhols.

Reed’s first book, A Small Fortune, a thriller written under the name of Audrey Braun, published to critical acclaim in July 2011. Her next Braun book releases in September. Local writers (and readers) will be fascinated by the unusual path her book publishing has taken. You’ll learn how she leveraged a self-published e-book into a 3-book contract, with some interesting twists along the way.

Her work has appeared in The Center For Fiction’s The Literarian, The Nervous Breakdown, Opium Magazine, More Magazine, and elsewhere. Reed is currently getting her Masters of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from Pacific University and is at work on a new literary novel.

Following Reed’s reading and Q&A, we’ll have our popular Open Mic where up to nine local writers will read 5 minutes of their original work.

Admission for the evening is $7.

Further information and the 2012 schedule are available here or contact Vera Wildauer at vwildauer@gmail.com.

After the workshop, Reyes will read from his latest collection of poetry--Pomegranate, Sister of the Heart.

Carlos Reyes will conduct a poetry-writing workshop from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Hoffman Center in Manzanita on Saturday, March 31, 2012. He will do a reading from his new book, Pomegranate, Sister of the Heart, following the workshop at 2:30. This is a special event of the Manzanita Writers’ Series. The free reading is open to the public and books will be available to purchase at the event.

Writers who participated in Reyes’ March 2011 one-hour workshop can tell you that his workshops are immediately engaging, fun and creative. This workshop will involve different writing prompts from the 2011 workshop. You’ll walk away with useful handouts, a “homework” assignment, along with many new poetry drafts. Download a registration form here. There is a $25 fee for the workshop. Bring a brown bag for the half-hour lunch break.

Poet and translator Carlos Reyes lives and writes in Portland, Oregon when he is not traveling. He travels a lot, and whether he journeys to Panama, Spain, Alaska or Ireland, those experiences inspire and inform his poetry. In 2007 he was honored with a Heinrich Boll Fellowship, which gave him two weeks to write on Achill Island, Ireland. He has had fellowships to Yaddo and the Fundación Valparaíso (Mojåcar, Spain). He was poet-in-residence in 2009 at the Lost Horse Ranger Station in the Joshua Tree National Park, and recently writer-in-residence at the Island Institute in Sitka, Alaska. Pomegranate is his fifth collection of poetry to be published.

Click here to find out more on the 2012 schedule or contact Vera Wildauer at vwildauer@gmail.com.

Oregon Book Award Finalist Marjorie Sandor to read, and lead free memoir workshop

Literary Arts is pleased to announce an event in Manzanita as part of the Oregon Book Awards Author Tour. Marjorie Sandor will appear as part of the Manzanita Writers Series at Hoffman Center on Saturday, March 10th, at 7 p.m.

In addition, Sandor will offer a free workshop on Saturday, March 10th from 3:00 to 5:00 p.m. at the Hoffman Center for the Arts in Manzanita (594 Laneda Ave). The workshop will focus on memoir-writing and explore the power–both haunting and restorative–of our most ordinary and familiar domestic spaces. Sandor will briefly discuss her own experience of creating a book out of the bits and pieces of an early-morning gardening journal kept during a mid-life moment of intense change. From there, participants will do some of their own writing, working from simple prompts. The workshop is free but space is limited and participants are asked to register by emailing Susan Denning at susan@literary-arts.org.

Marjorie Sandor’s most recent book is The Late Interiors: A Life Under Construction, a 2012 finalist for the 2012 Oregon Book Award in Creative Nonfiction. Her previous books include the linked story collection, Portrait of my Mother, Who Posed Nude in Wartime: Stories (Sarabande Books), which won the 2004 National Jewish Book Award in Fiction; and a previous book of essays, The Night Gardener: A Search for Home (The Lyons Press), won the 2000 Oregon Award for Creative Nonfiction.

Following Sandor’s reading and Q&A, we’ll have our popular Open Mic where up to nine local writers will read 5 minutes of their original work.

Admission for the evening is $7.

The North Coast Squid, a new literary magazine featuring the writing of locals — both full-time and part-time — was unveiled to an enthusiastic crowd on Saturday, February 15.  The annual magazine will be available for sale at all the Manzanita Writers’ Series events, as well as the following retail outlets (we’ll keep adding to the list, so keep checking back):

In Manzanita:
Cloud & Leaf Bookstore
Ekahni Books
Manzanita News & Espresso

In Nehalem:
Rainbow Lotus
Hal’s Emporium

In Cannon Beach:
Jupiter Books
Cannon Beach Book Company

In Seaside:
Beach Books

The North Coast Citizen and the Manzanita Writers’ Series coordinators have partnered to bring out a literary journal, the North Coast Squid.

Writing entries were called for in the fall. Even with a short turn-around time, over fifty writers submitted 120 pieces. Sixty-seven submissions were poetry, 18 fiction, 16 memoir, 13 non-fiction, and six Flash Fiction. In addition, over 20 people submitted photography or art.

Entries were judged by two accomplished authors from outside the local area. Novelist Jennie Shortridge of Seattle read the prose submissions. Oregon’s sixth and current Poet Laureate Paulann Peterson, read the poetry.

“Jennie and Paulann have a passion for increasing literacy and broadening the love of reading and writing,” said Vera Wildauer, of the Manzanita Writers’ Series, “They eagerly read through their stacks to support this endeavor and selected 38 pieces.”

A committee of five chose the artwork to include.

“Sponsors stepped up to cover publication costs,” added Kathie Hightower, “We’re very pleased with the results, especially for an inaugural issue where people had just one month to submit. Of course, we have a vision that future journals will be even more expansive and stitch-bound volumes. But this is a great start and a way for many local writers to see their writing published for the first time. We hope many of the writers will read their entries during our Open Mic events this year.”

The North Coast Squid will be available for purchase at every Manzanita Writers’ Series event as well as at a number of retail outlets along the coast, which will be announced soon. Fifty percent of the $2 cover price will go to the Hoffman Center to help with operational costs that provide programs like the Manzanita Writers’ Series.

Ismet Prcic kicks off the 2012 Manzanita Writers' Series season with a reading from his novel, Shards.

Ismet Prcic will read from his novel Shards at the Manzanita Writers’ Series at 7pm on Saturday, February 18, 2012 at the Hoffman Center in Manzanita. This event kicks of the 2012 series, now in its fourth year.

Also at the Saturday event, we’ll unveil the first edition of the new literary journal, the North Coast Squid, with selections from a variety of writers who have a connection to the local area.

Shards is a novel about a young Bosnian, also named Ismet Prcic, who has fled his war-torn homeland and is now struggling to reconcile his past with his present life in California.

It’s a harrowing war story, a stunningly original coming-of-age novel, and a heartbreaking saga of a splintered family. Shards has been listed as a New York Times Notable Book of the Year, a Chicago Sun-Times Best Book of the Year, an Oregonian Top 10 Northwest Book of the Year, and shortlisted for the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association Book Award and the Flaherty-Dunnan First Novel Prize.

Prcic has gotten positive reviews for his first novel:

“Prcic captures the insanity of war and its unceasing aftermath.” – Publisher’s Weekly.

“Impressive . . . Inventive . . . Pushes against convention, logic, chronology . . . Ambitious and deep . . . [Prcic] succeeds at writing an unsettling and powerful novel.”—The New York Times Book Review

“Irresistible . . . Fierce, funny, and real.”—Chicago Sun-Times

Ismet Prcic (ISS-met PER-sick) or Izzy as he prefers, was born in Tuzla, Bosnia-Herzegovina, in 1977 and immigrated to America in 1996. He holds an MFA from the University of California, Irvine, and was the recipient of a 2010 NEA Award for fiction. He is also a 2011 Sundance Screenwriting Lab fellow. He lives in Portland, Oregon, with his wife.

Following Prcic’s reading and Q&A, we’ll have our popular Open Mic where up to nine local writers will read 5 minutes of their original work.

Admission for the evening is $7.

Thriller author, Chelsea Cain will read from her new book on Nov 5. Photo by Laura Domela.

So, who is Chelsea Cain and why does she write gory thrillers?

New York Times Bestselling author Chelsea Cain will read from her latest book The Night Season at 7 pm Saturday November 5.

Caine’s Portland-based thrillers, described by The New York Times as “steamy and perverse,” have been published in over 30 languages, recommended on “The Today Show,” appeared in episodes of HBO’s “True Blood” and ABC’s “Castle,” named among Stephen King’s top ten favorite books of the year, and included in NPR’s list of the top 100 thrillers ever written. According to Booklist, “Popular entertainment just doesn’t get much better than this.”

So how did this “Queen of serial-killer fiction” (Kirkus Reviews) get into writing gory books? Here’s the start of an explanation.

“In retrospect I always had a fascination with the macabre.

It started with the pet cemetery. A kitten of mine was hit by a car and I buried her in an elaborate ceremony under the Rhododendron bush in our front yard in Bellingham, Washington. Months later, I came across a dead bird. I picked it up, put it in my lunchbox, carried it home and buried it under the Rhododendron.

Eventually kids in the neighborhood started hearing about the cemetery and would appear at my door cradling their dead pets. By the end of that year I had buried fifteen birds, three cats, a hamster, a rabbit, a chicken, and about a dozen gold fish. Each corpse was laid in a shoebox, cushioned with toilet paper, and presented with a piece of costume jewelry from a collection that someone had given me. I would then bury the box and say a few words to whoever was present. I had a special vintage ladies hat I would wear for the occasion. It was black, with white silk flowers piled on it, and a torn black net veil.

I was not an ordinary child.”

Get the idea that Cain won’t be an “ordinary reader?” To find out more about how the Green River Killer, Nancy Drew and TV cops shows headed Cain down the path of gory thrillers join us on November 5.

After Chelsea’s reading and Q&A we’ll have our popular Open Mic focused on the theme of “It was a dark and stormy night” at the Hoffman Center in Manzanita.

Admission for the evening is $5.

The weekend is a joint event of the Manzanita Writers’ Series/Hoffman Center and the Manzanita Business Alliance, and is made possible in part by a grant from the Tillamook County Cultural Coalition.

After hearing Jess Walter read at Wordstock 2010, the Manzanita Writer’s Series coordinators vowed to get him to come to Manzanita. He’s funny, engaging, and so-very-down-to-earth. You won’t want to miss this.

Take a look at some of the reviews of The Financial Lives of Poets.

“The hero of Jess Walter’s novel is like a stoned Humbert Humbert … The funniest way-we-live-now book of the year.” – TIME

“Brilliant–and brilliantly funny.” – ESQUIRE

“Lifts off like a rocket … This vigorous, engaging novel is one of the sharpest satires to come along in years.” — BOSTON GLOBE

“Gasp-out loud funny.” — New York Daily News

The book has been chosen in lists of best novels of the year by Time, NPR’s Fresh Air, Los Angeles Times, Washington Post, The Oregonian, Kansas City Star, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Salon.com, and others.

A former National Book Award finalist and winner of the Edgar Allan Poe Award, Jess Walter is the author of five novels and one nonfiction book. His work has been translated into more than 20 languages and his essays, short fiction, criticism and journalism have been widely published, in Playboy, McSweeney’s, ESPN the Magazine, Details, Newsweek, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Boston Globe among many others.

Following Walter’s reading and Q&A, we’ll have our popular Open Mic where up to nine local writers will read 5 minutes of their original work. The recommended theme for this month is “Trouble.”

Admission for the evening is $5.

The series is a program of the Hoffman Center and will be held at the Hoffman Center (across from Manzanita Library at 594 Laneda Avenue.)

Miriam Gershow leads short story workshop

Join us Saturday, September 17, 2011, from 11 to 130pm to learn how to write and publish short stories.

Spend the first half of the workshop using writing prompts to generate short story ideas. The second half will focus on how and where to place your short fiction. The fee for the workshop is $25.

Miriam Gershow is a novelist, short story writer and teacher. Her stories appear in The Georgia Review, Quarterly West, Black Warrior Review, Nimrod International Journal, The Journal, and Gulf Coast, among other journals. Miriam’s stories have been listed in the 100 Distinguished Stories of The Best American Short Stories 2007 and appeared in the 2008 Robert Olen Butler Prize Stories.

Miriam is the recipient of a Fiction Fellowship from the Wisconsin Institute for Creative Writing, as well as an Oregon Literary Fellowship.

She received her MFA from the University of Oregon. She taught fiction writing at the University of Wisconsin as well as descriptive writing to gifted high school students through Johns Hopkins University. She currently lives in Eugene with her husband and son, where she writes and teaches writing at the University of Oregon.

Saturday evening, Gershow will read from her new novel, The Local News, at 7pm at the Manzanita Writers’ Series at the Hoffman Center.

To register for the workshop, download the registration form here.

Click here for the 2011 Schedule.   If you’re planning to attend the workshop, contact vwildauer@gmail.com.  Contact Kathie Hightower at (503) 739-1505 or kathie@jumpintolife.net for more information.

Naseem Rakha reads on Saturday, August 20

Naseem Rakha will read from her book The Crying Tree at the Manzanita Writers Series event at 7 pm on Saturday, August 20, 2011.

Set in southern Illinois and central Oregon, The Crying Tree tells a story of a mother who must overcome the hate, grief, and secrets that surround the murder of her 15-year-old son, and defy church and family as she attempts to stop the execution of the man who killed her boy.

With the heart of a storyteller, Naseem explores the death penalty and forgiveness with her audience through the lens of our justice system as well as subsequent interviews with crime victims, inmates, corrections officials and exonerated death row prisoners.

Publisher’s Weekly says, “This complex, layered story of a family’s journey toward justice and forgiveness comes together through spellbinding storytelling.”

The American Booksellers Association chose The Crying Tree for its TOP 10 Indie Next list for Reading Groups <http://news.bookweb.org/news/winter-2010-2011-indie-next-list-reading-groups> . The book has been published in six international editions.

Naseem is an award-winning author and journalist whose stories have been heard on NPR’s All Things Considered, Morning Edition, Marketplace Radio, Christian Science Monitor, and Living on Earth. She lives in Oregon with her husband, son, and many animals.

Following Rakha’s reading and Q&A, we’ll have our popular Open Mic where up to nine local writers will read 5 minutes of their original work. The recommended theme for this month is “Forgiveness.”

Admission for the evening is $5.

Further information on the Writers’ Series can be found here or contact Kathie Hightower, 503-739-1505 or Vera Wildauer at vwildauer@gmail.com.