Recorded & Past 2025 Live Events

Watch Event Recording HERE

Writers often spend years working on their traditionally published debut novels. First, you have to craft a compelling story filled with lively, engaging characters—a grueling process that typically includes countless revisions. Then you spend considerable time and energy trying to get an agent or publisher, collecting plenty of rejections along the way. By the time you finally land a book contract, you are likely very exhausted and ready to let your publisher handle everything. But that moment, for the writer, is when the business of publishing truly begins. Now it’s time to sell your novel to the reading public. In this panel, 4 debut novelists discuss their publishing experiences, from acceptance to publication and beyond. What should writers do to prepare for the launch of their debut? What should they do once the book is published? The panelists will share marketing tips and tricks that helped get their books seen and heard. The panel’s moderator will be K.E. Semmel (The Book of Losman). Panelists include: Aggeliki Pelikidis (Unlucky Mel); Jennifer Savran Kelly (Endpapers); and Roohi Choudhry (Outside Women).

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Local poets will share their published and new work inspired by their encounters with local and foreign bodies of water and waterfall with David Weiss, Howard Nelson, Roger Hecht, Mary Gilliland, and Jerry Mirskin. 

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Join us for a group reading with writers Shahirah Ali (poems), Bailey Bramer (poems), Carolyn Clark (new poems from QWERTY the antique typewriter), Augusto Luiz Barbosa Facchini (excerpt from his story “Voyage Story”), and Yessica Martinez (poetry from her manuscript “Aircraft”).

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Join us for a group reading with local writers Jada Simone (poetry about resiliency, family, and coming of age), Denice Peter Karamardian (excerpts from the ODAR series, historical fiction), Jon Raimon (poems about fatherhood, identity, resistance), Elizabeth Stuelke (a scene from her feature film Her Lover), David Guaspari (“Whoopee!” — about the ads in old comic books), and Hana Hope Widerman (poetry). 

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Women’s journeys, spiritual, emotional, or physical, are the subject of this group reading by three Ithaca authors, who will read from both published and unpublished memoirs. IN MY BOOTS: A Memoir of Five Million Steps Along The Appalachian Trail, by Amanda Jaros Champion, recounts a transformative journey that stretches from Georgia to Maine. In THE PREVENTORIUM, Susan Currie narrates her fifteen month stay, at the age of six, at the Mississippi Preventorium, and reveals a lost history of a once popular medical movement. Anne Mazer went underground with her parents under an assumed identity at the age of six months old and didn’t emerge until two years later. She will read from a work in progress. A short Q & A will conclude the program.

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Seven writers, seven narrators, and seven musicians (or musical combos) come together at the spin of the bottle, discovering in the moment how music, performance, and literature can combine for rare experiences.

Writers: Pat Dutt, Jon Frankel, Eleanor Henderson, John Lennon, Rhian Ellis, David Kaden, Bob Proehl. 

Readers: Jaime Warburton, Mickie Quinn, Becky Lane, Marietta Synodis, Mary Lorson, Isaac  Sharp, Melanie Bush.

Musicians: Billy Cote, Sera Smolen, Nikolai Ruskin, Tenzin Chopak, Aria Dawn, Pierce Walsh, Jennie Stearns. 

WATCH EVENT RECORDING HERE

Join us for a group reading with local writers Gordon Paul Bonnet (excerpt from his novel “In the Midst of Lions”), Jennilie Brewster (excerpt from memoir about trauma, art, and landscape), Jack Wang (excerpt from his novel “The Riveter”), Judy Malloy (vignette from her play-in-progress “Touch”), Alida Dean (new poems), and Jamie Davidson (literary ethnography). 

WATCH EVENT RECORDING HERE

Play It Again Senior Theatre Troupe of Lifelong includes 8 members, each of whom will read an original piece of memoir of the theme of “mistakes.” Each reader will be supported and enhanced by snippets of dialogue, snatches of song, sound effects, and gestures provided by the Troupe to create a well-rehearsed and entertaining event.

Join the Saltonstall Foundation for the Arts as we present four exceptional local and regional poet alums of our residency program. Our two local poets, nicole v. basta (’24) and Clare Jones (’22) are well-known in Ithaca for their respective community-building practices and collaborations. nicole is the author of two chapbooks, and Clare is the recipient of fellowships from the Fulbright Program and Iowa Writers’ Workshop. Our two regional poets, Liza Flum (’17) and Sarah Giragosian (’21), both have newly published full-length collections. Liza, based in Geneva is celebrating the publication of Hover (Omnidawn, 2015), while Sarah, based in Corning, recently published Mother Octopus, co-winner of the 2024 Halcyon Prize (Middle Creek Press.) All four poets are widely published and have received numerous national awards and honors for their writing.

Teen writers from Lehman Alternative Community School will share poetry and prose related to identity, resistance, coming of age in a troubled world, and finding joy and purpose in the struggle. With Ollie Stephenson, Connor Logue, Tommy Mitchell. Stella Sapp-Dietrich, Sadie Kingra, Oden Entwood, Freyja Hill, Kira Hutko, Tre Hoyt, and Yani Bunch.

Five traditionally published authors of queer fiction for adults and teens discuss all things writing and publishing, with space for audience questions. Thispanel will cover reimagining tropes and classic story elements from a queer lens, the joys of writing queer fiction, and writing queer stories in the current political climate. The authors will also discuss their published books and talk about their path to telling their stories and publishing them. M. Stevenson, Isabel Sterling, Amber Smith, Erica Rose Eberhart, and Sam Geller.

Katharyn Howd Machan will lead teenaged participants in guided exercises to create new work and/or continue a manuscript already begun, whether it be a short story, a collection of stories, a novella, a novel, or even a collection of poems. The emphasis will be on world building and character development: channeling knowledge and imagination into writing with significance and resonance.

with Raul Palma. In service to Kazim Ali’s essay “Genre-Queer: Notes Against Generic Boundaries,” which advances the argument that prose writers need to boldly rethink how they perform in or around genre, this course will encourage fiction writers to take inventory of the forms and genres that populate their daily lives and to use that inventory to experiment in fiction.

This will be a generative course—a sort of laboratory where we’ll use discussion and creative writing exercises as a way to break or undermine the logic of popular sub-genres. Students will leave the course with a deeper understanding regarding the opportunities and challenges that accompany genre-bending work, along with new pages of writing.

with Aidan Cobb. This workshop empowers students to explore the connections between poetry, visual art, and self-expression in a fun, hands-on, and interactive way. Designed for third through sixth graders, it introduces poetry through engaging activities that inspire creativity. Children will participate in student-led discussions on poems, exploring figurative language and poetic devices. They will also make connections between poetry and visual art while creating their own poetry and artwork. As a final collaborative project, each child will contribute a poetic line—whether a metaphor, simile, or phrase—on a leaf-shaped cutout. These leaves will be added to a collective Poetry Tree, forming a shared piece of artistic expression. (Adults – come and hang out with the kids you bring!)

with Elisabeth Nonas. Prompts, pointers, and practices to help you plow ahead when the writing gets tough. In this practical workshop we will discuss craft, process, deadlines, and do some exercises designed to help you meet your writing goals.

You’re invited to the quietest block party EVER! Clare Jones will host a short session designed to move you past creative barriers and forge ahead in the company of others. Bring whatever you write with: laptop, journal, typewriter, quill. We will check in for 10 minutes, write independently for 40 minutes, then wrap up for 10 minutes. Have a cookie, build community, and hone your craft.

with Regi Carpenter. You’ve written an incredible piece but you’re terrified to perform it! You mumble, say um a lot, and look at your paper the whole time. Meanwhile, the people who have come to listen to your work aren’t able to get the full impact of your writing. This workshop will teach you how to present your pieces in an engaging, impactful way that brings your characters to life. Using the tools of voice, phrasing, tone, and gesture your work will come alive.

Buffalo Street Books will host the fourth annual Ithaca Book and Zine Fair at Buffalo Street Books and the DeWitt Mall hallways. This event celebrates and supports literary and artistic publishing outside the mainstream. Independent publishers, zine-makers, artists, DIYers, and writers from around the region will show and sell their wares.   The list of artists, writers and presses will be added to this website soon. illuminatedpress.org/events-calendar

Celebrate the power of words and music at SingTrece’s Mother’s Day Lyric Writing Workshop, a unique and inspiring event designed to help you craft heartfelt lyrics in honor of the mothers in your life. Whether you’re an experienced songwriter or simply want to express your love through words, this interactive workshop will guide you through the creative process. You’ll explore themes of love, gratitude, and cherished memories while learning to shape emotions into beautiful lyrics. This session is perfect for anyone looking to create a meaningful tribute for Mother’s Day, whether as a personal gift, a song for a loved one, or simply an artistic expression. Join us for a soul-stirring experience where words meet melody, and emotions find their voice.

with Imogen Osborne.  When you swim, you feel your body for what it mostly is – water – and it begins to move with the water around it. (Roger Deakin). Transparency, fluidity, elasticity, opacity, mutability, musicality, stagnation. How can these qualities influence our work as poets?  Drawing inspiration from Ithaca’s unique geological history and abundant waterways, we will spend this workshop exploring our personal connection to water, and appreciating what we stand to learn from this enigmatic life force that has quenched the imagination of artists the world over. Through guided exercises and prompts, this generative workshop will encourage participants to consider water in its many guises. We may write poems that surprise, nurture and replenish, or pieces that churn, flood, and sink. Alongside this we will think of ourselves as stewards of water, considering the ways that creativity itself can promote ecological understanding and reciprocity.

Ever want to craft a speculative microfiction story 300-words or less? Have you heard of drabbles (exactly 100 word stories)? And nanofiction (stories with less than 100 words)? How about drabbuns, a hybrid microfiction/poetic form, invented in 2020? D.A. Xiaolin Spires will lead you through a workshop on the craft of speculative fiction ministories. If interested in the possibility of publishing your fantastic drabbles and mini-stories, Spires will also discuss publications seeking speculative microfiction. Participants will learn the craft, write and share stories and celebrate in the wondrous narratives of the tiny! (Please bring your own laptops or tablets for research and writing.)

You’re invited to the quietest block party EVER! Clare Jones will host a short session designed to move you past creative barriers and forge ahead in the company of others. Bring whatever you write with: laptop, journal, typewriter, quill. We will check in for 10 minutes, write independently for 40 minutes, then wrap up for 10 minutes. Have a cookie, build community, and hone your craft.

Theatre Incognita curates staged readings/ performances of works from local writers.