Author Talk: Gender & Street Art in Literature

Join us for a special fiction event welcoming two authors who explore gender fluidity, border crossing, and street art! 

Lambda Award-nominated author, Jennifer Savran Kelly, and winner of the 1729 Book Prize, Brooke Shaffner, will discuss their debut novels and sign books! 

About the authors:

Brooke Shaffner's COUNTRY OF UNDER won the 1729 Book Prize, was the PEN/Bellwether Prize runner-up, and was shortlisted for Dzanc Books’ Prize for Fiction and Black Lawrence Press’s Big Moose Prize. Brooke’s work has appeared in Scoundrel Time, The Rumpus, The Hudson Review, Marie Claire, BOMB, Litmosphere, Big Indie Books, Lost and Found: Stories from New York, The Lit Pub, and on Charlotte Readers Podcast. Brooke has received grants from the Arts & Science Council, United States Artists, and the Saltonstall Foundation and residencies from MacDowell, Ucross, Saltonstall, the Edward Albee Foundation, Jentel, I-Park, and VCCA. Brooke is bisexual and grew up part Garza, part Shaffner in Texas’s Rio Grande Valley. Her Garza grandfather was an undocumented immigrant from Mexico; her Shaffner grandfather was raised Mennonite. She founded Freedom Tunnel Press with her partner Niteesh Elias to publish artivist books that straddle borders. An excerpt of her memoir-in-progress won the Lit/South Award and was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Find more at brookeshaffner.com.

Jennifer Savran Kelly (she/they) lives in upstate New York, where she writes, binds books, and works as a production editor at Cornell University Press. Jennifer's debut novel Endpapers won a grant from the Barbara Deming Memorial Foundation, was a fall/winter 2023 Indies Introduce pick, and has been recommended by Lit Hub, Buzzfeed, Electric Literature, LGBTQ Reads, Esquire, and more. Jennifer's short work has been published in Potomac Review, Black Warrior Review, Trampset, and elsewhere.

Moderator: 

Jess deCourcy Hinds is a local librarian and writer whose writing regularly appears in such publications as the New York Times, Ms., Literary Hub and Business Insider.