Litquake's Lit Cast

Let's connect our global literary community in a time of closed borders. Hear World Editions authors Adam Dalva, Esther Gerritsen, Adeline Dieudonné, Pierre Jarawan, Sisonke Msimang, and Amin Maalouf read from their works, discuss the current situation in their countries, and talk about what books mean to them during Covid-19. Adam Dalva’s writing has appeared in The New York Review of Books, The Paris Review, Tin House, and The Guardian. He teaches Creative Writing at Rutgers University and is a book critic for Guernica Magazine. Adam has received fellowships from the Atlantic Center for the Arts and the Vermont Studio Center. He is a graduate of NYU’s MFA Program, where he was a Veterans Writing Workshop Fellow. Adam’s bestselling comic book, Olivia Twist, was published by Dark Horse in Fall 2018. Esther Gerritsen is a Dutch novelist, columnist, and playwright. She made her literary debut in 2000. She is one of the most established, widely read, and highly praised authors in the Netherlands, and makes reg

A reading of dozens of tiny stories from micro-fictionistas, including guest readers, plus a discussion of the Art of Flash and prompts—including visual prompts—to write and submit your own, with a selection to be published on the Flash Fiction Collective Facebook page. Author bios: Jane Ciabattari, author of the short story collection Stealing the Fire, writes the Between the Lines column for BBC Culture. She is a former president of the National Book Critics Circle and a member of the Writers Grotto. Her reviews, interviews and cultural criticism have appeared in the New York Times Book Review, the Guardian, Paris Review, the Washington Post and the Boston Globe, among other publications. Grant Faulkner is the Executive Director of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) and the co-founder of 100 Word Story. He has published two books on writing, Pep Talks for Writers: 52 Insights and Actions to Boost Your Creative Mojo, and Brave the Page, a teen writing guide. He’s also published a collection of 100-w

Celebrate ZYZZYVA's 35th anniversary issue with contributors Dave Madden, Lysley Tenorio, Margaret Wilkerson Sexton, and Kristen Iskandrian. Kristen Iskandrian is the author of the novel Motherest (Twelve). Her story “Good With Boys,” which appeared in Issue No. 109, was included in Best American Short Stories 2018. She lives in Birmingham, Alabama, and is co-owner of Thank You Books, a new independent bookstore. Lysley Tenorio is the author of the forthcoming novel The Son of Good Fortune (Ecco) and the story collection Monstress (Ecco), named a Book of the Year by the San Francisco Chronicle. Dave Madden is the author of the story collection If You Need Me I’ll Be Over There (Indian University Press) and The Authentic Animal: Inside the Odd and Obsessive World of Taxidermy (St. Martin’s). Meg Hurtado Bloom's writing has appeared in Split Lip, Lumen Magazine, and other publications. Her poetry also appeared in ZYZZYVA's Bay Area Issue (No. 117). Margaret Wilkerson Sexton is the author of two novel, A Kind of

Booksmith presents visionary novelist William Gibson reading from the sharply imagined sequel to his New York Times bestselling novel The Peripheral. He is in conversation with Mother Jones editor-in-chief, Clara Jeffery. This event was recorded January 23, 2020 at Public Works.

Co-presented by Litquake and MoAD In honor of the post-mortem publication of Zora Neal-Hurston’s short story anthology Hitting a Straight Lick With a Crooked Stick: Stories From The Harlem Renaissance, we put together a reading at the Museum of African Diaspora here in San Francisco. After reading pieces of their favorite stories from the book, local authors, educators, and activists spoke to a sold out crowd about the legacy of Zora Neale Hurston and how it has influenced contemporary literary culture. With a Q&A to wrap the whole thing up, this night was one for remembrance and celebration. We have it all here for you, on this episode of Lit Cast. Featuring: UC Berkeley African American studies professor Chiyuma Elliott, poet and CCA professor Tonya M. Foster, and bestselling novelist Margaret Wilkerson Sexton. Moderated by writer and radio journalist Jenee Darden.

Anna Wiener discusses her new memoir, Uncanny Valley, with author Mike Isaac.  This podcast was recorded at Green Apple Books on January 27, 2020

Towards the end of 2019, we attended one of the many incredible readings held at Oakland-based Wolfman Books. To celebrate  Trebor Healey’s new collection, Falling, we packed in to Wolfman’s 40th street storefront to hear stories that confronted populism, immigration, and queer identity. Supported by intimate tales from Alvin Orloff’s memoir, Disasterama: Adventures in the Queer Underground 1977-1997, and new work from Oakland-based choreographer and poet Brontez Purnell, the night was filled with touching memories, bold questions, and a lot of laughs.

Who doesn't love a glimpse behind the facades of troubled Silicon Valley giants? In the tradition of Brad Stone’s Everything Store and John Carreyrou’s Bad Blood, award-winning investigative reporter Mike Isaac’s Super Pumped: The Battle for Uber delivers a gripping account of Uber’s rapid rise, its pitched battles with taxi unions and drivers, the company’s toxic internal culture, and the bare-knuckle tactics it devised to overcome obstacles in its quest for dominance. Roger McNamee's Zucked: Waking Up to the Facebook Catastrophe is the story of a noted tech venture capitalist, early mentor to Mark Zuckerberg, and Facebook investor, who woke up to the serious damage Facebook is doing to our society and set out to try to stop it. Moderated by The New Yorker's Anna Wiener. 

Eureka! We did it! From this year’s 20th Litquake festival, we present some of our favorite Bay Area authors reading from THEIR favorite Californian wordsmiths live at the Swedish American Hall in San Francisco. Listen to this festival kick off with a raucous night of readings by Charlie Jane Anders, Natalie Baszile, Elaine Castillo, Ingrid Rojas Contreras, Daniel Handler, Adam Johnson, Chang-rae Lee, Beth Lisick, Ishmael Reed, and Tobias Wolff, presenting from the works of writers who inspired them -- from Dashiell Hammett to Daniel Alarcón. Hosted by Isaac Fitzgerald, with live music from the Patrick Wolff Quartet and a special appearance by Karl the Fog. It’s a literary overload you don’t want to skip.

In this very special episode of Lit Cast, we're proud to feature the only recording Lawrence Ferlinghetti reading his original work "Lit.quake?" - plus a few more - at Litquake 2002.     Litquake's 20th anniversary festival will take place October 10-19, 2019. For all the latest updates, follow us @litquake on Facebook and Twitter!

From the Litquake archives! During our 2018 festival, National Book Award–nominated Rachel Kushner joined Litquake for an evening on her New York Times bestselling novel The Mars Room. This novel tells the story of Romy Hall, who’s at the start of two consecutive life sentences at Stanville Women’s Correctional Facility, deep in California’s Central Valley. As James Wood said in The New Yorker, Kushner’s fiction “succeeds because it is so full of vibrantly different stories and histories, all of them particular, all of them brilliantly alive.” This event features Kushner in conversation with San Francisco Chronicle culture columnist Caille Millner, complemented by appearances from the Voice of Witness collection Six by Ten: Stories from Solitary editor Mateo Hoke and contributor Mohammed Ali. Recorded live at the Make Out Room on Thursday, October 18, 2018. Litquake's 20th anniversary festival will take place October 10-19, 2019. For all the latest updates, follow us @litquake on Facebook and Twitter!

Litquake’s proud to present a special episode of Lit Cast Live featuring one of our own, Julia Flynn Siler, in conversation on her newest book The White Devil’s Daughters: The Women Who Fought Slavery in San Francisco’s Chinatown. In a narrative hailed as “eye-opening” by Kirkus Reviews, Siler tells the story of both the abolitionists who challenged the corrosive anti-Chinese prejudices of the time and the young women who dared to flee their fate. She relates how the women who ran the Cameron House defied contemporary convention by physically rescuing children from the brothels where they worked or by snatching them off ships as they were being smuggled in–and how they helped bring the exploiters to justice. This event was recorded live at the Mechanics’ Institute in San Francisco on Wednesday, July 12.  Litquake's 20th anniversary festival will take place October 10-19, 2019. For all the latest updates, follow us @litquake on Facebook and Twitter!

One of Esquire, The Rumpus, The Millions, Literary Hub and Electric Literature's Most Anticipated Books of 2019, Chia-Chia Lin’s debut novel The Unpassing explores community, identity, and the myth of the American dream through a Taiwanese immigrant family of six struggling to make ends meet on the outskirts of Anchorage, Alaska. Lit Cast is proud to feature Chia-Chia as she reads an excerpt from her novel and goes deep into her writing process, influences, and more with her former Iowa MFA classmate Jamel Brinkley. This episode was recorded live at Green Apple Books on the Park on May 30, 2019. Litquake's 20th anniversary festival will take place October 10-19, 2019. For all the latest updates, follow us @litquake on Facebook and Twitter!

Following the success of his T.S. Elliot-prizewinning poetry collection Night Sky With Exit Wounds, Ocean Vuong’s debut novel On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous was heralded as one of the most hotly anticipated books of 2019 by Publishers Weekly, the LA Times, The Guardian, and many more. On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, written as a letter from a son to his mother, is both a brutally honest exploration of race, class, and masculinity and a testament to the power of agency over one’s own story. This episode of Lit Cast features Vuong in conversation with San Francisco literary legend Rebecca Solnit, recorded live at Green Apple Books on the Park on June 18, 2019.  Litquake's 20th anniversary festival will take place October 10-19, 2019. For all the latest updates, follow us @litquake on Facebook and Twitter!

From the Litquake archive! In this recording from our 2018 festival, the Bay Area’s long-running Porchlight storytelling series returns with "advice"-themed tales from Steve Almond, Dickson Lam, Sands Hall, Sisonke Msimang, Maggie Rowe, and Betty Charbonnet Reid Soskin, the nation's oldest park ranger. This event was co-hosted by Arline Klatte and Beth Lisick, and recorded live at the Swedish American Hall on October 15, 2018. Litquake's 20th anniversary festival will take place October 10-19, 2019. For all the latest updates, follow us @litquake on Facebook and Twitter!  

MacArthur and Guggenheim fellow Karen Russell’s new short story collection, Orange World, was declared “hilarious, exquisite, first-rate” by The New York Times Book Review and “one of the most innovative, inspired short-story collections of the past decade” by NPR. Lit Cast Live proudly features Russell in conversation with Zoetrope editor Michael Ray at Green Apple Books on the Park in San Francisco on May 21, 2019. Litquake's 20th anniversary festival will take place October 10-19, 2019. For all the latest updates, follow us @litquake on Facebook and Twitter!    

Back in April, Litquake celebrated National Poetry Month by hosting a group of esteemed poets at one of San Francisco’s famous landmarks. This event was hosted by D.A. Powell, whose honors include fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Guggenheim Foundation, and featured incredible poets like Robert Hass, former Poet Laureate of the United States and winner of a Pulitzer prize; Brenda Hillman, Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets; Henri Cole, a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry; Barbara Jane Reyes; Paola Capo-Garcia; and Marcello Hernandez Castillo. Our newest Lit Cast Episode features readings from these fantastic poets on a very special occasion that brought the power of poetry into the historic walls of Grace Cathedral. Litquake's 20th anniversary festival will take place October 10-19, 2019. For all the latest updates, follow us @litquake on Facebook and Twitter! This event was recorded live at Grace Cathedral on April 13th, 2019.

Award-winning poet Franny Choi recently passed through San Francisco on tour for her second collection, Soft Science, which uses the myth of the cyborg to explore queer, Asian American femininity through a series of Turing test-inspired poems. Our newest Lit Cast episode features Choi joining local poet (and frequent Litquake collaborator!) sam sax for an electrifying evening of readings from Soft Science and sax’s recent collection Bury It - plus a few brand-new, heretofore unpublished gems.   This episode was recorded live at The Bindery on April 25, 2019.

Litquake and The Bindery present Evan James reading from his debut novel, Cheer Up, Mr. Widdicombe. In a return of a not-so-prodigal son, author Evan James comes to San Francisco on book tour for his comedy of manners debut novel that tells the story of a family summer on Puget Sound. Conjuring a Wes Anderson-meets-John Updike vibe, it tells a tale filled with tennis, a personal assistant in search of romance, a preppy screenwriter with a penchant for pills, a landscape gardener named Marvelous Matthews, and a bewitching self-help author, all attempting to find that elusive something that will, as Marie Kondo says, “spark their joy.” Recorded live at The Bindery.  Litquake's 20th anniversary festival will take place October 10-19, 2019. For all the latest updates, follow us @litquake on Facebook and Twitter!

Back in March, Mitchell S. Jackson came to San Francisco on tour for his latest book, Survival Math: Notes on an All-American Family. With a poet’s gifted ear, a novelist’s sense of narrative, and a journalist’s unsentimental eye, Mitchell S. Jackson candidly explores his tumultuous youth in the other America. Survival Math takes its name from the calculations Mitchell and his family made to keep safe—to stay alive—in their community, a small black neighborhood in Portland, Oregon blighted by drugs, violence, poverty, and governmental neglect. This event was recorded live at The Bindery on March 12, 2019. Litquake's 20th anniversary festival will take place October 10-19, 2019. For all the latest updates, follow us @litquake on Facebook and Twitter!