Odd Words

This coming week in literary New Orleans:

Through this weekend the New Orleans chapter of the Gulf South Booksellers Association will run the Jazz Fest Book Tent. Proceeds go to literary programs supported by this group, so buy a book. Do you really need another rayon shirt you’re a little embarrassed–as a local–to wear?

& Jazz Tent Book Signings Week Two of Jazz Fest.

• Thursday:
  Bill Loehfelm, 1, 1-2PM, Doing The Devil’s Work; Leif Pederson, 2-3PM, Adventures of Swamp Kids – A Zoo Ta-Do; Richard Campanella, 3-4PM, Lost New Orleans.
• Friday:
  Bernie Cook, 1-2PM, Flood of Images; Guy Lyman, III, 3-4PM, A Big Easy Childhood; Dennis McNally, 4-5PM, On Hwy 61: Race, Music and the Evolution of Cultural Freedom.
• Saturday:
  M. O. Walsh, 12-1PM, My Sunshine Away; Cornell Landry, 1-2PM, Good Night Cajun Land; Michael Pitre, 2-3PM, Fives and Twenty-Fives; Troy Andrews & Brian Collier, 3-4PM,Trombone Shorty.
• Sunday:
  Brian Boyles, 1-2PM; New Orleans: Boom and Black Out; Johnette Downing, 2-3PM, Fifolet.

& Thursday nights, call the New Orleans Poetry Brothel TONIGHT & they’ll read you a poem! 8pm-Midnight CST. 504-264-1336.

& Thursday at 7 pm the SciFi, Fantasy and Horror Writer’s Group meets at the East Jefferson Regional Library. The purpose of the group is to encourage local writers to create works of fiction based on science fiction, fantasy and horror themes. Participants submit manuscripts to be critiqued by others in the group. Open to all levels. Free of charge and open to the public. No registration.

& Friday the FREEDOM WRITING for WOMEN OF COLOR (NEW ORLEANS) group meets at a movable location from 7 pm to 10 p.m. Contact poetryprocess@gmail.com for more information.

& Saturday from 11 am to 7 pm it’s that time of year again: Free Comic Book Dake. Stop by Crescent City Comics, 4916 Freret St., for free comics (www.freecomicbookday.com/Home/1/1/27/981) and a to-be-decided-later sale

& Sunday from 2-5 pm come out and celebrate the work of those who graduated from the University of New Orleans Creative Writing Workshop in Summer and Fall of 2014, and Spring of 2015. Everyone and your mother is invited (particularly your mother)! At the reading, thesis committee directors often introduce the readers with what is usually a heart-warming and/or hilarious spiel. You don’t want to miss this. Then we will all have the pleasure of hearing readers share parts of their thesis for about 10 minutes each. Readers include: Tad Bartlett, Dana Glass, Dawkter Marvelous, Brendan Frost, Cynthia Davidson, Andrea Panzeca, Ross Peter Nelson, Zil Nagoh, Roxy Seay, Kia Alice Groom, Christian Coleman, Benjamin Sines, and Eirc Mac Dillman. The reading will take place in Kirschman Hall Auditorium (room 122), on the UNO campus at 2000 Lakeshore Drive. Come for the reading, and then consider heading over to our celebration banquet where food and drinks will be provided for a cover charge of $25 (please note: the reading itself is free).

& This Sunday at 3 pm The Maple Leaf Reading Series features poet Trevor Tingle will give a farewell reading before leaving New Orleans, followed by an open mic. The Maple Leaf Reading Series, founded by poet Everette Maddox, is the oldest continuous poetry reading series in the south.

& Sunday at 4 pm in Baton Rouge it’s the annual LSU MFA Third Year Reading. Baton Rouge Gallery – center for contemporary art, 1515 Dalrymple Dr, Baton Rouge.

& Tuesday at 7 pm the East Jefferson Regional Library hosts an Author Event featuring The Darkness Survives by Sally Michelle Jackson. Hank Heilsing and his new bride had really planned this honeymoon to New Orleans as a duo but soon after their arrival a few ‘incidents’ require that the whole team assemble in the Crescent city. While New Orleans is a tourist mecca with swamp tours being considered to be great fun, it takes on a different feel when you are touring on foot through a restricted area battling with a deranged adversary, his henchmen and a swamp creature or two.

& If you missed Sunday’s graduation bash, Wednesday at 7:30pm New Orleans Professor Carolyn Hembree’s UNO MFA poets will read at the Bayou Beer Garden.

& Wednesday night from 8-9 pm, come drink some coffee and make your voice heard at the Neutral Ground Poetry Hour, 5110 Danneel Street.

& Tubby & Coo’s Mid-City Book Shop presents Reading Between the Wines featuring e K.L. Owens, Jade Hurter and Maurice Ruffins, at Pearl Wine Co. inside of the American Can Company from 7:00-8:00 pm/