The Peru Gazette

Saranac Lake, NY– Barkreaders gives local writers a place to both share their work and meet new authors at Adirondack Center for Writing. This bi-monthly reading includes an open mic, so anyone has the opportunity to share up to 5 mins of writing live before an audience. May’s installment of Barkreaders features SUNY Plattsburgh professor and writer Sara Schaff, author of The Invention of Love (Split Lip Press, 2020). Barkreaders is a live, in-person event at Adirondack Center for Writing (15 Broadway, Saranac Lake, NY 12983).

The second Barkreaders guest of the year is Sara Schaff, whose story collection, The Invention of Love, was published during the pandemic by Split/Lip Press. The book explores questions about love, marriage, motherhood, and longing, following 14 female protagonists as they contend with financial insecurity and the reality of twenty-first-century womanhood. Schaff will read at ACW on Wednesday, May 11th, at 7 pm, with an open mic to follow.

Barkreaders will include a 10-15 minute featured reading by the month’s guest, and then an open mic where audience members can sign-up to read a short piece of writing. Open mics are a great place for writers both new and experienced to test out their work in front of a supportive audience. Since COVID has largely moved readings and open mics online, readers and writers have expressed a desire for in-person literary gatherings in order to grow community, hone new work, find an audience, and to learn about new books being published by North Country authors.

Admission to the event is free, with a suggested donation at the door. The reading and open mic will run for a total of 60 minutes. Those interested in attending can RSVP for free here: https://adirondackcenterforwriting.org/barkreaders/

More about ACW’s first guest author, Sara Schaff:

Sara Schaff is the author of the story collections The Invention of Love (Split/Lip Press 2020) and Say Something Nice About Me (Augury Books 2016), a CLMP Firecracker Award Finalist in fiction and a 2017 Next Generation Indie Book Award Finalist for short fiction. Her writing has appeared in Catapult, Kenyon Review Online, Gay Magazine, The Missouri Review, Yale Review Online, The Belladonna, Michigan Quarterly Review, LitHub, and elsewhere.

A graduate of Brown University and the MFA program at the University of Michigan, Sara has taught at Oberlin College, the University of Michigan, and St. Lawrence University, as well as in China, Colombia, and Northern Ireland, where she also studied storytelling. Sara lives and teaches in the North Country of New York State with her husband, the poet Benjamin Landry, and their daughter, and she is completing a novel with the assistance of a Dr. Nuala McGann Drescher Leave Award from New York State and United University Professions. She is represented by Maria Massie of MMQ Literary Agents.

Essential Links:

Facebook Event

ACW Website: Barkreaders

Sara Schaff’s Website

 

The Adirondack Center for Writing has been bringing people and words together for over 20 years through provocative events and meaningful programs like this one. For more info about ACW and their latest online offerings, visit www.adirondackcenterforwriting.org and follow @adkctr4writing on social media.

COURTESY OF NANCIE BATTAGLIA

COURTESY OFANCIE BATTAGLIA

COURTESY OF NANCIE BATTAGLIA