Drop Leaf Press: Taitano + Shanley

We’re back! Drop Leaf Press returns with a reading at Alley CatBooks to celebrate the release of two poetry chapbooks: Lehua Taitano’s SONOMA and Maxwell Shanley’s forthcoming chapbook (TBA). Each book is hand-bound and includes cover art and lettering by illustrator and designer Mary Lundquist. They’ll be joined by two readers: Clarissa Mendiola and a special guest. Please gather with us for an evening of libations, snacks, and poetry. Books are $9; cash or card accepted.

Get it early: Buy SONOMA at Alley Cat Books (SF), Diesel, A Bookstore (Oakland), or purchase our titles from the Drop Leaf Press online store:http://dropleafpress.com/store

Note: Maxwell Shanley’s chapbook (TBA) is headed to the printers. We’ll announce when it’s available in our shop/in stores. Pics to come!

ABOUT THE READERS:

LEHUA M. TAITANO, a native Chamoru from Yigo, Guåhan (Guam), is a queer poet, writer, and artist. She is the author of A Bell Made of Stones (TinFish Press, 2013) and a chapbook of short fiction, appalachiapacific, which won the 2010 Merriam-Frontier Award. Her poetry, essays, and Pushcart Prize- nominated fiction have appeared in Poetry, Narrative Witness, Oxalis, Witness, Storyboard, and The Yellow Medicine Review, among many others. She has served as an APAture Featured Literary Artist (Kearny Street Workshop) and as a contributing Kuwentuhan poet (The Poetry Center at San Francisco State University). Taitano currently serves as the Community Outreach Coordinator on the Executive Board of the Thinking Its Presence: Race, Literary, and Interdisciplinary Studies Conference.

MAXWELL SHANLEY lives in San Francisco where he works as a bookseller. He is currently completing an MFA at San Francisco State University. His work from his forthcoming chapbook (TBA, Drop Leaf Press, 2017) has previously appeared in New American Writing and Slipstream.

CLARISSA MENDIOLA: As a Chamoru woman raised on the mainland, home is straddling the International Date Line, where it is today and tomorrow simultaneously. Clarissa’s work attempts to describe that place, however disorienting. Her work can be found in As Us, Literary Hub, Omniverse, and The Offending Adam. Clarissa has an MFA in Writing from California College of Arts, was a 2011 Hedgebrook Writer in Residence, and teaches creative writing summer camps for junior high school students. She lives in San Francisco with her husband and two sons.

DANIEL SUÁREZ is the son of Cuban immigrants. He currently lives in Chicago, Illinois and is a Substitute Teacher. His poems can be found in the Columbia Poetry Review, RHINO, Eleven Eleven, Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review, and other print and online journals.