Why There Are Words: Provenance

Doors open at 7pm; readings begin at 7:15. $10.

Nancy Au‘s stories have appeared or are forthcoming inSmokeLong Quarterly, The Journal of Compressed Creative Arts, Necessary Fiction, Fiction Southeast, Word Riot, Identity Theory, Prick of the Spindle, and elsewhere. She was recently awarded the Spring Creek Project residency (Oregon State University), which is dedicated to artists and writers whose work is inspired by nature and science. She graduated from UC Berkeley with a degree in Anthropology, and is completing an MFA at San Francisco State University where she taught creative writing. She teaches at California State University Stanislaus.

Andrea Kneeland is the author of How to Pose for Hustler (Civil Coping Mechanisms, 2015) and The Translations (Sententia Books, 2015). Her collection of fairy tales, The Birds & The Beasts, is forthcoming from Lazy Fascist Press later this year.

Janice Lee is the author of KEROTAKIS (Dog Horn Press, 2010), Daughter (Jaded Ibis, 2011), Damnation (Penny-Ante Editions, 2013), Reconsolidation (Penny-Ante Editions, 2015), and most recently, The Sky Isn’t Blue (Civil Coping Mechanisms, 2016). She also has several chapbooks: Red Trees, Fried Chicken Dinner (Parrot/Insert Press), The Other Worlds (Eohippus Labs), and The Transparent As Witness (Solar Luxuriance), a collaboration with Will Alexander. She is Editor of the #RECURRENT Novel Series, Assistant Editor at Fanzine, Executive Editor of Entropy, and CEO/Founder of POTG Design. She currently lives in Los Angeles and teaches at CalArts.

Richard Loranger is a writer, performer, visual artist, and all around squeaky wheel, currently residing in Oakland, CA. His recent book of flash prose, Sudden Windows (Zeitgeist Press, 2016), has been enthusiastically received. He is also the author of Poems for Teeth, The Orange Book, and nine chapbooks. Other recent work can be found in Oakland Review #2, Overthrowing Capitalism vol. 2 (Revolutionary Poets Brigade), and the anthology The Careless Embrace of the Boneshaker (great weather for MEDIA). You can find more about his work and scandals at his website.

Sue Mell was born in Queens, New York, and holds an MFA from the Program for Writers at Warren Wilson College. Several of her stories have appeared in Narrative Magazine. Sue lives in San Francisco, where she freelances as a photo stylist and is currently working on a novel.

Alexandra Naughton is a lil dusty possum and lives in Richmond. Her first novel,American Mary, was published by Civil Coping Mechanisms and has received rave reviews by readers worldwide. She is an extremely prolific writer: see her portfolio. She founded Be About It Press in San Francisco in 2010.

Jesse Prado lives in Hayward and blogs at thegreatcratsby.tumblr.com. His first poetry chapbook, I’ve Been On Tumblr, is critically acclaimed, and you can own one for yourself for ten dollars. Hit him up.

Natasha Sajéis Professor of English at Westminster College in Salt Lake City, and a long-standing faculty member at the Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA in Writing Program. She is the author of three books of poems, Red Under the Skin, Bend, and Vivarium, a book of poetry criticism, Windows and Doors: A Poet Reads Literary Theory (Michigan, 2014), and many essays.

Why There Are Words takes place every second Thursday of the month, when people come from San Francisco, the North Bay, the East Bay, the South Bay–everywhere–to crowd the house. The brainchild of Peg Alford Pursell, this literary goodness has been going strong for six years.