Poetry + Prose Live In LA

Welcome to the AWP Free Studio Reading event! Join us at 831 Venice Blvd. ste 102 for a fun and engaging in-person reading session. Get ready to immerse yourself in a world of literature and creativity. This event is perfect for book lovers, aspiring writers, and anyone looking for some inspiration. Come and enjoy an evening filled with words that will transport you to different worlds. Don't miss out on this opportunity to connect with fellow literature enthusiasts and discover new authors. We can't wait to see you there!

JackLeg Press

Northwestern University - Creative Writing Program

Sunday Reading Series - Chicago

• V. Joshua Adams
• Silas Chen
• Rivka Clifton
• Genevieve DeGuzman
• Aubyn Keefe
• Jason Koo
• Juan Martinez
• Simone Muench
• Kathryn O'Day
• Brittany Rogers
• Kenyatta Rogers
• Jeff Russell

Jackleg

V. Joshua Adams is a poet, translator, and critic who teaches at the University of Louisville. His first full-length poetry book, Past Lives, was published by JackLeg Press in 2024. A critical book, Skepticism and Impersonality in Modern Poetry, is forthcoming from Bloomsbury.

Rivka Clifton is a founding co-editor of Bear Review and the author of Muzzle (forthcoming JackLeg Press). Her work can be found in: Pleiades, Guernica, Cincinnati Review, Salt Hill, Prairie Schooner, The Journal, and other such magazines. Rivka is an avid record collector and curator of curiosities.

Genevieve DeGuzman is the author of Karaoke at the End of the World (forthcoming 2026, JackLeg Press). A 2022 Oregon Literary Fellow, she has been an Alice James Award finalist and earned Best New Poets nominations. Genevieve also won the Atticus Review contest and was a finalist for the Michelle Boisseau Prize selected by Traci Brimhall and for the Black River competition by Black Lawrence Press. Her works have appeared in The Adroit, Nimrod, phoebe, RHINO, and other journals and anthologies. Born in the Philippines, she grew up near San Diego and now lives in Portland, Oregon. Find her at: genevievedeguzman.carbonmade.com

Jeff Russell is a poet living in Durham, North Carolina. He studied Creative Writing at the University of Arizona and Classical Chinese literature at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is on the advisory board for Jackleg Press. His first book of poetry, By The Time This Reaches You, was published by Selva Obscura. Selections of this work won the innovative writing award from Miracle Monocle and have been published in Entropy and Dream Pop Press.

Northwestern University MFA Candidates

Silas Chen is a Chicago-based writer whose fiction explores DIY subcultures, transgender disorientation, and gay romance. His work has appeared in X-Ray Literary Magazine and Fruits Journal.

Aubyn Keefe is a writer from Massachusetts transplanted in Chicago. She earned an MS in journalism and an MFA in creative writing at Northwestern University. In addition to working as a writing coach and editor, she teaches writing and literature to incarcerated people in Illinois.

Juan Martinez is the author of the collection Best Worst American (2017) and the novel Extended Stay (2023). His work has appeared in many literary journals and anthologies, including Ploughshares, Ecotone, NIGHTMARE, The Morning Transport, Glimmer Train, Huizache, McSweeney's, TriQuarterly, Conjunctions, Small Odysseys, National Public Radio's Selected Shorts, Norton's Sudden Fiction Latino and Flash Fiction America, and elsewhere, and it's forthcoming in the Latinx horror anthology The Ghosts of Where We Are From. He is an associate professor at Northwestern University and lives near Chicago.

Kathryn O’Day is a former high school teacher who writes about work, politics, and relationships. Her essays and stories have been published in The Good Life Review, Chicago Story Press, Pangyrus, Another Chicago Magazine, Prose Online, and The Northwind Anthology, and her interviews have been published in Another Chicago Magazine and TriQuarterly Magazine, where she also reads fiction submissions. Her story "Memento" won the 2023 Northwind Writing Award and was nominated for a Pushcart Prize.

Sunday Reading Series

Jason Koo is a second-generation Korean American poet, educator and editor. He is the author of four full-length collections of poetry: most recently, No Rest, a winner of the Diode Editions Book Contest, and More Than Mere Light, America's Favorite Poem and Man on Extremely Small Island. His work has been published in Best American Poetry, Missouri Review, Poetry Northwest, Village Voice and Yale Review, among other places, and won fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, Vermont Studio Center and New York State Writers Institute. He is an associate teaching professor of English and the director of creative writing at Quinnipiac University and the founder of Brooklyn Poets.

Simone Muench is the recipient of an NEA Poetry Fellowship; the 2023 Lewis University Career Scholarship Award; a 2023 Illinois Arts Council Fellowship, and the Meier Foundation for the Arts Award. She is the author of seven full-length books including The Under Hum, cowritten with Jackie K. White, (Black Lawrence, 2024). She is the creator of the Hungry Brain Sunday Reading Series that she co-hosts with Kenyatta Rogers. She serves as poetry editor for JackLeg Press, a poetry editor for Tupelo Quarterly, and faculty advisor for Jet Fuel Review

Brittany Rogers is a poet, educator, and lifelong Detroiter. She has work published or forthcoming in Prairie Schooner, Indiana Review, Four Way Review, Underbelly, Mississippi Review, Lambda Literary, and Oprah Daily. Brittany is a fellow of VONA, The Watering Hole, Poetry Incubator, and Pink Door Writing Retreat. She is editor-in-chief of Muzzle magazine and co-host of VS Podcast. Her debut collection, Good Dress, was published by Tin House Press, 2024.

Kenyatta Rogers is a Cave Canem Fellow and has been awarded scholarships from the Breadloaf Writers’ Conference. His work has been previously published in or forthcoming from The Academy of American Poets, Poetry Magazine, Jubilat, Vinyl, Bat City Review, The Volta, PANK, MAKE Magazine among others. A Pushcart and Best of the Net nominee, he is as a co-host of the Sunday Reading Series with Simone Muench and is the Creative Writing Department Head at The Chicago High School for the Arts.

Northwestern University MFA Candidates

Event Venue & Nearby Stays

831 Venice Blvd. ste 102, 831 Venice Boulevard, Los Angeles, United States