Name: Stranger Than Fiction Reading Series
Start: 2025-02-23T14:00:00-08:00
End: 2025-02-23T16:00:00-08:00
Location: Specs Bar

Once again, six real, raw literary voices within the hallowed walls of Specs Bar in North Beach, where the ghosts of the beat writers will sit among us. Please join our standing-room-only audience to welcome new work from Kim Addonizio, Matthew Zapruder, Jack Boulware, Alan Black, Mary Ladd, and Frances Stroh. Bios below:
Kim Addonizio is the author of a dozen books of poetry and prose. Her most recent poetry collection is Exit Opera(W.W. Norton). Her essay collection "Bukowski in a Sundress: Confessions from a Writing Life" was published by Penguin. She has received NEA and Guggenheim Fellowships, Pushcart Prizes in both poetry and the essay, and her poetry has been widely translated and anthologized. "Tell Me" was a National Book Award Finalist in poetry. She lives in Oakland, CA. https://www.kimaddonizio.com
Matthew Zapruder lives in Northern California. He is editor at large at Wave Books, and teaches in the MFA at Saint Mary’s College of California. His newest collection of poetry, "I Love Hearing Your Dreams", was published by Scribner in Fall, 2024.
Jack Boulware runs the Substack newsletter "What Jack Boulware Fails to Realize". He was a co-founder and executive director of San Francisco's Litquake literary festival, and is author/co-author of three books including the Bay Area punk oral history "Gimme Something Better". He contributes to Alta Journal and elsewhere, and is finishing a novel based on his experiences as a travel writer.
Alan Black hasbeen a writer, mightbe a writer, couldbe a writer, mightnotbe a writer.
Mary Ladd's award-winning work is featured in Mother Jones, Alta, and elsewhere. She edited "The Long COVID Reader" and created "The Wig Diaries", a cancer book with noted illustrator Don Asmussen. A proud We Wai Kai First Nation member, Mary lives with her editor husband, Oscar Villalon, and teenager in San Francisco.
Frances Stroh is the award-winning author of "BEER MONEY: A Memoir of Privilege and Loss". She has published essays in various magazines, including The Detroit Metro Times. She is the co-curator of the Stranger Than Fiction Reading Series.