Two new novels explore different moments in history at WordFest next Tuesday, February 12, 6:00 pm, at the Cassava Coffeehouse, 1333 Broadway in Longview.

One of the more recent books published by Portland’s Forest Avenue Press, Julia Stoops’ Parts Per Million is a tale of civic activism, loss and transformation during the buildup to the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq. Three Portland media activists are working to save the world—one radio show at a time—when an Irish photographer with an expired visa and a messy past, disrupts their lives. As the scrappy crew takes to the streets, reporting on anti-war protests and the explosive political climate, they uncover the biggest scoop of their careers, involving corrupt war technology research at a prominent Oregon university.

Julia Stoops was born in Samoa, growing up in Japan, Australia, New Zealand and Washington, D.C., and has lived in Portland since 1994. Parts per Million, shaped by her experiences in community radio journalism and anti-war activism, was shortlisted for the PEN Bellwether Prize for Socially Engaged Fiction. A visual artist as well as a writer, Julia is a recipient of Oregon Arts Commission Fellowships for visual arts and literature, and was a resident at the Ucross Foundation in 2016. Her current activist work is in the digital privacy movement.

WordFest regular Lilly Robbins Brock will read from Intrepid Journey: An Untamed Frontier, the first book in Lilly’s Intrepid Journey series set in the 1850s of the Pacific Northwest. When an opportunity opens up to travel to the dangerous but promising Northwest frontier, Thomas Bennett and his reluctant wife, Jane, prepare for their respective journeys. Thomas and his brothers will pave the way on a paddle wheel steamship traveling around South America, while Jane and the children are to follow twelve months later on the shorter Nicaragua route. But nothing has prepared them for the long separation and their life-changing adventures. They must rely on each other for the courage demanded by their journeys and arrival in a largely lawless, unforgiving land.

Lilly’s previous books were nonfiction, Wooden Boats and Iron Men, about men who served on PT boats in World War II, and Victory on the Home Front: While Her Husband Fought, She Built Planes ~ She was a Rosie the Riveter, focusing on strong women who served at home. Lilly’s preferred genre is historical fiction but she has also written and published Food Gifts Recipes from Nature’s Bounty, based on organic gardening.

There will be an open mic period following the presentations.

The monthly gathering of readers and writers meets the second Tuesday of each month, 6:00-8:00 PM, at Cassava. The events are free and open to the public.

Cassava offers a dinner menu for those who wish to enjoy a meal with the readings, as well as local wines and brews.

For more information, contact Alan Rose at www.alan-rose.com.

WordFest celebrates the new year’s arrival with local prose and poetry next Tuesday, January 8, 6:00 pm, at the Cassava Coffeehouse, 1333 Broadway in Longview.

David Martin will be reading from the final volume in his six-book series, The Adventures of Sugar Dog. Written for middle grade and older readers, the series is about 12-year-old Jimmy Baker and his dog who, along with Jimmy’s three friends, embark on a number of mysteries during the summer between sixth and seventh grade.  The new book, Twilight and Tomorrow,  takes place six years later when Jimmy is graduating from high school and Sugar Dog is old and growing more and more feeble. 

David’s radio voice may be familiar to many who listen to KLOG, KUKN and The Wave. In radio broadcasting for many years, he has also worked for KGON, KPAM, KXL as well as other stations in the Portland metropolitan area. A singer and songwriter as well as author, David has recently written a western under the pen name Dusty Dawkins, titled Six Feet Under.

WordFest regular Caleigh Maffett reads from her fantasy novel in progress, Artorious, Selected. Artorious is a fifteen-year-old boy marked by the Folke to contain their king of kings, Lord Aether. A year prior, he was involved in an incident regarding Aether that made him the Number One Most Wanted in Faroque. Toran Kaelpie, a bounty hunter, finds Artorious while he’s escaping local law enforcement. Sick, tired, and constantly on the run, Artorious doesn’t have time or the trust to get involved with other people. Not that it’s going to stop Toran and his sister Lillian from stepping in anyway.

Caleigh is a junior at university, planning to go into editing. She has been published in Metamorphose under her pen name and was an editor on the 2018 Salal Review, Lower Columbia College’s award winning literary and visual arts magazine.

Kaden Moeller will be reading from his poetry collection, The Color That You See, which he describes as “an act of both bereavement for my lovely San Juan dog Mara and something for my Mother to read when she got back from her three jobs.”  He describes it as “a poetic picture of the early twentieth first century, much like Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass is a poetic picture of the 19th.”

Born in Kirkland, Washington, Kaden moved to South Florida at the age of five, then back to Washington, and Longview, when he was twenty eight. His first poems and short stories were published in his high school creative writing magazine, The Tail Spinner, back in Florida.

There will be an open mic period following the presentations.

The monthly gathering of readers and writers meets the second Tuesday of each month, 6:00-8:00 PM, at Cassava. The events are free and open to the public.

Cassava offers a dinner menu for those who wish to enjoy a meal with the readings, as well as local wines and brews.

For more information, contact Alan Rose at www. Alan-rose.com.

Aspiring novelists who took the writing challenge in November will read from their works at the next WordFest on Tuesday, December 4, 6:00 pm, at the Cassava Coffeehouse, 1333 Broadway in Longview. (Note: WordFest occurs on the first Tuesday in December.)

During National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), people across the country commit to writing a novel of approximately 30,000 words in 30 days. Even if they don’t achieve their goal, many writers have used this as a way to start the novel that has been gestating in their mind.

Vikki J. Carter will host the event where local NaNoWriMo participants will introduce and read from their projects. Vikki is the producer of Authors of the Pacific Northwest, a weekly podcast for writers who are interested in learning how to be successful in the publishing industry.  Her company, SquishPen Productions, focuses on helping writers learn tips of the trade from published authors so they too can succeed in a competitive field.

Vikki has two books in the works, the first is part of a series set in Elizabethan era England and the clashing world of a woman’s choice for love.  The second novel follows  a young couple’s chaotic relationship as they struggle with the not-so-glamorous pursuit of fame in the world of rock-n-roll. You can learn more about SquishPen Productions at www.squishpen.com

 

 

Lorraine Merrin will be highlighting the poetry of David Lee, Utah’s first poet laureate. Lee captures small town America with affection and humor and an ear for truth within the vernacular. He has been called “the pig poet,” and may be best known for his collection of poems, The Porcine Canticles.   He has won numerous awards and holds a PhD with a concentration on the poetry of John Milton.

Lorraine’s poetry has been published in Rattle, Thema, Time of Singing, and other literary magazines, two anthologies, and in her own collection, Holding Tight To Gravity’s Tail.

 

There will be an open mic period following the presentations.

 

The monthly gathering of readers and writers meets the second Tuesday of each month, 6:00-8:00 PM, at Cassava. The events are free and open to the public.

 

Cassava offers a dinner menu for those who wish to enjoy a meal with the readings, as well as local wines and brews.

 

For more information, contact Alan Rose at www. Alan-rose.com.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ever popular Bob Pyle returns to WordFest to discuss and read from his first novel, Magdalena Mountain, on Tuesday, November 13, 6:00 pm, at the Cassava Coffeehouse, 1333 Broadway in Longview.

Bob​ is the author of nineteen  books, including Wintergreen, Rambles in a Ravaged Land, Chasing Monarchs, Where Bigfoot Walks, Sky Time in Grays River, and a poetry collection Evolution of the Genus Iris. A Yale-trained ecologist and Guggenheim fellow, he is a full-time writer living in Wahkiakum County.

 

With Magdalena Mountain, he shows he’s at home in an imagined landscape as much as in the natural one. At the center of this story of majesty and high mountain magic are three Magdalenas— Mary, a woman whose uncertain journey opens the book; Magdalena Mountain, shrouded in mystery and menace; and the all-black Magdalena alpine butterfly, the most elusive of several rare and beautiful species found on the mountain. In the Colorado Rocky Mountain wilderness lives the enigmatic Oberon, a reluctant de facto leader of the Grove, a diverse community of monks who share a devotion to nature. Converging in the same wilderness are October Carson, a beachcomber-wanderer in pursuit of the alpine butterflies he collects for museums; James Mead, a young graduate student intent upon learning the ecology of this seductive creature; and Mary Glanville, who also seeks the butterfly but can’t remember why. While the mystery surrounding Mary takes a menacing turn, their shared quest pulls them deeper into the high mountain wilderness, culminating in a harrowing encounter on the stony slopes of Magdalena Mountain

 

Copies of the novel as well as Bob’s other books will be available for sale and signing at WordFest.

 

Longview poet and memoirist Mary Lyons will read from her developing anthology titled Body Parts. One of our most popular presenters, Mary has shared funny and bizarre experiences in “An Affair of The Heart,” shedding light on how modern technology intersects with the human heart, and “Clowning around,” a hilarious account of her experience performing as a clown for children. On Tuesday, Mary will be reading her essays, “Foot By Foot” and “Old Blue Eyes.”

 

 

 

 

There will be an open mic period following the presentations.

 

The monthly gathering of readers and writers meets the second Tuesday of each month, 6:00-8:00 PM, at Cassava. The events are free and open to the public.

 

Cassava offers a dinner menu for those who wish to enjoy a meal with the readings, as well as local wines and brews.

 

For more information, contact Alan Rose at www.Alan-Rose.com.

 

 

 

 

Humorist Jan Bono returns to WordFest with the third book in her Sylvia Avery Mystery Series on Tuesday, October 9, 6:00 pm, at the Cassava Coffeehouse, 1333 Broadway in Longview.

Crab Bait, like the two earlier novels, Bottom Feeders and Starfish, is set on the Long Beach Peninsula.  In the new mystery, the Merry Widows of the North Beach Peninsula may be just a tad too merry. They’ve formed a geriatric belly dancing troupe, The Veiled Rainbow, and are having the time of their lives spending the insurance money they received when their respective husbands died, deaths that all happened under mysterious circumstances. Meredith Avery, Sylvia’s mother, a three-time widow herself, has been instrumental in helping these women take out hefty life insurance policies on their spouses shortly before their deaths. What else might Meredith have led them to do?

“My mystery books are cozies,” says Jan, “and cozy mysteries are a very specific genre. They have no graphic violence, no obscene language, and no explicit sex scenes. What they do have is an amateur sleuth who works with the local police department in a small town to solve crimes. There’s a quirky cast of characters, and lots of humor.”

Jan has lived in Long Beach, Washington, since 1977. She began writing a humorous, personal experience newspaper column that continued for 10 years, garnering 11 state awards from the WNPA. Her column’s popularity led her to become one of the top five contributing authors to the “Chicken Soup for the Soul” series, publishing 36 stories during the past 8 years.

In 2012, Jan became the Grand Prize winner of the Coast Weekend serial mystery chapter contest. This inspired her to begin writing her lighthearted and fun cozy mystery series, which she describes as “like Murder She Wrote, but with a lot more humor.”

Jan has also written five collections of humorous short stories, two poetry chapbooks, one collection of short romances, a book about her 252-pound weight-loss journey, and nine one-act plays. She has been published in numerous magazines, including Guidepost, Star, and Woman’s World.

Copies of the three mysteries will be available for sale and signing at WordFest.

 

 

Mason Loika will be reading a selection of his poetry, including the song “The Spin We’re In,” recorded in 2004.  In addition, he will read from a story he wrote for the Bucks County Herald, and a short story entitled “Phantom of the Night.”

Mason has written as a reporter for the Miami News, the Miami Herald, and the Bucks County Herald, covering entertainment in radio, television, movies and music. He also wrote the nonfiction Gulag to Rhapsody: A Survivor’s Journey (2012) about a former prisoner-of-war who survived 2½ years in the same Soviet gulag that later imprisoned Russian dissident Alexander Solzhenitzen.

Mason recently moved to Longview from Bucks County, Pennsylvania, where he wrote reviews of live concerts for such artists as the Marshall Tucker Band, Heart, and Norah Jones, as well as local bands.

 

There will be an open mic period following the presentations.

 

The monthly gathering of readers and writers meets the second Tuesday of each month, 6:00-8:00 PM, at Cassava. The events are free and open to the public.

Cassava offers a dinner menu for those who wish to enjoy a meal with the readings, as well as local wines and brews.

 

For more information, contact Alan Rose at www. Alan-rose.com.