Tuesday Funk #14

Please join us for the next reading on Tuesday, July 7th:

MEGAN FERRELL moved to Chicago from St. Louis almost four years ago, and still won’t become a Cubs fan. She earned a B.A. in English from Truman State University longer ago than she’d care to think, and longs for the day when her intermittent part-time writer status gets bumped up to full-time. She penned a novel chronicling many truly heinous dating experiences. Instead of accepting these dates as random horrific events in her life, she explored the spiritual nature of a journey that led her to a diamond in the rough.

MEGAN MILKS is a Ph.D. candidate in the Program for Writers at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Her work has been anthologized in Thirty Under Thirty, Wreckage of Reason: An Anthology of Contemporary Xxperimental Prose by Women Writers; and Fist of the Spider Woman: Tales of Fear and Queer Desire. She won the 2008 Goodnow Award in Prose and was a finalist in DIAGRAM's inaugural $5 Innovative Fiction Contest. Her work can be found in DIAGRAM, Mad Hatters Review, Pocket Myths: The Odyssey, Mildred Pierce, and The Wild.

SANA RAFI is doing an MFA in Creative Writing from Columbia University, New York. She is currently working on a collection of short stories based in Pakistan. She is interested in writing about the lower income-class, raising social and political issues through her fictional characters and their situations. She has been writing since her teenage years and aims to pursue writing as a full-time career.

Tuesday Funk #13

Please join us for the next reading on Tuesday, June 2nd:

KRISTIN FITZSIMMONS received her MA from the University of Chicago in 2008. She is currently an Americorps member at the Hull House Association in Uptown where she teaches English as a Second Language and attempts to learn Spanish as a fourth language in addition to French and Dutch. Some of her recent poems are published in the March/April 2009 edition of The Boston Review.

CATHY GILBERT grew up in Central Illinois, and after receiving her MA in the Humanities from the University of Chicago, she returned to that area to become an Instructor of English at Heartland Community College in Normal, IL. She teaches many levels of composition and is excited to teach some creative writing classes in the fall. When she is not frantically planning, teaching, or grading, Cathy turns to poetry to calm her nerves. Her poems have appeared in the Madison Review, Main Channel Voices, and Pank, and can most recently be found in an online journal called r.kv.r.y. Cathy is very grateful for the opportunity to read her poems tonight, here in the great city of Chicago. She's been looking forward to the promised cupcake for over a month.

PARNESHIA JONES

Tuesday Funk #12: Our One Year Anniversary!

Please join us for the next reading on Tuesday, April 7th:

ELISABETH BLAIR is a folk vocalist and songwriter. She will be performing as the main vocalist in a performance art piece called "ALAS" May 1, 2, and 3 at Links Hall. For more info, visit www.elisabethblair.net

GINA DiPONIO's work has appeared in Contrary Magazine, Story Week Reader, Traverse Magazine, and others. She teaches literature and writing to every age of student, from 3rd graders to elderly home residents, around Chicago. Any time now, she’ll have an MFA in Fiction Writing from Columbia College, Chicago.

WILLIAM SHUNN is a full time writer, known mainly for science fiction. His short fiction has been appearing in the major magazines of the field since 1993, and has spilled beyond the borders of the genre to appear in places like Salon.com and Storyteller Magazine. He's a past nominee for the Hugo Award, the Nebula Award (twice), and the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award. Six of his stories were collected in a 2007 chapbook called An Alternate History of the 21st Century. His first novel, Cast a Cold Eye (co-authored with Canadian SF writer Derryl Murphy), will appear sometime late this year from PS Publishing. He's hard at work on a science fiction novel for young adults, called Technomancers. For more info visit his website: http://www.shunn.net.

Tuesday Funk #11

Please join us for the next reading on Tuesday, March 3rd:

Originally from Michigan, JOSEPH GIBSON IRVIN earned his MFA from New School University in New York City. His first novel, A FENCE WE CAN CLIMB, is a midwestern gothic tale of two brothers who murder their invalid father for his money. Currently he is working on his literary blog, bookish.us, and seeking representation for his novel.

KRYSTEE WYLDER writes songs for fun and folly, she likes to tell stories about life and also make up nonsensical tapestries of words. She likes cats, coffee and crocheted hats.....she is moving back to chicago after a few months away and is excited to find a new job as a nanny and settle back into her shoes and bicycle in the great big city.

CONNOR COYNE grew up in the East Village of Flint, Michigan, and has lived in Chicago and New York City. He received his Bachelors from the University of Chicago and his Masters of Fine Arts in Creative Writing (Fiction) from the New School. He has written plays, poetry, essays, short stories, and novels, and his work has been featured in the Saturnine Detractor and the Dick Pig Review. He is a cofounder of the Gothic Funk Nation and is proud to have helped organize Tuesday Funk.

Tuesday Funk #10

Tuesday Funk #10

Please join us for the next reading on Tuesday, February 3rd:

LYNN SUH: Born in Cambridge (MA), and raised in Paris, Chicago, and Seoul (Korea), Lynn has been a bit of a vagabond with few constants in life - his parents, his violin, and his habit of talking to himself. His poetry reflects his personal reflections on human foibles, aspirations, and dignity, and shows his love of literature, music, and nature. His poetry primarily draws inspiration from Czeslaw Milosz and Rainer Rilke. He holds a bachelors degree from U.C. Berkeley, and a masters degree from the University of Chicago. Presently, he is working both as a part-time tutor and freelance musician, and is hoping to pursue a Ph.D. in philosophy.

JONATHAN WILLIAMS hails from the sleepy state capital of Tallahassee, which he fled to pursue Statistics at the University of Chicago. There he first ran across the Gothic Funk crowd, as well as the U of C Scavenger Hunt. First a participant and later a judge, he still helps out with the Hunt despite having collected two degrees and so losing any further pretense for hanging around campus. His interests include origami, the intelligence community, and forgetting grad school.

HALLIE GORDON is the author of several plays including Imaginary Nostalgia, Trick of the Light and Dry Lightning. She is currently working on a first novel titled Dreaming of Heaven. Hallie is proud to be one of the organizers of Tuesday Funk.

Tuesday Funk #9

Please join us for the next reading on Tuesday, January 6th:

SPENCER DEW is the author of the story collection Songs of Insurgency (Vagabond Press, 2008). His fiction and essays have appeared in numerous journals. He is a regular reviewer for Rain Taxi Review of Books and is completing a PhD at the University of Chicago on the novels of Kathy Acker. His website is www.spencerdew.com.

EIREN CAFFALL was born in New York City, a year and a day after the first Earth Day, raised in the Berkshire Hills of Western Massachusetts. She spent her childhood creating language for the landscapes she encountered, reading, and establishing imaginary countries in the forest.
She is a freelance writer living and working in Chicago, and has written for travel guides, created book reviews for Punk Planet Magazine, taught creative writing workshops to students from ages 4-18. She has recorded several albums of original music; her latest was Civil Twilight, completed in 2004.
She is currently at work on a book-length collection of essays. She lives on Chicago’s north side with her husband Jason and son Dexter, where they are only two blocks from Lake Michigan.

ELIZABETH WETMORE is a 2002 graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and a 2006 - 2007 recipient of a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, as well as several grants from the Illinois Arts Council. A recent story — "Listening for Grace" — appeared in the journal Salt Flats Annual and was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Other stories have appeared in Hayden’s Ferry Review, Black Warrior Review, Crab Orchard Review, and other journals. She is currently at work on a novel set in West Texas and a collection of short stories set in Phoenix, Arizona.

No Tuesday Funk This Month.

Due to holidays past and future, there will be no Tuesday Funk this upcoming December 2nd.

Please join us for the next Tuesday Funk on January 6th, 2009. 7 PM @ Flourish Cafe in Edgewater.