I snagged a press release from an insider yesterday, so I’ll just paste it below:

The low-residency MFA program in creative writing at Queens University of Charlotte is pleased to announce its next series of faculty readings.  The readings are scheduled for Sunday, May 24 and Friday, May 29.  The reading on Sunday evening will begin at 8:00.  The reading on Friday evening will begin at 8:15.  All readings will be held in Sykes Auditorium in The John H. Sykes Learning Center on the Queens campus and are free and open to the public. (note: I suggest parking across the street from Sykes at the Whithers House. – EB)

Sunday, May 24

Lauren Groff’s first novel, The Monsters of Templeton, was a New York Times and Booksense bestseller, shortlisted for the Orange Prize for New Writers, and translated into nine languages. Stories from her second book, Delicate Edibe Birds, were published in journals and anthologies including the Atlantic Monthly, Ploughshares, Glimmer Train, One Story,  Best American Short Stories and Best New American Writers.  She is the recipient of a Pushcart prize and the Axton Fellowship in Fiction from the University of Louisville, and has received other fellowships from Yaddo, the Vermont Studio Center, and Ragdale. She lives with her family in Gainesville, Florida.

Geoffrey Becker’s book of stories, Black Elvis, won the 2008 Flannery O’Connor Prize for Fiction and will be published by the University of Georgia Press in the fall of 2009.  His novel, Hot Springs, is forthcoming from Tin House books.  He is the author of two previous books, Dangerous Men, a collection that won the Drue Heinz Prize, and Bluestown, a novel.  His other awards and honors include an NEA fellowship, selection for the Best American Short Stories anthology, the Nelson Algren Award from The Chicago Tribune, and the Parthenon Prize.  He teaches writing at Towson University in Maryland, where he also directs the graduate program in Professional Writing.

Friday, May 29:

Jane Alison is the author of the memoir Sisters Antipodes and the novels Natives and Exotics (Harcourt 2005); The Marriage of the Sea (FSG 2003), which was a New York Times Notable Book; and The Love-Artist (FSG 2001), which has been translated into seven languages. Her short fiction and critical writings have appeared in TriQuarterly, Five Points, Seed, and The Germanic Review, among others. She has coedited a multivolume critical series on women writers and has also published several biographies for children.  Educated at Princeton and Columbia, she also teaches at the University of Miami.

Robert Polito received his Ph.D. from Harvard. His most recent books are the poetry collection Hollywood and God (forthcoming spring 2009) and The Complete Film Writings of Manny Farber (forthcoming fall 2009). He is also the author of Doubles (poetry), A Reader’s Guide to James Merrill’s Changing Light at Sandover, and Savage Art: A Biography of Jim Thompson, which received the National Book Critics Circle Award in Biography/Autobiography, among other books. He edited the Library of America volumes Crime Novels: Noir of the 1930s & 1940s and Crime Novels: American Noir of the 1950s, as well as The Selected Poems of Kenneth Fearing. His poems and essays have appeared in The New Yorker, the Voice Literary Supplement, Verse, Threepenny Review, Yale Review, Bookforum, Ploughshares, The New York Times Book Review, Bomb, Fence, Open City, Boston Phoenix, Paste, Best American Poetry, Beast American Essays, Best American Film Writing, and other journals and anthologies. He is a contributing editor to The Boston Review, Pequod, Open City, Bomb, Fence, and Lit. He directs the graduate writing program at The New School.

And as if it wasn’t enough that my boyfriend’s band wasn’t included on this year’s bill, Phil tried to keep me out of the loop even more by ignoring my emails for up to 48 hours at a time, then responding with one word comments such as “poopie” and “dinglebutt.” Bruce, meanwhile, has yet to follow me on Twitter. But we all know he’s just playing dumb.

It wasn’t until I mentioned I had possession of photos taken at a certain public restroom and alley way around Thomas Street that Phil came forth with the information we needed, although his typing was sloppy due to sweaty fingers. Shortly thereafter, my website shut down.

Also, in the past week, I have gone to TWO record stores and to the actual concert venue, and on all ocassions was unable to purchase tickets for tonight’s event. I’ve been given the runaround with vendor replies such as “cash only” and “I don’t have the envelope” (*wink, wink*) and “can we see some ID, please” and “no paper tickets available, call back tomorrow.”

CONSPIRACY?

So, in an effort to be transparent, I present what information I’ve been able to find about tonight’s set list. The show starts at 8 p.m., with bands playing about 10 minutes each. The order is as follows:

The Mangles

The Stellas

Hardcore Lounge

The Virginia Reel

Raised by Wolves

Chocha Loca

Snagglepuss

Black Lashes

BabyShaker

Bo White Trio Select

Yardwork

Trouble Walkers

Lou Ford

Sammies

Noises 10

Houstons

The night closes with the Fool’s Brigade House Band, which includes  members of Buschovski, Bruce Hazel & Some Volunteers, Randolph Lewis, Mike Strauss, Dylan Gilbert, The Black Lashes, Poprocket, The Alternative Champs, The Catch Fire, tenSpeed, Project Bluebird, Nitehawk, Sea of Cortez, etc. :

Jason Atkins
Bryson Avery
Brent Bagwell
Kris Baucom
Molly J. Brown,
Brent Dunn
Shane Elks
Nicolette Emanuelle
Anna Gallagher
Chris Garges
Jay Garrigan
Dylan Gilbert
Darrin Gray
Peter Grey
Bruce Hazel
Chris Johnson
David Kim
Randolph Lewis
Mark Lynch
Shawn Lynch
Karla Marsh
David Massi
Mike Mitschele
John Morris
Jon Phillips
Mike Strauss
Chad Wilson
Trevor Cook

$10 admission, all proceeds benefit Jacob’s Ladder.

So, come if you like, but don’t be surprised if you find me chained to the sidewalk with a bullhorn if I can’t get through security the first 20 times I try.

Along with several other online poet bloggers, I appreciate Collin because he’s helped ground me as an aspiring writer. I admire him for his confidence in self-publishing, for his no-nonsense approach to the writer’s market, and for his perseverance as a novelist. And damn, where does he find the time, in addition to editing full-time and writing/publishing his own work on the side, to update his blog almost daily?

Indeed, on and off the page, Collin’s work is timely and powerful. His most recent poetry book, After The Poison, is a great example of poetry with a purpose. His poems dive into the past decade of American lifestyles, commenting on his own life as well as those of the voiceless and the newsworthy.

And now, Collin has emerged as a fiction writer. I recently read a preview chapter from the beginning of his novel, Conquering Venus. It will be interesting to see how this book is received, especially since its main characters wrestle with topics such as suicide, sexuality, depression, temptation, and escapism (and that’s just in the first chapter). Equal parts drama and thriller, it has potential to be a page-turner, while also appealing to readers who desire literature with attention to structure and language. But where other authors may be pigeonholed into certain genres for their choices in subject matter, Collin is worth checking out for his blending of the political with the everyday. He handles tough subjects in his writing with the forcefulness of a punch and the precision of a scalpel. Plus, it’s nice, after all, to read work that isn’t afraid to piss a few people off. But if you fall on right (left?) side of the fence with Collin, I think he’s nothing but a sweet Southern boy at heart.

Name: Collin Kelley

Age: 39

Astrological Sign: All Virgos are mad

Website: www.collinkelley.com

Place: Atlanta (otherwise known as Hot’lanta or The ATL)

What are you working on right now? The second novel in a trilogy that begins with Conquering Venus, forthcoming this summer from Vanilla Heart Publishing.

How long does it usually take you to get from start to finish? In the case of Conquering Venus, nearly 15 years. Obviously, I’m in no hurry.

What is your greatest accomplishment thus far? Having a writing career on my own terms.

What is something you have done to improve your creative and productive life? Taking workshops with other great poets and writers, traveling solo across America and Europe and buying a MacBook. 

What do you need to make your work better? Miles Davis, a glass of wine and a wi-fi connection.

Tell us something you learned recently while working on a project: That writing poetry almost exclusively for the last five years has sharpened my fiction writing skills.

On a Friday night, I could find you ____: At a poetry reading or watching Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles and doing laundry.

What are you consuming this month? PJ Harvey’s and John Parish’s new album, A Woman A Man Walked By, which is brilliant. I also can’t stop listening to Neko Case’s new one, Middle Cyclone, and if you haven’t heard Vanessa Daou’s new record of jazz/pop and spoken word, Joe Sent Me, buy it immediately. Kristin Scott Thomas in the French film, I’ve Loved You So Long, was the performance of 2008. She was robbed of an Oscar nomination. Put it on your Netflix queue. Carrie Fisher’s memoir, Wishful Drinking, made me laugh out loud.

What scares you? Christian right-wing crazies who try to strip people of their civil and human rights.

You feel guilty when ______: a book has been sitting on my bedside table unread for months because I watch Letterman instead of reading before bed.

What projects do you have lined up/What are some of your goals for the coming year? I’ll be promoting the hell out of Conquering Venus with appearances at the Decatur Book Festival on Labor Day weekend, at the West Hollywood Bookfair on Oct. 4, among others. I’m also hoping to finish the first draft of the second novel.

Define: “success”: When you have made your daydreams reality.

So, allow me to list, for my memory’s sake and as a small salute to who I used to be, some Charlotte/NC music-related events I plan on attending in the coming weeks, if I can afford them all:

April 17 – The Adulterers @ SK NetCafé

April 29 – Dinosaur Jr. @ Neighborhood Theatre

May 1 – The Fool’s Brigade benefit concert (Rolling Stones tribute by Charlotte bands) @ The Neighborhood Theatre

May 9 – Bike Charlotte benefit concert (w/ Acoustic Syndicate side project and Custom Grass Revue, plus other bands TBA) @ Amos’ Southend

May 12 – Ghost w/ Magik Markers @ Grey Eagle in Asheville

June 11 – TV On the Radio @ Amos’ Southend

June 12 – Jane’s Addiction & Nine Inch Nails @ Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre

June 17 – Band of Horses @ Neighborhood Theatre

There are a bunch of Charlotte/NC literary events coming up, too, but I’ll post those separately.

There is someone who uses the women’s bathroom at my workplace who sprays a vanilla/floral body mist each time she does a no. 2. I know this for a fact. It’s one of those things you notice only if you’ve been working/living at a place for a long time, and have become accustomed to its smells (olfaction is the most memorable of the senses, after all).

I know what the restroom air freshener smells like, and it’s not this scent, which appears sporadically and only once a day around the same 3 stalls. It’s gotten to where as soon as I smell this particular fragrance mixed with the odor of you-know-what, I start doing double takes and spinning around to see if I can catch the mystery woman with the spray bottle hidden in her pocket.

I still haven’t figured out who she is, which is for the best, because I’d probably walk up and whisper close enough for her to smell my coffee breath “Who do you think you’re kidding?” Or I’d try to strike up a conversation about beans and your heart with her in the kitchen, or complain loudly about air pollution contributed by cow carbon emissions in the hallway outside her cubical EVERY DAY until I saw her face twitch and then she’d confess to either growing up in solitary confinement with Koalas or to being born with the supernatural power to smell “pretty.”

File this under the rest of inappropriate topics that rack my brain each week, but I just had to share this in case any guys reading this really think it’s nothing but roses down there for most women. Or for this woman’s husband, if he ever does a Google for “female poop smells.” I know you’ve tried to believe her. Maybe it was even once a fantasy of yours. But this has gone on long enough. For you, dear sir, I’m writing this here and now to tell you YOU’VE BEEN FOOLED.