'South End Writes' Series Resumes for Spring 2013 Season

This week, the South End Library launches its spring series of "South End Writes," a celebration of local South End authors who will stop by to talk about their work and connect with the neighborhood. 

The program, now in its third year, is organized by the Friends of the South End Library, and has welcomed dozens of authors to speak and share their work with South End residents. Ten authors are already lined up to appear at the library through June of 2013, including Leah Hager Cohen on Jan. 15th and Dennis Lehane in May. See here for the full schedule. 

"The South End Library is in a neighborhood that houses an enormous number of writers and poets, whether they are accomplished or just starting out," said Marleen Nienhuis, of the Friends of the South End Library. "It gives them a chance to let their neighbors know what they are working on."

In addition to readings from published books, Nienhuis said one of the special parts of the South End Writes program is that authors often come to the event looking for feedback on unpublished works, too. 

"They want to throw it out there and get coments back," she said, noting that author Doug Bauer read an unpublished essay last fall. "Feedback is so important to the writing process."

First up  this week is Leah Hager Cohen, who penned The Grief of Others, which in a review by the New York Times was called "her best work yet." The novel explores six characters as they explore themes of family, trust, forgiveness, marriage and middle school. 

The program gets underway at 6:30 p.m. at the South End Library (685 Tremont St.) "South End Writes" is free and open to everyone. 

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Full upcoming schedule, through the Friends of the South End Library:

Jan .15, 2013, 6:30 p.m. - Leah Hager Cohen

The Grief of Others

The author, who publishes both fiction and non-fiction, will read from her latest novel which the New York Times described as “her best work yet.” With an introduction by  Sue Miller

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Tuesday, January 29, 6:30 p.m. - Lynne Potts

A Block in Time: a History of Boston’s South End from a Window on Holyoke Street. 

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Tuesday, February 5, 6:30 p.m. - April Bernard

The poet (Romanticism) and novelist, most recently of  history (Miss Fuller), is currently the director of creative writing at Skidmore College. With an introduction by South End author Doug Bauer

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Tuesday, February 26, 6:30 p.m. - Andre Dubus III

Townie, a memoir

The examination of the author’s violent past has been described ”best book” of non-fiction of 2011 and 2012 by many literary-gate guardians, and was preceded by his previous novels House of Sand and Fog (made into a movie by the same name) and The Garden of Last Days.  Sue Miller will introduce the author.

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Tuesday, March 19, 6:30 p.m. - Mari Passananti 

will read from her second novel, The K Street Affair.

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Tuesday, April 16, 6:30 p.m. - Doug Bauer

Editor, writer of numerous books of fiction and non-fiction, and revered professor of English at Bennington College (to where he commutes from the South End), Bauer will read from his most recent collection of essays, What Happens Next?, to be published in the fall of 2013  by the University of Iowa Press.

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Tuesday, May 14, 6:30 p.m. - Dennis Lehane, the spectacularly successful author who grew up in Dorchester and is ALSO a BPL trustee, published his latest novel, Live by Night, in 2012. Set in Boston in the 1920s, the New York Times’ reviewer called the book a “sentence-by-sentence pleasure.”

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Tuesday, May 21, 6:30 p.m. - Alice Hoffman

The Dovekeepers, a historical novel describing the AD70 massacre at Masada from the point of view of four women at the fortress before it fell during the Jewish-Roman war, is the most recent of the nearly two dozen novels by Hoffman and just came out in paperback. To be introduced by Sue Miller.

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Tuesday, June 11, 6:30 p.m. - Alice Stone,

the local filmmaker whose mesmerizing documentary, Angelo Unwritten, has followed the life of a teenager adopted out of foster care when he was twelve, will return with an update of new material gathered since December 2011.

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Tuesday, June 18, 6:30 p.m. - Philip Gambone  

will return to read from his current work-in-progress, retracing the steps of his father who, as a soldier, was sent to Europe during the Second World War.

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