You are invited to come and meet the Hubbard Hall Writers (and me and Red) talking about our very successful workshop and reading from their surprising, powerful and very poignant and uplifting work. Dr. Jen Baker-Porazinksi, John Greenwood, Rebecca Fedler, Rachel Barlow, Diane Fiore and Kim Gifford have written about pugs, relationships, memory, Alzheimer’s, the challenges of dating in various ways. I will also be offering a sneak preview from my next book “Second Change Dog: A Love Story,” and Red will be along, he is the workshop writing dog. There will be a reception with food before the reading so people can look at the poems, blogs, photos, drawings and artwork that has come out of the workshop.

At the reading, we will use screen projections to talk about our blogs and explain how we are exploring new technology and platforms to get our work out into the world. Some of the group are moving to be professional writers, others just want to write for other reasons. The evening is being held for the benefit of the Hubbard Hall Scholarship Fund, so if you come, you will not only hear some wonderful writing and support the writers, you will help kids enjoy Hubbard Hall’s great educational activities and programs.

Thanks to Hubbard Hall’s generosity, we are pricing the reading to make sure everyone can come – kids and young writers are especially welcome. No one will be turned away for lack of funds. Advanced ticket sales are $10 and are available at the Hubbard Hall website. Tickets are free at the door but donations to the Hubbard Hall Scholarship Fund will be welcome. Writing workshops are complex and challenging, but this one has really worked. It was supposed to be a six-week workshop, we are heading into our second year, and I don’t think this group will ever disband. We meet almost daily on Facebook and have all explored the ways in which we can use writing to make a living, explore complex issues in our lives, and to use blogs to advance our work and reach new audiences.

I am very excited about the work this group has gone. For years, I’ve wanted to figure out how to reach writing in a positive and effective way, and this is the group that showed the way. You will be hearing from the milkman who writes poetry and memoir, the doctor who is struggling to find her humanity, the housewife and mother who writes like Erma Bombeck, the artist/photographer/writer and teacher whose life revolves around pugs, the young poet raised on a family farm.  Their work ought to be shared with the world. These people are a light unto the world. In the way that independent bookstores need to be support, so do writers started out and working to find their voices and communicate. So please come if you can. We will have fun, share what we have learned, touch some hearts and souls. The readings will take place at the Freight Depot at Hubbard Hall. Reception at 6 p.m., readings at 7 p.m. Hope to see you there. Readings are supposed to be a dying art form, but so are bookstores. Both will be around for a good while.