Nonfiction, Public Appearances, Readings

Reading in Ames

Thursday, December 11, 2014, at 7:00 pm
Design on Main, 203 Main Street, Ames, Iowa

Bid a fond farewell to fall semester and celebrate our community of writers at Iowa State with the final Emerging Writers Series event of 2014, hosted by Adam Wright. I will be reading nonfiction about my experiences teaching before coming to ISU. Camille Luera-De-Meyers will read poetry, and Audrey McCombs with special guest Michelle Donahue will read fiction.

Bring a cup of something warm, check out the new artwork in the gallery and settle in for a cozy winter evening of storytelling. Free and open to the public.

Last week, Lance and I celebrated the release of Prairie Gold with the good people of Ames. Four of our talented contributors (Michelle Donahue, Rachel Lopez, Claire Kruesel, and Meghan Brown) read their work, so many people came out that at one point we were standing room only, delicious refreshments courtesy of a 2014 AgArts Local Wonders grant were enjoyed by all, and our dedicated audience stuck around long after the event ended (9:00 on a Friday night, mind you) to discuss literature. Plus, we sold a bunch of books.

In sum, our first Prairie Gold event was a great success!

The College of Design was wonderful enough to loan us their amazing downtown space for the night. It’s great to be fostering connections between the literary and visual arts. Here’s our event in a news release published by the College of Design: Book Release Party Marks Start of ISU Design on Main Gallery’s Fall Programming Aug. 29.

(Psst! Follow us on Facebook to make sure you don’t miss updates about the rest of the stops on our book tour. Oh, and invite your friends to follow us on Facebook too. We’re so close to 500 likes, we can already taste it. It tastes like love.)

Public Appearances

Ames Release Party

Editing, In the Media, Nonfiction

Writers’ Voices

First of all, I want to say thank you to Monica Hadley and Caroline Kilbourn at 100.1 FM, KRUU-LP in Fairfield, Iowa, for having Lance and me on the show this past Friday. It was both of our first time on talk radio, and we had a lot of fun talking about Prairie Gold with the mother/daughter duo. Thanks also to Monica for mentioning us on her blog.

If you missed the live broadcast, which also included me reading an excerpt from my nonfiction essay “Letters After Achilles,” they’ll be re-airing it Monday (tomorrow) morning at 8:00 CST. You can listen live on their website.

If that’s just not going to work for you (because you’ll be at work, say, and you’re a responsible employee who stays on task), they’ll be archiving it on Writers’ Voices, so check back there at a later date.

I do want to take the opportunity to make a couple minor corrections to my bio, which has changed since the final draft of Prairie Gold was sent to the printers. While I very much enjoyed my two years as an undergraduate English instructor at ISU, as of May 2014 I’ve (temporarily) hung up my teaching hat and have been trying my hand in a new field: multimedia communications. As the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture‘s communications assistant, I write news releases and feature stories, manage their social media, post updates on their website, design publications like their quarterly newsletter, and other fun stuff like helping produce a video for STRIPS, a cutting edge sustainable agriculture practice.

Likewise, I am no longer the nonfiction or social media editor for Flyway: Journal of Writing and Environment. In order to give all of ISU’s Creative Writing and Environment graduate students the opportunity to serve on the editorial staff, Flyway positions are one-year appointments. I want to make sure credit for all of the wonderful work Flyway is currently doing goes to the right people: Adam Wright is now the nonfiction editor, and Erin Schmiel has taken over social media.

Of course, you can always find the most up-to-date information about what I’m up to on my Bio/Home page.

Public Appearances, Readings

Prairie Gold Events

I am pleased to announce three exciting pieces of Prairie Gold news: an upcoming radio interview, our Midwestern book tour, and a Goodreads Giveaway.

Live On the Air

Today, editors Lance M. Sacknoff and Stefanie Brook Trout will discuss Prairie Gold on KRUU 100.1 FM, the Voice of Fairfield. Stefanie will read an excerpt from her essay “Letters After Achilles.” Listen live from 1:00-2:00 pm to catch the Writers’ Voices talk radio show.

Midwestern Book Tour

Prairie Gold: An Anthology of the American Heartland is hitting the road! A 2014 Local Wonders Grant from AgArts (Iowa Chapter) is helping to support a book release party in Ames and several readings in cities throughout Iowa. See the list below for all of the event details we’ve nailed down so far. (Download a news release.)

Friday, August 29, 2014 – Book Release Party & Reading

7:00 pm – Design on Main – Ames, Iowa

Featuring fiction by Michelle Donahue and Rachel Lopez, nonfiction by Meghan Brown, and poetry by Claire Kruesel
Publisher Steve Semken and editors Lance M. Sacknoff and Stefanie Brook Trout will give remarks, introduce the readers, and answer questions about the project
Copies of Prairie Gold will be for sale at a special Ames Release Party discount of 15% off
Download our Release Party Flier

Thursday, October 9, 2014 – SPECTRA Reading

8:00 pm – Rozz-Tox – Rock Island, Illinois

Featuring fiction by T.C. Jones and Barbara Harroun and poetry by Esteban Colon, Salvatore Marici, and Ryan Collins
Publisher Steve Semken and editors Lance M. Sacknoff and Stefanie Brook Trout will attend and can answer questions about the project
Part of the Midwest Writing Center’s SPECTRA Reading Series, the event will also include readings by Lauren Haldeman, Erin Keane, and one more TBA

Thursday, October 16, 2014 – Reading

7:00 pm – Prairie Lights – Iowa City, Iowa

Featuring nonfiction by Will Jennings and Meghan Brown, fiction by Barbara Harroun, and poetry by Salvatore Marici
Publisher Steve Semken and editors Lance M. Sacknoff and Stefanie Brook Trout will give remarks, introduce the readers, and answer questions about the project

Thursday, January 29, 2015 – Final Thursday Reading

7:00 pm – Hearst Center for the Arts – Cedar Falls, Iowa

Part of the Heart Center’s Final Thursday Reading Series
More details to come!

Thursday, April 9, 2015 – AWP Reception and Reading

7:00 pm – Subtext Books – St. Paul, Minnesota

Featuring poetry by Lindsay Tigue, Sandra Marchetti, Nancy Cook, Stephanie Schultz, and Michelle Menting; fiction by Matthew Fogarty and Molly Rideout; and nonfiction by John Linstrom and Sarah Elizabeth Turner.
Publisher Steve Semken and editors Lance M. Sacknoff and Stefanie Brook Trout will give remarks, introduce the readers, and answer questions about the project
In addition to the off-site reading, we will also have a table at AWP, so come see us at Booth #119!

We expect to add one more Iowa reading in Des Moines and a few more outside of Iowa, so follow Prairie Gold on Facebook to make sure you don’t miss any additional developments.

Goodreads Giveaway

Prairie Gold is on Goodreads, which means you can now add it to your shelf. Have you already read it? Please take a minute to rate and review the book. Don’t have a copy yet? Enter our Goodreads Giveaway contest by October 31, and you could win one of five copies!

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Prairie Gold

by Lance M. Sacknoff

Giveaway ends October 31, 2014.

See the giveaway details
at Goodreads.

Enter to win

Poetry

“White Squirrel” Wins Poetry Prize

I’m honored that my poem “White Squirrel” was selected as the winner of the Multimodal Poetry Contest sponsored by the Iowa State University Writing and Media Center. I took home a $50 gift card to the ISU Bookstore (My kind of prize!), and they will be publishing my poem on their website. I look forward to updating this post with a link to the poem, which features the white squirrel, atomic history, and sycamore trees on ISU’s campus.

Stefanie Brook Trout

Author Page

Tag Archives: ISU