One of the many opportunities to hear excellent local and regional writers’ work occurs three times a year as part of the Beacon Hill Reading Series. Since its inception, Beacon Hill has evolved into a crucial connection between diverse literary communities, featuring upcoming writers alongside more established ones. The series has showcased over 60 authors, including writers from Spokane, like Sharma Shields, Bruce Holbert and Shawn Vestal, as well as writers from across the Northwest and beyond. Join these excellent wordsmiths for a night of poetry and prose to kick off Get Lit!
Tod Marshall’s poetry collections include Bugle, The Tangled Line, and Dare Say. He has also published a collection of his interviews with contemporary poets, Range of the Possible, and an attendant anthology of work by the interviewed poets, Range of Voices. His work has been published in several journals, including The Southern Review, The American Poetry Review, Volt, The Iowa Review, Shenandoah, The Kenyon Review, Poetry Northwest, Willow Springs, and elsewhere. He lives in Spokane and directs the writing concentration and coordinates the visiting writers series at Gonzaga University.
S. M. Hulse received her M.F.A. from the University of Oregon and was the James C. McCreight Fiction Fellow at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her debut novel, Black River, was published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt in January 2015 and has been named an American Booksellers Association Indies Introduce title for Winter/Spring 2015. Her stories have appeared in Willow Springs, Witness, and Salamander. A horsewoman and fiddler, she has spent time in Washington, Montana, Idaho, and Oregon.
Jeremy Pataky's debut book of poetry, Overwinter, was published by University of Alaska Press in the Alaska Literary Series. He earned an MFA in poetry from the University of Montana. His work has appeared in Colorado Review, Black Warrior Review, The Southeast Review, and in many others, includes several anthologies. He earned an MFA at the University of Montana and is a founding board member of 49 Writers, a nonprofit dedicated to supporting the artistic development of writers throughout Alaska, fostering a writing community, and building an audience for literature. He divides his time between Anchorage and his property near McCarthy, Alaska, in Wrangell-St. Elias National Park.
The Beacon Hill Reading Series features both local and regional authors. Meant to unite the various literary communities of Spokane, the series aims also to make well-crafted writing accessible to a general audience. It is curated and co-hosted by writers Maya Jewell Zeller, Laura Read, and Gwen James. The series is free and open to the public.
