📍 Where: Austin Public, 1143 Northwestern Ave, Austin, TX

📆 When: January 29, 2025, 7:00 PM - 9:00 PM

On January 29th from 7-9 PM, four talented local screenwriters will present live table readings of their original scripts. Performed by an incredible lineup of local actors, this event will offer a first live reading of scripts that will be tomorrow’s cinematic masterpieces.

Whether you’re a film lover, a writer, or just curious about the art of storytelling, this event is your chance to connect with Austin’s creative talent and be inspired🎭

What to expect:

• 5 original scripts performed live by local actors, written by local screenwriters

• Live feedback given by local producers, directors, and professional script readers

• Networking opportunities with Austin’s film community

Screenwriters:

KB Brookins

Maryan Nagy Captan

Jose Da Hype

Tony Faia

Actors:

Iba Thiam

Mase Kerwick

Jose Da Hype

Micailah OCaii Nobles

Essynce

Marzetta

Rex Stanfield

Paige Freeman

Ray Perez

Jason Reyes

Carolyn Koskan

Erin Simpson

P Michael Hayes

This is a free event, but seating is limited—so reserve your spot now!

Come celebrate Austin’s thriving film scene. We can’t wait to see you there!

NOTES: If you can’t come, please cancel your RSVP to make space for someone that would like to come. Masks are required for attendees, and we will have free masks at the front door, Far UVC lights, and an air purifier running throughout, courtesy of Clear the Air ATX. Austin Public has a wheelchair accessible entrance and bathroom (call them at (512) 322-0145 ext. 3235 for more details). This event is all ages, but strong language will be used in some of the scripts, so take caution when bringing small children. This event has a zero tolerance policy for hate speech or heckling of any kind. Last, this event is hosted and produced by KB Brookins.

‘Zine Lunch!’ presented by Sarabande Books is a free online workshop on micro-writing and art. Hosted nearly every Friday from 12 - 1PM EST via Zoom, the workshops are designed to be a fun and low-stakes way to make time for creativity. In each lunchtime session, a Sarabande author or friend of the press leads attendees through the creation of a small work of writing or art in zine form. Bookmark this space to see our upcoming ‘Zine Lunch!’ sessions. You can register for upcoming workshops and view recordings of past workshops through the linked images below. Learn more about zine art here.

Workshop title: Mama Let’s PRAISE!

Description: A workshop where participants will close read and create their own poems of praise — including odes, afters, and more!

Register here: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZEqdeypqj4pHtGXh2dLwzLk6Yxvl0c_P6JM#/registration

Texas Book Festival connects authors and readers through experiences that celebrate the culture of literacy, ideas, and imagination. The annual Festival features more than 250 authors of the year’s best books and attracts 40,000 book lovers!

KB Brookins will speak at:

Session: Texas Institute of Letters Presents: 2024 Adult Literature Award Winners

Date: SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 16TH

Time/Location: 10:15 AM - 11:00 AM, Texas Tent

Authors: KB Brookins, Drew Buxton & Deborah D.E.E.P. Mouton

Moderator: David Bowles

Books: Freedom House, So Much Heart & Black Chameleon

Description: Each year the Texas Institute of Letters recognizes outstanding literary works by Texas authors. Join us to celebrate three of the 2024 award winners: KB Brookins won the Texas Institute of Letters Award for First Book of Poetry for Freedom House, Drew Buxton won the Sergio Troncoso Award for Best Book of Fiction for So Much Heart: Stories, and Mouton won the Carr P. Collins Award for Best Book of Nonfiction for Black Chameleon: Memory, Womanhood, and Myth.

Book Signing: 11:15 AM at the Main Signing Tent

Becoming Ourselves: Memoirs of Transformation

Date: SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 16TH

Time/Location: 3:00 PM - 3:45 PM, Kirkus Tent

Authors: Michael Andor Brodeur & KB Brookins

Moderator: Greg Marshall

Books: Swole: The Making of Men and the Meaning of Muscle & Pretty

Description: Join Michael Andor Brodeur and KB Brookins for a conversation exploring the nuances of gender, patriarchy, and transformation. In Swole, Brodeur maps out histories and anecdotes of muscle culture through a multi-genre narrative. In Pretty, Brookins turns a critical eye to gender norms and toxic masculinity as the author recounts their experience growing up as a Black Texan grappling with identity, race and the desire to define oneself independent of societal expectations. Together, these two memoirs uplift and challenge all different modes of masculinity.

Book Signing: 4:00 PM at the Main Signing Tent

Lit Crawl: Texas Poetry Crush

Date: SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 16TH

Time/Location: 7:00 PM - 8:00 PM, Speakeasy, Rooftop (412 Congress Ave., 4th floor)

Participants: KB Brookins, Jenny Browne, Jennifer Maritza McCauley, and mónica teresa ortiz

Description: Have you ever had a crush on a poem? How about a poet? Five poets will share poems by a Texas poet they admire and read their own poems inspired by living in Texas.

Note: Each level is ADA accessible.

More info: https://texasbookfestival.org/festival/

Free RSVP: https://www.praisesongforthepeople.com/event-details/praisesong-for-the-people-austin-2

Spearheaded by Texas Poet Laureate Amanda Johnston, Praisesong for the People: Poems from the Heart and Soul of Texas will commission 70 poets across 7 Texas regions to write original praise poems celebrating everyday people in the state we call home. This project seeks to uplift our diverse and intersecting population across age, gender, and BIPOC, LGBTQIA+, differently-abled, and immigrant communities.

Join us for the launch of the Praisesong for the People readings on October 29th at 7:30 pm at Radio Coffee & Beer featuring Prudence Arceneaux, KB Brookins, Joe Brundidge, Audrea Diaz, Jennine Krueger, Lisa Lynne Moore, Sam Bastone-Treviño, and Sasha West! Hosted by Amanda Johnston.

Learn more about Praisesong for the People at PraisesongForThePeople.com.

Presented with support from Writers' League of Texas, The Academy of American Poets, and Mellon Foundation.

The Southern Festival of Books: A Celebration of the Written Word is among the oldest literary festivals in the country, annually welcoming hundreds of authors and thousands of visitors to downtown Nashville each October.
 
The Festival, a program of Humanities Tennessee, is free and includes performance stages, food trucks, and loads of publishers and booksellers.

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 27

MEMOIR PANEL with KB Brookins, Corey J. Miles and Julian Randall

1 PM

Obion Room, Tennessee State Library and Archives, Nashville, TN

Book signing will follow the panel with Parnassus!

More info: https://www.sofestofbooks.org/2024-festival-authors

Expect amazing writers & independent lit presses. VersoFrontera: The Best Literary Destination in Texas!

RSVP here: https://www.facebook.com/events/1063605548567989/?active_tab=discussion

**if you mised this reading, watch the recording here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ImhnHw3xN_8 **

Join Hundred Pitchers of Honey for a virtual reading with KB Brookins, Megan Merchant, and Joan Kwon Glass! Starts at 6:30PM CT.

Register here: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZcqf-6pqjosH9PLbwF_15JERzlaEXNQft1T#/registration

RSVP HERE: https://alienatedmajestybooks.com/events/654820240921

Join three award-winning writers for a reading from their respective works that dive into unique perspectives on what it means to belong.

What does it mean to be a literary and political subject in the afterlife of colonization? Texas-based Nigerian American poet Ayokunle Falomo sifts through Nigerian stories and mythologies to explore the self, family, and nationhood through the intimate lens of father-son relationships and a reckoning with colonizers. KB Brookins’s personal experiences growing up in Texas informs their memoir, blending Black queer studies and cultural criticism to explore notions of beauty and toxicity of Black masculinity from a transgender perspective. Award-winning poet Sara Bawany’s Quarter Life Crisis dives headfirst into the brutal reexamining of a period in one’s life described by many as a time of uncertainty, insecurity, and doubt for the future, one that is rooted in the intersection of faith, mental health, and justice.

✦✦✦ ABOUT THE READERS ✦✦✦

Ayokunle Falomo is Nigerian, American, and the author of AFRICANAMERICAN’T (FlowerSong Press, 2022), two self-published collections and African, American (New Delta Review, 2019; selected by Selah Saterstrom as the winner of New Delta Review’s 8th annual chapbook contest). A recipient of fellowships from Vermont Studio Center, MacDowell, and the University of Michigan’s Helen Zell Writers’ Program, where he obtained his MFA in Creative Writing—Poetry, his work has been anthologized and widely published in print and online publications: The New York Times, Houston Public Media, Michigan Quarterly Review, The Texas Review, New England Review, Write About Now among others. You can find more information about him at afalomo.com.

KB Brookins is a Black queer and trans writer, cultural worker, and visual artist from Texas. KB’s chapbook How To Identify Yourself with a Wound won the Saguaro Poetry Prize, a Writer’s League of Texas Discovery Prize, and a Stonewall Honor Book Award. Their debut poetry collection Freedom House won the American Library Association Barbara Gittings Literature Award and the Texas Institute of Letters Award for the Best First Book of Poetry. KB’s debut memoir Pretty released in May 2024 with Alfred A. Knopf. Follow them online at @earthtokb.

Sara Bawany is a clinical social worker and second-year MFA Poetry student at Texas State University. She published (w)holehearted: a collection of poetry and prose in 2018, and her second book, Quarter Life Crisis, was published in October 2023. She is the Assistant Managing Editor at Porter House Review and is an instructor at House of Amal, a writing institution for Muslim youth. You can learn more about her work atwww.sarabawany.com.

RSVP here: https://www.thewordfordiversity.org/margins

Date/Time: Sept 10, 5-5:55pm CT

Format: Virtual

Panel: Personal Storytelling Rooted in Place

Panelists: KB Brookins, Neesha Powell-Ingabire, Jose Olivarez

Moderator: Jenna Nishimura

RSVP HERE: https://alienatedmajestybooks.com/events/654320240906

Friday Sep 6th, 2024, 6:00 PM-8:00 PM @ Alienated Majesty Books (Austin, TX)

Join us in celebrating the release of Occupy Whiteness by Joaquín Zihuatanejo. Joaquín will be joined in reading & conversation by local poet KB Brookins. 

✦✦✦ ABOUT THE BOOK ✦✦✦

Occupy Whiteness is a collection of hybrid erasure poems from inaugural Dallas Poet Laureate and multi-world slam competition winner Joaquín Zihuatanejo. Starting from long-form works of literature by straight, white men, Joaquín Zihuatanejo occupies their pages, erasing words and sections, leaving only his poetry behind — the white space that remains becoming colonized Brown verse. Occupy Whiteness is an act of rebellion that reclaims spaces and highlights a history of erasure of Brown life.

An unflinching look at the present day, the collection is haunted and blessed by the image of ancestors who braved the river and desert to travel into border states for the opportunity of freedom. These are poems meant to agitate and create unease, to make the reader realize that neither their author nor the immigrant children he describes are Other. Through poems and interspersed photography from the border, Zihuatanejo poignantly depicts this equally beautiful and brutal place we call home.

✦✦✦ ABOUT THE GUESTS ✦✦✦

Joaquín Zihuatanejo was recently named the inaugural Dallas Poet Laureate for 2022-2024. Hailed as “The People’s Poet” by The Dallas Morning News, Joaquín credits his Abuelo, who was the first person to place a book in his hands and challenge him to read aloud, as his first teacher and the source of his poetic inspiration. He received his MFA in creative writing from the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico. His work has been published in Poets.org, Southwestern American Literature, Yellow Medicine Review, Sonora Review, among other journals and anthologies. His poetry has been featured on HBO, NBC, and on NPR in Historias and The National Teacher’s Initiative. His new collection of poetry, Occupy Whiteness, is out now from Deep Vellum Publishing. Joaquín was recently named a Poet Laureate Fellow by the Academy of American Poets and received a $50,000 prize in honor of the good work he has done in Dallas as their first poet laureate. Joaquín has two passions in his life, his partner Aída and poetry. Always in that order.

KB Brookins is a Black, queer, and trans writer, cultural worker, and visual artist from Texas. Their writing is featured in Poets.org, HuffPost, Teen Vogue, Poetry Society of America, Oxford American, and elsewhere. KB’s poetry chapbook How To Identify Yourself with a Wound won the Saguaro Poetry Prize, a Writer’s League of Texas Discovery Prize, and a Stonewall Honor Book Award. Their debut poetry collection Freedom House, described as “urgent and timely” by Vogue, won the American Library Association Barbara Gittings Literature Award and the Texas Institute of Letters Award for the Best First Book of Poetry. KB adapted Freedom House into a solo art exhibit, which debuted at Prizer Arts and Letters in April 2024. Their debut memoir Pretty (Alfred A. Knopf) released on May 28, 2024.

This will be an artist talk where KB Brookins (joined by Em Shapiro) and sari shryack will speak about their exhibits currently up at the Dougherty Arts Center. No RSVP needed.

Freedom House: An Exhibition is a multimedia installation of poems, film, furniture, and digital collages that simulate what freedom — embodied in everyone’s most delicate and personal place, a home — looks, feels, and sounds like. All 16 digital collages in this exhibit are based on poems in KB Brookins’ book of the same name, Freedom House. KB aims to make poetry more than what can exist on a page.

To request images for exhibit and publication consideration, please contact KB.

Register for the conference here: freedomoklahoma.org/thefreedomsessions

Black Queer Tulsa (@blackqueertulsa) will be collaborating with Freedom Oklahoma for The Freedom Sessions Conference! This panel discussion covers the beauty and the hardships that come with being black and queer in a marginalized community while living in a red state. — focusing on different perspectives of community leaders from different identities.

The panel will be moderated by MiaMaria Heredia (Mental Wellness Coordinator) and will feature Daniel McHenry (Founder), Kristy Vann (Executive Director), and a special guest, author KB Brookins!

No RSVP needed!

Freedom House: An Exhibition is a multimedia installation of poems, film, furniture, and digital collages that simulate what freedom — embodied in everyone’s most delicate and personal place, a home — looks, feels, and sounds like. All 16 digital collages in this exhibit are based on poems in KB Brookins’ book of the same name, Freedom House. KB aims to make poetry more than what can exist on a page.

To request images for exhibit and publication consideration, please contact KB.

Free to attend! No RSVP needed!

Come watch KB Brookins read from their newest book Pretty: A Memoir!

KB will be conversation with Neesha Powell-Ingabire. KB will also answer audience questions, and sign books afterwards. Start time for this event is 7:30pm ET.

Can’t attend in-person? Register virtually here: https://www.crowdcast.io/c/pretty

Free to attend! No RSVP needed!

Come watch KB read from their newest book Pretty: A Memoir!

KB will be in conversation with Andrea “Vocab” Sanderson. KB will also answer audience questions, and sign books afterwards. This event is hosted by The Twig Book Shop in San Antonio, TX. Time of event is 5:30-7pm CT.

Free to attend! No RSVP needed!

Come watch KB read from their newest book Pretty: A Memoir!

KB will be in conversation with Kemi Alabi. KB will also answer audience questions, and sign books afterwards. This event is hosted by Women & Children First in Chicago, IL. Time of event is 7-8pm CT.

Free to attend! Join us here: https://www.instagram.com/booksmithsf/

Come watch KB Brookins read from their newest book Pretty: A Memoir and chat with Lio Min. They will also answer audience questions. Event start time is 12pm PT / 2pm CT / 3pm EST.

RSVP for this free event here: https://www.abodepress.com/events-1/juneteenth-reading-at-future-front/form

Come watch KB read from their newest book Pretty: A Memoir!

They will be joined by Mirakol Smith & Enzo Silon Surin, who will also read from their books <3

Free to attend! No RSVP needed!

Come watch KB Brookins read from their newest book, Pretty: A Memoir!

KB will be in conversation with Vanessa Angelica Villareal. KB will also answer audience questions, and sign books afterwards. This event is hosted by Skylight Books in Los Angeles, CA. Time of event is 7-8pm PST.

Come celebrate Pride Month with KB Brookins as they read from their newest book Pretty: A memoir at the Little Gay Book Club :)

This event will be hosted at the Little Gay Shop in Austin, TX. KB will also sign books afterwards.

Join @glaad on instagram for a Live interview with KB Brookins and Shar Jossell!

Free to attend! RSVP here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/kb-brookins-bushwick-book-launch-with-mckenzie-wark-tickets-885620293137

Come watch KB read from their newest book Pretty: A Memoir!

Local trans writers will read short pieces, then KB will read a brief passage from Pretty. KB will then be in conversation with McKenzie Wark, and engage in a Q&A with the audience.

Come witness greatness and get a signed copy of Pretty: A Memoir. Location is 214 Starr St, 1/2 block away from the Jefferson Stop of the L Train. Time is in EST.

Free to attend! RSVP here: https://withfriends.co/event/19993963/kb_brookins_pretty_with_edgar_gomez

Come watch KB Brookins read from their newest book Pretty: A Memoir!

KB will also answer audience questions, and sign books afterwards. Event start time is 7pm EST.

Free to attend! No RSVP needed!

KB Brookins will be participating in a reading and conversation with Zoe Bossiere!

KB will read from their newest book Pretty: A Memoir. Zoe Bossiere will read from her newest book, Cactus Country: A Boyhood Memoir. They will also answer audience questions, and sign books afterwards.

Additional information can be found at the Powell’s Event Page. Start time is 7pm PST.

Free to attend! No RSVP needed!

Come watch KB read from their newest book Pretty: A Memoir!

KB will in conversation with Zoe Bossiere. They will also answer audience questions, and sign books afterwards.The start time is 4pm Pacific Time.

Free to attend! No RSVP needed!

Come watch KB read from their newest book Pretty: A Memoir!

KB will be in conversation with Joaquin Zihuatanejo. KB will also answer audience questions, and sign books afterwards. The start time is 6pm Central Time.

Free to attend! No RSVP needed!

Come watch KB read from their newest book Pretty: A Memoir!

KB will be in conversation with Kiese Laymon. KB will also answer audience questions, and sign books afterwards. The start time is 7pm Central Time.

Free to attend! No RSVP needed!

Come to this special reading to commemorate the release of KB Brookins’ Pretty: A Memoir!

A stellar list of special guests — ire’ne laura silva, Maryan Nagy Captan, & Amanda Johnston — will read alongside KB Brookins. KB will sign books and cut a cake (that everyone’s welcome to eat) afterwards! So come out <3 This event will be held at Alienated Majesty Books in Austin, TX.

ACCESS STATEMENT: this event will require masks. Masks will be available at the front desk of the bookstore. This event will also have HEPA air filters running throughout its duration. The entrance is accessible by wheelchair. There is free parking in a parking lot attached to the venue.

This event is free to attend and open to the public. No RSVP needed!

Join us for the panel “Just Who Do You Think You Are?: Redefining the Narrative”

2:00 PM

Greensboro Cultural Center Hyers Theatre (200 N Davie St. Greensboro, NC 27401)

In works that critique toxic traditions, navigate the violence of perception, and explore cultural confusion, AMINA GUATIER (The Best that You Can Do), MYRIAM GURBA (Creep: Accusations and Confessions), and KB BROOKINS (Freedom House & Pretty: A Memoir) weave personal histories and identities into the larger fabric of culture, arguing for a rethinking of who controls how we think about place, gender, race, and societal norms. Each of these writers claims physical, intellectual, and emotional space that has been misappropriated, ill-defined, or abused by culture at large.