We're thrilled to team up again with The Rumpus for a solstice celebration! Come join all of us and Venita Blackburn, K-Ming Chang, Denne Norris, and Jarod Roselló for an evening of readings and trivia. We're also celebrating Alysia Li Ying Sawchyn's first event as the new editor-in-chief of one of our favorite lit mags <3 Don't miss it!

Head to this event's page on our website to purchase all these writers' books! Check out our entire inventory on our website, or order any books we don’t have in stock, and don’t miss our lists of recommended and best-selling titles.

This event will be hosted on Zoom. You'll receive the link to the Zoom meeting the day of the event via email. Free registration/ticket sales will end at 6:30pm ET on 12/21. Please email events@whitewhalebookstore.com if you miss this cut-off and need a ticket. For questions, check out our FAQ for events here.

About the writers:

Works by Venita Blackburn have appeared in thenewyorker.com, Harper’s, Ploughshares, McSweeney’s, the Paris Review and others. She received the Prairie Schooner book prize in fiction for her collected stories, Black Jesus and Other Superheroes in 2017. She is founder of the literary nonprofit Live, Write (livewriteworkshop.com), which provides free creative writing workshops for communities of color. Blackburn’s second collection of stories, How to Wrestle a Girl, was published fall of 2021. She is an Assistant Professor of creative writing at California State University, Fresno.

K-Ming Chang is a Kundiman fellow, a Lambda Literary Award finalist, and a National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 honoree. She is the author of the New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice novel Bestiary. In 2021, her chapbook Bone House was published by Bull City Press. Her short story collection, Gods of Want, is forthcoming from One World, as well as a novel titled Organ Meats. She lives with her birds in California.

Denne Michele Norris is the Editor-in-Chief of Electric Literature. Her writing appears in McSweeney's, American Short Fiction, and The Undefeated, and has been supported by MacDowell, Tin House, VCCA, and the Kimbilio Center for African American Fiction. She is the first Black, openly transgender woman to be named Editor-in-Chief of a major American literary publication. Follow her on Twitter and IG @thedennemichele.

Jarod Roselló is a Cuban American writer, cartoonist, and teacher. He is the author of the middle-grade graphic novel series, Red Panda & Moon Bear, and the forthcoming early reader series, Hugo & Dino. He teaches in the creative writing program at the University of South Florida.