Gemini Ink

LitMinds Book Club
2025-11-12 18:30 - 20:00 (America/Mexico_City) | Gemini Ink, 1111 Navarro St, San Antonio, TX, 78205, United States
Note: This title replaces Empire of the Summer Moon by S. C. Gwynne, which appeared in our previous class schedule.
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“A riveting tale of perseverance and the lengths humans will go to help each other in times of struggle.”—Dave Eggers
ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The New York Times Book Review, NPR, The Washington Post, San Francisco Chronicle, Vulture, She Reads, Kirkus Reviews
Trip. My parents started using that word about a year ago—“one day, you’ll take a trip to be with us. Like an adventure.”
Javier Zamora’s adventure is a three-thousand-mile journey from his small town in El Salvador, through Guatemala and Mexico, and across the U.S. border. He will leave behind his beloved aunt and grandparents to reunite with a mother who left four years ago and a father he barely remembers. Traveling alone amid a group of strangers and a “coyote” hired to lead them to safety, Javier expects his trip to last two short weeks.
At nine years old, all Javier can imagine is rushing into his parents’ arms, snuggling in bed between them, and living under the same roof again. He cannot foresee the perilous boat trips, relentless desert treks, pointed guns, arrests and deceptions that await him; nor can he know that those two weeks will expand into two life-altering months alongside fellow migrants who will come to encircle him like an unexpected family.
A memoir as gripping as it is moving, Solito provides an immediate and intimate account not only of a treacherous and near-impossible journey, but also of the miraculous kindness and love delivered at the most unexpected moments. Solito is Javier Zamora’s story, but it’s also the story of millions of others who had no choice but to leave home.

About the author

Javier Zamora was born in El Salvador in 1990. His father fled the country when he was one, and his mother when he was about to turn five. Both parents’ migrations were caused by the U.S.-funded Salvadoran Civil War. When he was nine Javier migrated through Guatemala, Mexico, and the Sonoran Desert. His debut poetry collection, Unaccompanied, explores the impact of the war and immigration on his family. Zamora has been a Stegner Fellow at Stanford and a Radcliffe Fellow at Harvard and holds fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Poetry Foundation.

Writing in the Land with Emmy Pérez
2025-11-13 18:30 - 20:00 (America/Chicago) | Online via Zoom
Literary Masters Lecture Series
Thursday(s), November 13 & 20, 6:30–8pm CT, online via Zoom
Nonmember $90; Member $75; Student?Educ/Mil $63
*EARN CPEs
TWO SCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE

Have you been seeking a more intentional connection to nature? Writing about the land is an intimate way to slow down and reconnect to earth with purpose. Join us for the last Literary Masters Lecture of the year! Each session features an engaging craft talk, actionable writing strategies, and a live Q&A with the author.
In this two-part lecture, led by 2020 Texas Poet Laureate Emmy Pérez, we will discuss poems, songs, and prose that center the land and our connections to places and the environment. We will use these discussions and short writing activities to examine nature through a creative lens, explore attention to detail, integrate historical and cultural contexts, and encourage an eco-justice approach to the writing. We will leave the lecture with our own research plans to explore a place of personal interest.
This lecture is open to writers of all skill levels 18+.
In this lecture students will:

Discuss poems and short prose pieces
Start drafting a poem or short prose piece
Develop a research plan to include online and in-person exploration of a land or a waterway of interest

Emmy Pérez, Texas Poet Laureate 2020, is the author of Solstice, With the River on Our Face, and the forthcoming Boxes with Zero Tolerance, and Paper america: New and Selected Poems. She is a recipient of fellowships from the Academy of American Poets, United States Artists, the National Endowment for the Arts, and CantoMundo. A member of the Macondo Writers Workshop since 2008, she is a professor at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, where she also serves as chair of the Department of Creative Writing.

Celebrating Our Stories: A Night with Gemini Ink
2025-11-14 18:30 - 20:30 (America/Chicago)
Friday, November 14, 2025 | 6:30–9:30pmRoosevelt Library, San Antonio
View sponsorship opportunitiesRegister now / Buy tickets
The Roosevelt Library
The Gemini Ink Board and team invite you to our autumn fundraiser, Celebrating Our Stories: A Night with Gemini Ink—an unforgettable evening that uplifts San Antonio storytellers and honors those who keep our literary community thriving.
This year, we’re moving the celebration to the Roosevelt Library, a stunning venue that reflects the beauty and history of San Antonio’s artistic spirit.
An Evening of Stories, Flavor, and Connection
Enjoy a culinary journey of small plates—from gumbo to Cacio e Pepe—paired with select wines and beverages. Hear from our Honorary Chair and Gemini Ink founder, Nan Cuba link, and mingle with fellow literary enthusiasts, including our recent Inkstravaganza honorees Cary Clack, Dr. Norma Elia Cantú, Jenny Browne, and Andrea “Vocab” Sanderson.
Featuring Live Performances
Experience riveting performances from some of San Antonio’s most dynamic voices, including Poet Laureate Eddie Vega, and Gemini Ink’s Voices of San Anto alums Dragonfly and Enedina Irene, sharing their powerful personal stories.
A Special Reveal
Be among the first to learn who will be honored at Inkstravaganza 2026—the announcement will be made exclusively during the event!
Support the Literary Arts
When you purchase a ticket link or become a sponsor, you directly support Gemini Ink’s year-round programs—helping us nurture the creative voices of tomorrow through initiatives like Partner Classes for under-resourced youth and our Writing for Resiliency workshops for frontline professionals.
Join us for this very special celebration of the writing arts. None of this would be possible without you!
View sponsorship opportunitiesRegister now / Buy tickets

Live Storytelling: Voices of San Anto Showcase
2025-11-15 14:00 - 16:00 (America/Chicago) | Pan American Branch Library, 1122 W Pyron Ave, San Antonio, 78221
You’re invited to a live storytelling show featuring students from our Voices of San Anto Bilingual Storytelling workshop!
Students from our workshop, led by local writer, performer, and San Antonio Poet Laureate Eddie Vega, will share deeply personal stories. Each participant will read a 5-7 minute piece about a significant moment in their life.
Come experience the power of live storytelling and hear these moving narratives firsthand.
We hope you can join us!

Veterans Writing Collective with Sarah Colby
2025-11-19 18:30 - 20:30, 2025-12-17 18:30 - 20:30, 2026-01-21 18:30 - 20:30, 2026-02-18 18:30 - 20:30, 2026-03-18 18:30 - 20:30 (America/Mexico_City) | Online via Zoom
The Veteran’s Writing Collective (VWC) encourages the art of writing in a workshop environment where participants are offered honest, positive, and constructive peer-to-peer and mentor feedback. The workshop is open to all active-duty military, veterans, retirees, and their immediate family members. Writers of all levels working in all genres are welcome.
The VWC meets monthly online via Zoom.
If you would like an invitation to this class, send an email to veteranscollective@geminiink.org

Sarah Colby was born in northern New Mexico and raised in the Rocky Mountains. She is married to a retired Army Chaplain and is mother to a son in the Navy. Sarah has an MFA in Creative Writing from Sierra Nevada College and an exuberant interest in making the ordinary luminous. Her war-time experiences have motivated her to be a voice for the mostly untold stories of families and loved ones during these years of protracted conflict. She is currently working on a manuscript of poems about her experiences as a military family member.

Open Writer's Labs
2025-11-24 18:30 - 20:30, 2025-12-29 18:30 - 20:30, 2026-01-26 18:30 - 20:30, 2026-02-23 18:30 - 20:30 (America/Mexico_City) | Online via Zoom
These peer-driven workshops, held the last Monday of each month, are free and open to writers of all levels and focus on poetry, flash fiction, and short creative non-fiction.

Online Via Zoom
For the online workshop, sign up the day before the class to ensure you receive the Zoom link.
This workshop is facilitated by Kevin Ramos. Originally from the northeast, Kevin studied theater arts at Rutgers University and The University of Washington. He’s lived all over the country before making his home in San Antonio, Texas. Kevin has written several novels and short stories. Most recently, publishing a short memoir called Enough about addiction, mothers, and missing graves. And a novel, Hayley’s Sense of Fire (DLG Publishing Partners), a modern re-telling of the classic fairy tale, The Little Matchgirl.

In-Person at Gemini Ink

Join our in-person Open Writer’s Lab with Robert Allen at Gemini Ink’s office, 1111 Navarro St., San Antonio, TX 78205.
Robert Allen has worked as a librarian and an electrical contractor for most of his life. Many moons ago, he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in English Literature from the University of Texas at Austin, where he studied poetry under David Wevill. Allen has been active in local writer’s groups and open mics, including the Sun Poets Society. He’s been published in The Ocotillo Review, the Texas Poetry Calendar, Voices de la Luna, di-verse-city, the San Antonio Express-News, and Poetry on the Move. In 2006, he started attending Gemini Ink’s free Monday night writing classes and has attended regularly ever since. With more than a decade of attending writers’ groups, classes, and open mics, he now co-facilitates Gemini Ink’s Open Writer’s Lab.
Parking at Gemini Ink
Gemini Ink offers free parking along the back wall of our downtown offices. Please access this parking lot from Augusta St and first park in any of the 12 spots along the back wall. Only when these 12 spots are full do we ask that you park elsewhere in our lot. We now rent our offices from UTSA and are collaborating with them to create a secure and accessible parking lot for our community of writers and readers.

Teen Writing Circle with Daniel Ramirez
2025-11-29 12:00 - 13:30, 2025-12-27 12:00 - 13:30, 2026-01-31 12:00 - 13:30, 2026-02-28 12:00 - 13:30 (America/Mexico_City) | Online via Zoom
Register
Last Saturday of Every Month 12-1:30pm cst via Zoom
For ages 13-19 years old
Are you a teen who enjoys writing in their free time? Or are you someone who’s never had the chance to write on their own? If so, this Online Teen Writing Circle is for you!
In this once-a-month writing circle, teens will enjoy writing in a judgment free zone. We’ll break the ice with one another and perform various writing exercises. You are encouraged to share your work with your peers and get constructive feedback, but it is not required. Our only goal is to keep you writing!
This course is open to teen writers of any skill level.
Participants will leave the writing circle with:

New, unique written work
Listening and sharing experience
Constructive feedback to help improve their writing

Want to learn more about our Teen Writing Circle? Check out our Frequently Asked Questions!

Daniel Ramirez has been an educator for over 15 years. After studying History in grad school, he tromped around the outdoors doing conservation with teenagers. Spending time as a Montessori educator revealed the power of incorporating creativity with learning. Encouraging youth to tap into their creative abilities convinced him to discover his own. Since then, in addition to his original love of storytelling, he’s found a penchant for calligraphy, puppetry, poetry, and block printing. A San Antonio native, he explores the crystalline waters of Central Texas in his free time.

Gemini Ink Holiday Open House
2025-12-11 18:30 - 20:30 (America/Mexico_City) | UTSA Southwest Campus – Coates Chapel, 300 Augusta, San Antonio, Texas, 78205
Save the date for Dec 11!

Join our community of writers, readers, and friends to share your work, make connections, and close the year on a high note.
We’ll also be celebrating our Partner Classes Teaching Artist of the Year for 2025 is Daniel Ramirez! Daniel is our TA of the Year for the amazing work he has been doing, especially with youth, for his wonderful creativity, and his ability to be a great co-teacher and to take the lead when the situation calls for it. He has an excellent way of building rapport quickly with students, whether they are reluctant 5th graders or busy public health workers. Through this rapport, he helps participants feel safe enough to take risks in their writing and play creatively with ideas and words. We are so excited to honor Daniel this year!
Open mic sign-up starts at 6:30pm.Hosted by Mandy Lynn, Public Classes Coordinator.
Wine, non-alcoholic drinks, coffee, and snacks will be served.
Thank you to our sponsors!

Poetry as Praise with Amanda Johnston
2025-12-13 10:00 - 13:00 (America/Chicago) | Online via Zoom
Saturday, December 13, 10am–1pm CT, online via Zoom
Nonmember $75; Member $65; Student/Educ/Mil $53
*EARN CPEs
TWO SCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE

Honor that special someone, a major milestone, or that first sip of coffee with a praise poem!
Through times of hardship and joy, poetry connects us to our shared human experience. Praise poems give writers a vessel to carry wonder and gratitude and to deliver loving messages to their community.
In this one-day workshop led by Texas Poet Laureate Emeritus Amanda Johnston, participants will explore poetic forms of praise, learn how to identify and celebrate the awe-inspiring everyday moments of life, and craft new works that can be given as gifts to loved ones.
This class is open to writers of all skill levels 18+.
In this workshop students will:

Explore poetic forms of praise.
Write and share new praise poems.
Build an idea catalog for future works.

Amanda Johnston is a writer, visual artist, and the 61st Poet Laureate of Texas. She earned an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Southern Maine. She is the author of two chapbooks, GUAP and Lock & Key, and the full-length collection Another Way to Say Enter, and editor of the anthology Praisesong for the People: Poems from the Heart and Soul of Texas, coming Fall 2025 from Host Publications. Her work has appeared in numerous online and print publications, among them Callaloo, Poetry Magazine, The Moth Radio Hour, Bill Moyers, The Rumpus, and the anthologies Furious Flower: Seeding the Future of African American Poetry and Women of Resistance: Poems for a New Feminism. She has received fellowships, grants, and awards from Cave Canem, Hedgebrook, Tasajillo, the Kentucky Foundation for Women, The Watermill Center, American Short Fiction, Prizer Arts & Letters, and the Academy of American Poets. She is a former Board President of Cave Canem Foundation, a member of the Affrilachian Poets, and founder of Torch Literary Arts.
IG: @poetamandajohnston
Facebook: Amanda Johnston
Website: AmandaJohnston.com

The Big Texas Author Talk featuring Cyra Sweet Dimitru
2025-12-17 19:00 - 20:00 (America/Chicago)
Join us on Wednesday, December 17th, 2025, via Zoom for a conversation with Cyra Sweet Dimitru, to discuss her new book, Words Make a Way Through Fire: Healing After My Brother’s Suicide (Simon & Schuster).

(Virtual Readings Quarterly @ 7pm CST)

RSVP
Words Make a Way through Fire is an intimate, courageous memoir of a woman shattered by witnessing her eldest brother’s horrific suicide when she was a teenager. The book traces her creative journey of recovery and healing with poetry as a constant companion.
The primary means of Cyra Dumitru’s healing process, from age sixteen through adulthood, is writing poetry and journaling. During this decades-long journey, Cyra experiences a transcendent, loving presence called Voice who guides her and helps her imagine wholeness. She finds community with others through the sharing of poems. She studies poetry as craft and as medicine—becoming a published poet with multiple books, an award-winning college instructor of poetry writing, and a certified practitioner of poetic medicine who creates spaces where others can heal through poetry.
In Words Make a Way through Fire, Cyra explores the specific medicinal properties of poetry—giving order to interior anxiety, trusting the wisdom within—and invites her brother David to speak through her as he reflects upon his final hours. In doing so, poem by poem, she shifts gradually from being traumatized and feeling haunted to feeling empowered and spiritually expansive.

About the Author
Cyra Sweet Dumitru is a published poet and instructor of poetry, and one of four certified practitioners of poetic medicine in Texas. Her poems have appeared on the walls of City Hall, been spoken on national public radio and in museums, and appeared in city newspapers and national literary journals. Her collections of poems include What the Body Knows, Listening to Light, Remains, and Elder Moon. She offers therapeutic writing circles for adults learning to live with trauma, bereavement, depression, anxiety, and religious trauma. Cyra lives in San Antonio, Texas with her family.

About the Moderator
Natalia Treviño‘s fiction appears in Mirrors Beneath the Earth (Curbstone Press), The Platte Valley Review, and her non-fiction appears in Wising Up Anthologies, Complex Allegiances and Shifting Balance Sheets: Women’s Stories of Naturalized Citizens. Her first book of poetry, Lavando La Dirty Laundry, is available from Mongrel Empire Press and most online bookstores. A member of the Macondo Writers’ Workshop, Natalia has been working to increase young adult literacy since 1992 in her teaching career and through programs sponsored by the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center, Gemini Ink, and the Bexar County Juvenile Detention Center.

MOSAIC Poetry Reading & Print Sale
2025-12-18 18:00 - 20:00 (America/Mexico_City) | Contemporary at Blue Star, 116 Blue Star, San Antonio, Texas
We’re celebrating the work of high school students who created original visual art and poetry in this special series of workshops, in partnership with MOSAIC Studio, Contemporary at Blue Star. The celebration will be held at MOSAIC Studio at Contemporary at Blue Star.
Learn more about our Partner Classes Program!

LitMinds Book Club
2026-01-14 18:30 - 20:00 (America/Chicago) | Gemini Ink, 1111 Navarro St, San Antonio, TX, 78205, United States
Join us for the LitMinds Book Club at Gemini Ink. We’re reading The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini.
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The #1 New York Times bestselling novel beloved by millions of readers the world over.
New York Times Readers Pick: 100 Best Books of the 21st Century
“A vivid and engaging story that reminds us how long his people [of Afghanistan] have been struggling to triumph over the forces of violence—forces that continue to threaten them even today.”—The New York Times Book Review
The unforgettable, heartbreaking story of the unlikely friendship between a wealthy boy and the son of his father’s servant, caught in the tragic sweep of history, The Kite Runner transports readers to Afghanistan at a tense and crucial moment of change and destruction. A powerful story of friendship, it is also about the power of reading, the price of betrayal, and the possibility of redemption; and an exploration of the power of fathers over sons—their love, their sacrifices, their lies.
Since its publication in 2003, Kite Runner has become a beloved, one-of-a-kind classic of contemporary literature, touching millions of readers and launching the career of one of America’s most treasured writers.

About the Author

Khaled Hosseini is one of the most widely read and beloved novelists in the world, with over thirty-eight million copies of his books sold in more than seventy countries. The Kite Runner was a major film and was a Book of the Decade, chosen by The Times, Daily Telegraph and The Guardian. A Thousand Splendid Suns was the Richard & Judy Best Read of the Year in 2008. Hosseini is also a Goodwill Envoy to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the UN Refugee Agency, and the founder of The Khaled Hosseini Foundation, a not-for-profit organization that provides humanitarian assistance to the people of Afghanistan. He was born in Kabul, Afghanistan, and lives in northern California.
Visit our LitMinds page to see what we’re reading next!

For a Girl Becoming with Joy Harjo
2026-01-30 17:30 - 19:00 (America/Chicago) | Las Palmas Branch Library, 515 Castroville Rd, San Antonio, Texas, 78237
Join us for a special family-friendly reading of For a Girl Becoming with Joy Harjo, featuring illustrator Adriana Garcia and guest poets Laurie Ann Guerrero and Xelena González.
This free community event celebrates poetry and storytelling. Hosted at the Las Palmas Branch Library. All are welcome.

Tapping Into Your Senses: A Memoir Workshop with Denise Tolan
2026-02-03 18:30 - 20:30 (America/Chicago) | Gemini Ink, 1111 Navarro St, San Antonio, TX, 78205, United States
Breathe life into your memoir

Tue, Feb 3, 10, 17 & 24
6:30-8:30pm CT, Hybrid (in-person at Gemini Ink or online via Zoom)
Nonmember: $200; Member: $170; Student/Educ/Mil: $140
*EARN CPEs
Class Full
Are you in the throes of writing your memoir but unsure how to make readers truly feel your story? Learn to transform your personal experiences into an immersive, resonant journey by tapping into your senses!
This four-week hybrid course will help you unlock the power of sight, sound, touch, taste, and smell to bring your memoir to life. Through engaging activities and guided exercises, you’ll explore the sensory details of key moments in your story and use them to develop your memoir more fully. We’ll build from these moments to create stronger characters, richer plotlines, and breakthroughs in your writing. Students are encouraged to bring a memoir-in-progress, if they have one. We will also generate work in class.
This workshop is open to writers of all skill levels 18+.
Workshop participants will leave with the following:

Strategies for using sensory elements to recall memories
Guidance on how to incorporate sensory elements into your work, including how to negotiate difficult moments in your memoir with confidence and control
A polished section of your memoir to build on

Denise Tolan‘s work has appeared in The Best Small Fictions, The Penn Review, Cherry Tree, and Lunch Ticket. Denise was a finalist for Best of the Net and the International Literary Awards: Penelope Niven Prize in Nonfiction. Her memoir, Italian Blood, was a finalist for the 2024 Eric Hoffer book award and the Reader’s Choice Awards. Denise has taught Creative Writing classes at the college level for over 20 years and given workshops at conferences in Texas, Arizona, Ohio, and Oklahoma.

In Conversation with Katie Gutierrez
2026-02-06 19:00 - 21:00 (America/Chicago) | Maverick Carter House, 119 Taylor St, San Antonio, 78205
Join us for In conversation with Katie Gutierrez at the Maverick Carter House on Friday, February 6 at 7pm presented by UT San Antonio Creative Writing Program in partnership with Gemini Ink.
Katie Gutierrez is the bestselling author of the mystery novel More Than You’ll Ever Know, a Good Morning America Book Club pick and Edgar Award finalist. Her essays and features have appeared in TIME, Texas Highways, Harper’s Bazaar, and more. She has an MFA from Texas State University and lives in San Antonio, Texas. Gutierrez will read from her work and share her approach to writing in conversation with Dr. Kimberly Garza. An audience Q&A and book signing will follow. This event is free and open to the public. Refreshments will be provided.
Location: The Maverick Carter House, 119 Taylor St., San Antonio 78205

Creating an Immersive Setting and Atmosphere with Andrew Porter
2026-02-16 18:30 - 20:00 (America/Chicago) | Online via Zoom
Literary Masters Lecture Series
Write a World for Readers to Explore

Monday(s), February 16 & 23, 2026, 6:30-8pm CT, online via Zoom.
Nonmember: $90; Member: $75; Student/Educ/Mil: $63
*EARN CPEs; TWO SCHOLARSHIPS AVAILABLE

Join us for the first Literary Masters Lecture of the year and learn to craft an immersive setting and atmosphere readers can truly sink into! Each session features an engaging craft talk, actionable writing strategies, and a live Q&A with the author.
In this two-part intensive lecture, award-winning fiction author Andrew Porter will share practical techniques for building immersive settings and atmospheres, explore their vital role in fiction and nonfiction, and offer craft tools participants can practice on their own after the lecture.
This lecture is open to writers of all genres and skill levels 18+.
Participants will leave this lecture series with:

An understanding of the important role setting and atmosphere play in a piece of writing
Techniques for creating an immersive setting and atmosphere in any genre
Additional activities to complete at home following the lecture

Andrew Porter is the author of four books, including the story collections The Disappeared (Knopf) and The Theory of Light and Matter (Vintage) and the novels In Between Days (Knopf) and The Imagined Life (Knopf, 2025). A graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, he has received a Pushcart Prize, a James Michener/Copernicus Fellowship, and the Flannery O’Connor Award for Short Fiction. His work has appeared in Best American Short Stories, One Story, Ploughshares, American Short Fiction, The Southern Review, and on Public Radio’s Selected Shorts. Currently, he teaches fiction writing and directs the creative writing program at Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas.

Poets & Coffee
2026-02-21 10:00 - 12:00 (America/Chicago) | Gemini Ink, 1111 Navarro St, San Antonio, TX, 78205, United States
A morning of poems and conversation
Saturday, February 21 · 10am–12pm · FREE * OPEN TO EVERYONE!
We’ll have the coffee ready—just bring a friend and settle in among fellow poetry lovers.
Explore what’s happening now in the world of contemporary verse. We’ll share a few favorite poems and spotlight contemporary poets who are making waves both on the page and on the stage. This is your chance to join the conversation! Share the poems that have moved you and tell us why poetry matters in your life.
What to Expect
• Fresh coffee and a relaxed, come-as-you-are atmosphere• A guided, informal conversation led by Gemini Ink Executive Director Alexandra van de Kamp• Readings of contemporary poems• Space to listen, reflect, and share (only if you want to)• New poems to take home and simple prompts to spark your own writing• A room full of people who love poetry—or are just getting curious
• No lectures. No pressure. Just good poems, good conversation, and good company.
You’ll leave with a sense of community. Whether you’re a seasoned poet or simply curious, everyone is welcome at our poetic gathering.
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
​​Alexandra van de Kamp is the Executive Director for Gemini Ink, San Antonio’s Writing Arts Center. Her third book of poems, Ricochet Script, was published by Next Page Press in 2022. Her previous full-length collections include: Kiss/Hierarchy (Rain Mountain Press 2016) and The Park of Upside-Down Chairs (CW Books 2010). She has also published several chapbooks, including A Liquid Bird Inside the Night (Red Glass Books 2015) and Dear Jean Seberg (2011), which won the 2010 Burnside Review Chapbook Contest. Her poems have been published in journals nationwide, such as The Cincinnati Review, Connecticut Review, The Texas Observer, and Denver Quarterly.

LitMinds Book Club
2026-03-11 18:30 - 20:00 (America/Chicago) | Gemini Ink, 1111 Navarro St, San Antonio, TX, 78205, United States
Join us for the LitMinds Book Club at Gemini Ink. We’re reading Their Eyes Were Watching God: A Novel by Zora Neale Hurston.
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“A deeply soulful novel that comprehends love and cruelty, and separates the big people from the small of heart, without ever losing sympathy for those unfortunates who don’t know how to live properly.”—Zadie Smith
One of the most important and enduring books of the twentieth century, Their Eyes Were Watching God brings to life a Southern love story with the wit and pathos found only in the writing of Zora Neale Hurston. Out of print for almost thirty years—due largely to initial audiences’ rejection of its strong black female protagonist—Hurston’s classic has, since its 1978 reissue, become perhaps the most widely read and highly acclaimed novel in the canon of African-American literature.

Fair and long-legged, independent and articulate, Janie Crawford sets out to be her own person—no mean feat for a black woman in the ’30s. Janie’s quest for identity takes her through three marriages and into a journey back to her roots.

About the Author

Zora Neale Hurston was a celebrated author, anthropologist, and central figure of the Harlem Renaissance, known for novels like Their Eyes Were Watching God that focused on Black American life and folklore. Educated at Howard University and Barnard College, she was a groundbreaking ethnographer who studied Black culture in the rural South and Caribbean, incorporating her research into her fiction. Despite achieving literary fame, she died in poverty, and her work was largely forgotten until its revival in the 1970s, led by authors like Alice Walker.

Visit our LitMinds page to see what we’re reading next!

Publishing Made Possible: How to Get Your Work into Literary Magazines & Presses with Diamond Braxton
2026-03-14 10:00 - 13:00 (America/Chicago)
Get your written work out there!

Saturday, March 14, 10am-1pm CT, Hybrid (in-person at Gemini Ink and online via Zoom)
Nonmember: $75; Member: $65; Student/Educ/Mil: $53

Are you a budding writer who’s ready to get your written work out into the real world? Abode Press founder Diamond Braxton will teach you how!
In this one-day workshop, we will guide writers of all levels through the ins and outs of getting published. We’ll cover how to identify the right journals and presses for your work. Then, we’ll walk you through essential submission materials such as artist statements, query letters, and writer bios. Whether you’re sending out a short story, poem, or full manuscript, you’ll learn strategies to help your application rise above the slush pile.
Perfect for anyone who feels daunted by the submission process, this workshop offers a clear roadmap and practical tools to navigate your publishing journey. Participants are encouraged to bring a piece of writing they’d like to publish, but it’s not required—everyone is welcome to join.
This workshop is open to writers of all skill levels 18+.
Workshop participants will leave with the following:

A writer bio
An artist statement and/or query letter
A list of potential publishers and agents that align with their work

Diamond Braxton is a writer, editor, publisher, and lecturer based in Texas. Their award-winning work has been published in Best of the Net, Best Microfiction, Foglifter, The Forge, and the forthcoming anthology I Love Us: Queer on the Borderlands (Flowersong Press, 2026). She has received fellowships for her work from Tin House, Lambda Literary, and Hedgebrook. She has held apprenticeships with Sourcebooks and Feminist Press. They are the Founder and Director of Abode Press, a 501(c)3 publishing press based in the American South dedicated to uplifting underrepresented voices.

The Big Texas Author Talk featuring Lauren D. Woods
2026-03-18 19:00 - 20:00 (America/Chicago) | Online via Zoom
Join us on Wednesday, March 18th, 2026, via Zoom for a conversation with Lauren D. Woods, to discuss her new book, The Great Grown-Up Game of Make-Believe (Autumn House Press).

(Virtual Readings Quarterly @ 7pm CST)

RSVP

Winner of the 2024 Autumn House Fiction Prize, these lyrical, haunting stories invite us to question the stories we tell ourselves and to imagine other paths—joyful, whimsical, even absurd—through the world.
A wife finds herself literally shrinking in her house, day by day; a mother recalls the surreal day when her infant daughter survives a close encounter with a bear; and, inside her lover’s heart, a woman discovers a secret nightclub populated by all the women he’s loved and left.
In the worlds Woods conjures, childhood memories ripple through adult lives, and characters test the limits of their self-created realities. The Great Grown-Up Game of Make-Believe urges us to contemplate how we can escape loneliness and heartbreak and live on our own terms.

About the Author

Lauren D. Woods, originally from the Dallas area, now lives and writes in Washington, DC, where she was a 2024-25 Washington, DC Arts and Humanities Fellow for Fiction. Her writing has appeared as a spotlighted story in The Best Small Fictions, as well as in The Antioch Review, The Normal School, Passages North, Hayden’s Ferry Review, Red Rock Review, Southern Humanities Review, and Lunch Ticket, among others. Lauren works in consulting and lives with her husband, four children, two cats, and a guinea pig. The Great Grown-Up Game of Make-Believe is her debut collection.

About the Moderator

Michael Don is the author of the story collection Partners and Strangers, a finalist for the 2019 Foreword Indies Book of the Year Award in short fiction. His stories and essays have appeared in journals such as The Southampton Review, World Literature Today, Puerto Del Sol, The Baltimore Review, Passages North, Southern Humanities Review, and Washington Square Review. He is a professor at George Mason University, co-editor of Kikwetu: A Journal of East African Literature, and co-organizer of the Fox City Lit reading series.
