Writers and readers tend to spend a lot of time alone. Free time is precious. The day job sucks up enough time and then there are pets to be walked, kids to be fed, spouses who need attention. We can really only spare so much time for others when the manuscript needs revising and the stack of unread books threatens to crush our bedside tables.
Sometimes, though, there comes along an event too good to miss, a reason to run a brush through the hair and don something a little fancier than chocolate-stained flannel pajamas. What would such an event look like? If it's going to keep me up past dark then it needs to contain at least a few of the following: food, wine, good company, a nice setting, entertainment of some sort, and it's an added bonus if I can somehow manage to feel virtuous about the whole thing.
I'm in luck (and so are you) because there is just such an event on the horizon. The first ever Lighthouse Fly-By Writers Event featuring the remarkable short story author Robin Black is fast approaching. Space is limited, but upon this posting there are still a few tickets available for the party on Friday, May 13. There will be food and wine, of course. The event will take place at a spectacular historic private home near the Denver Botanic Gardens. The always-entertaining folks at Stories on Stage will perform a reading of one of Black's short stories. All Lighthouse events are filled with the kind of folks who easily engage in intelligent conversation, are quick with the witty observation, are certain to have heard of the book you are really excited about or, if not, are quick to whip out a pen and jot your recommendation onto the nearest cocktail napkin.
If you're keeping track, you'll note that this event already meets all of my criteria for leaving the house. And to top it all off, proceeds from the evening will go toward establishing the Lighthouse Writership Tuition Assistance Fund. There's that virtuous feeling I'm seeking.
If you've already got your tickets, great. If not, time is running out and there really is a limited amount of space -- another bonus if you ask me. I'll take intimate venue over large crowd any day of the week.
And, if all of this isn't enough to entice you to put on leather-soled shoes and a shirt with a collar and actual buttons, then maybe you should take a gander at what the critics are saying about Black's debut collection.
"Should Alice Munro ever fulfill her threat of retirement, readers can turn to Black for solace." -- Cleveland Plain Dealer
"Pitch perfect." -- O: The Oprah Magazine
"Powerful and touching...Stories sparkling with poetic vision." -- The Philadelphia Inquirer
"Exquisitely distilled tales of loss and reckoning." -- Vogue
So, shed the fuzzy slippers and break out the cosmetics and heat-fueled styling irons.*
Join Lighthouse for a delightful evening. Bring a friend.
*Leather-soled shoes and shirts with buttons and/or collars not required for admission. Heat-styled hair and cosmetics are purely optional. Fuzzy slippers and unwashed pajamas will be frowned upon.
