From Michelle Zauner, the indie rock sensation known as Japanese Breakfast, Crying in H Mart is an unforgettable memoir about family, food, grief, love, and growing up Korean American. Join us for a special SAL Presents conversation with Michelle Zauner, celebrating the memoir’s paperback publication. Q&A with Jane Park. Create Your Own Series subscriptions, as well as Patron and Grand Patron single tickets, come with a copy of Crying in H Mart, shipped to the ticket holder’s door.

The Balanced Ecosystem: Creating and Sustaining a Classroom Community that Celebrates Literacy and Offers Relational and Affirming Feedback Strategies Laura Da’ is a poet and teacher. A lifetime resident of the Pacific Northwest, Da’ studied creative writing at the University of Washington and the Institute of American Indian Arts. She is Eastern Shawnee. Her first book, Tributaries, was published by the University of Arizona Press and won a 2016 American Book Award. Da’ has held residencies at the Richard  Hugo House, Tin House,  and Jack Straw. Her newest book, Instruments of the True Measure, is the winner of the Washington State Book Award. Da’ lives near Seattle with her husband and son.

Chris Abani is an acclaimed novelist, poet, essayist, screenwriter, and playwright. Born to an Igbo father and English mother, Abani grew up in Afikpo, Nigeria. His experiences in his home country inspire much of Abani’s work, equally informed by his research into African poetics, twentieth century Anglophone literature, Yoruba and Igbo philosophy and religion, and many other areas of study. Abani’s latest work is a book of poetry entitled Smoking the Bible, in which he illustrates the connective geography between harm, regret, and release, as his poems move through landscapes of Nigeria, the Midwestern United States, adulthood, and childhood. Q&A with Pádraig Ó Tuama.

A trenchant observer of democracy, Masha Gessen is the author of twelve books, including the National Book Award-winning The Future Is History: How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia and Surviving Autocracy. Their coverage of current political unfoldings in Russia, LGBTQ+ rights, and the rise of autocratic leaders appears regularly in the pages of The New Yorker and the New York Times. Q&A with Margaret O’Mara, Professor of History at the University of Washington.

A graphic novelist, tattoo artist, illustrator, and filmmaker, James Spooner directed the seminal documentary AFRO-PUNK. His graphic novel, The High Desert, weaves in the Black roots of punk rock and a vivid interlude in the thriving eighties DIY and punk scene in NYC’s East Village. He co-founded the Afropunk Festival, which currently boasts audiences in the hundreds of thousands globally.

“One of the most soulful and perceptive writers of our time,” Pico Iyer is a renowned travel writer beloved for his gift of perspective. In a new culminating work, The Half Known Life: In Search of Paradise, Iyer brings together the outer world and the inner to offer us a surprising, original, often beautiful exploration of how we might come upon paradise in the midst of our very real lives. Q&A with Ruchika Tulshyan.