Please join us for an exceptionally scary event, a joint production between The Barbershop and Litquake, San Francisco’s annual literary festival, now celebrating its Tenth Year.

BE AFRAID!

Evil Queens, Menacing Dykes, and Secret Gay Agendas

From lurid pulp novels to YouTube sermons, America’s fear of the gay menace still runs strong. They could be your neighbors or your children’s teachers. They could be lurking in your locker rooms and your foxholes, moving, one step at a time, closer to world domination. Are these just crazy conspiracies, or is there something real to fear about the shadowy queens and dykes forced to skulk at the edges of society?

Our full lineup:

Meliza Bañales

is the author of SAY IT WITH YOUR WHOLE MOUTH. The first West Coast Latina to win a poetry slam championship in 2002, she has toured with Sister Spit and Body Heat. She won an AIRspace residency for her one-woman-show, ONE BAD YEAR, which ended its run at the 2009 SF Fringe Festival. She was awarded a 2008 Creating Queer Community Grant, and a 2006 Frameline Completion Grant for the film DO THE MATH, with Mary Guzman. She is currently working on her second collection, 51 POEMS ABOUT NOTHING AT ALL.

Justin Chin

is an award-winning spoken word/performance artist and the author of three poetry collections, all published by Manic D Press: GUTTED – which received the 2007 Thom Gunn Award for Poetry by the Publishing Triangle – HARMLESS MEDICINE, and BITE HARD, as well as the essay collections BURDEN OF ASHES and MONGREL: ESSAYS, DIATRIBES, and PRANKS.

Marcus Ewert

wrote the groundbreaking children’s book 10,000 DRESSES, gorgeously illustrated by Rex Ray. He is currently working on still more kids’ books, plus a memoir about his real-life affair with William Burroughs. He is also an actor and director, and cocreated the hit animated series, Piki & Poko, Adventures in StarLand, currently being shown on MTV’s LOGO channel. He has appeared in the Gus Van Sant short film Four Naked Boys and a Gun, in Sadie Benning’s Flat Is Beautiful, and the movie Frisk by Todd Verow. In 2008, he starred in the feature film The Lollipop Generation by G.B. Jones.

Justin Hall

is an award-winning comic book creator and world traveler best known for his series TRUE TRAVEL TALES, HARD TO SWALLOW, and GLAMAZONIA THE UNCANNY SUPERTRANNY. His work has appeared in the Best American Comics and the S.F. Guardian, among others, and he has appeared at the San Diego Comic Con, the Toronto Comic Arts Festival, and the Tom of Finland Erotic Arts Fair. He recently read at the local Smack Dab Reading Series. You can find him online at All Thumbs Press.

Monica Nolan

is the author of THE BIG BOOK OF LESBIAN HORSE STORIES (co-written with Alisa Surkis) and LOIS LENZ, LESBIAN SECRETARY. Her next book, BOBBY BLANCHARD, LESBIAN GYM TEACHERS, will be out in 2010. Her films include Ashley, 22, Chuckie or Ben-Hur in Five Minutes, World of Women, and Lesbians Who Date Men. She has taught film at San Francisco State University, and the Film Arts Forum.

Aaron Shurin

is the author of KING OF SHADOWS, a collection of personal essays published by City Lights Books in 2008. He began publishing in the gay press in 1971, and is currently a professor in the MFA in Writing Program at USF. He has received California Arts Council Literary Fellowships in Poetry and an NEA fellowship in creative nonfiction. His book PARADISE OF FORMS: SELECTED POEMS was chosen as one of Publisher Weekly’s Best Books of 1999.

Details:

Joe’s Barbershop
2150 Market St (between Church and Sanchez)
Saturday, October 10th, at 8 pm.

We suggest arriving early, especially for this event, and especially if you want to kick back in one of the barber chairs.

Our awesome bookselling parter in crime, BOOKS, INC will be on hand with copies of our featured author’s books. Buy one or three and get them autographed.

SUGGESTED donation: $5 (everyone welcome)

That donation helps to cover our expenses and buys you highly addictive Kettle Salt and Pepper potato chips, baked goods, cold beer, and a Diet Coke or two.

We can always use volunteers to help set up and clean up afterward. Volunteers pay no cover and earn good karma. If interested, email Michael McAllister.