The Loft Literary Center

10/09/2026

Please join us on Tuesday, December 1st, at 7:00pm, at Moon Palace Books, for our next 5×5 Reading, featuring five fantastic artists: Aurora Masum-Javed, Anaïs Deal-Márquez, Lucas Alan Dietsche, luna rey hall, and Zambi.

Each featured artist will take five minutes to share work. After the main reading, there will be a short break for refreshments, followed by an open mic period. All are welcome to show up and participate in the open mic! (List is first come, first serve.) This reading, and the open mic afterward, will be hosted by Davi Gray and Cecily McMillan; both reading and open mic will feature ASL interpretation.

Light refreshments will be served; masks are encouraged at Moon Palace Books and are available on-site. This is a free event.

Better Things is a series of events sponsored by the ReEntry Lab, in partnership with the Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop (MPWW) and Moon Palace Books. The ReEntry Lab is an organization working to connect writers and other artists leaving incarceration to a community that’s ready to receive them.

This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a grant from the Minnesota State Arts Board, thanks to legislative appropriations from the arts and cultural heritage fund.



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10/07/2026

Check out this awesome FREE event on Oct 21 at 6 p.m. “Nick of Time” editors Julie Landsman, Debra J Stone, and Morgan Grayce Willow join writers Georgia Greeley and Mary Moore Easter in conversation. The Asiginaak singers will open the event. Panel moderated by the Loft’s Arleta Little. Book sales courtesy of Comma. University of Minnesota Press!

📍 The Loft at Open Book in Minneapolis

🔗 RSVP: https://www.upress.umn.edu/9781517920456/nick-of-time/

10/07/2026

The Loft gathered three Poet Laureates for a wide-ranging conversat...

10/06/2026

📣 DEADLINE EXTENDED! There’s still time to apply to be the next Minneapolis Poet Laureate. Apply by October 14 at 11:59 p.m.

🔗 https://loftlit.co/mplspoetlaureate

10/06/2026

✏️ Ready to transform a first draft into a submission-ready manuscript? Give your writing a full year of focused attention with the Loft’s Year-Long Writing Projects!

📝 Spend 12 months focused on your manuscript in a fully online program featuring workshops, one-on-one mentorship, and ongoing support from a dedicated cohort. Choose from Memoir with Kelly Sundberg or Creative Nonfiction with Sun Yung Shin.

ℹ️ Join us Oct. 13 at 6 p.m. CT for a free online info session to learn more!
🔗 https://loftlit.co/yearlonginfo

🗓️ Registration opens Nov 10 for Friends of the Loft / Nov 11 for the public
❄️ Cohorts begin January 2027
💵 Access Fund applications due Nov 5
🔗 https://loft.org/ylwp

10/06/2026

🎤📘 Join us this Thursday, October 8, for a morning craft seminar and an evening reading with award-winning author and former McKnight Award judge Valeria Luiselli! We’ll be celebrating her new novel, Beginning Middle End (Knopf / Penguin Random House).

🌬️🌋 Beginning Middle End follows a mother and daughter starting over in Sicily during a summer of wild winds, volcanic rumbles, and unexpected tempests. The novel was named to this year’s National Book Award longlist for fiction and hailed as “beautiful, maybe perfect” by Tommy Orange.

🗓️ Thursday, October 8
✏️ Craft seminar: 10 a.m.–12 p.m.
📖 Reading + conversation: 6–8 p.m.
🛒 Books for sale from SubText Books
📍 The Loft at Open Book in Minneapolis

🔗 READING: https://loftlit.co/vluiselli
🔗 SEMINAR: https://loftlit.co/valeriacraft

09/26/2026

One for the books! 😍

09/22/2026

🎤📕 We are so excited to welcome George Saunders to Minneapolis TONIGHT, Sep 22! Saunders, a MacArthur Fellow and Booker Prize winner, will read from his #1 NYT bestselling new novel, Vigil (Random House, 2026).

📖 Set at the bedside of an oil company CEO in the twilight hours of his life, Vigil follows him as he is ferried from this world into the next. After the reading, University of Minnesota Regents Professor and novelist Julie Schumacher will join Saunders for a conversation.

ℹ️ This event celebrates the 25th anniversary of UMN’s Esther Freier Series, and the Loft is proud to co-sponsor this sure-to-be-magnificent evening. See you there!

🗓️ Tuesday, September 22
⏰ 7:30 p.m. CT
📌 Northrop, Carlson Family Stage (84 Church St SE, Minneapolis, MN 55455)
🎟️ FREE with registration!

🔗 RSVP: https://loftlit.co/vigil
🛒 Buy the book: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/564991/vigil-by-george-saunders/

09/22/2026

This week on The Loft Lit Pod, Chris Jones sits down with writer, educator, and former Loft fellow Hilal Isler to discuss her striking new short story collection, Har Mar. Hilal shares insights into her craft, her publishing journey from Loft fellow to the release of Har Mar, and these stories (and the women in them) that stick with you long after you turn the final page.

🎧 LISTEN: https://loftlitpod.buzzsprout.com/2639994/episodes/19805270-under-the-skin-unpacking-har-mar-with-hilal-isler

09/19/2026

TOMORROW!

Hope tomorrow.