May 20, 2023, Room 31 NYC, 7:00 PM

Digging Press presents The Lit Revue at Room 31: a literary series for cultural omnivores showcasing words and music.

7:00 PM – Doors open

7:30 PM – Show

Host: Gessy Alvarez

Readings by: Gerard Cabrera, Ysabel Y. Gonzalez, and Rachel Horowitz

Music by: Lost Amsterdam

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Gerard Cabrera is a Massarican from Springfield, Massachusetts, the birthplace of the first American dictionary, Dr. Seuss, and basketball. His debut novel, Homo Novus, was published in October 2022, by Rattling Good Yarns Press, and was supported by the Bread Loaf Writers Conference and a Bread Loaf Bakeless Foundation fellowship at The Camargo Foundation in Cassis, France. Other writing has appeared in Gay Community News, Acentos Review, Angel Rust, Apricity, JONATHAN, Kweli, and Digging Press. He lives and works as an attorney in New York City. Visit him at www.gerardcabrera.com.

Newark, NJ native Ysabel Y. Gonzalez received her BA from Rutgers University and an MFA in Poetry from Drew University and works as the Assistant Director for the Poetry Program at the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation. Ysabel has received invitations to attend VONA, Tin House, Ashbery Home School, and BOAAT Press workshops. She’s a CantoMundo Fellow and has been published in Tinderbox Journal; Anomaly; Vinyl; Waxwing Literary Journal, and others. She is a Pushcart Prize nominee and the author of Wild Invocations (Get Fresh Books, 2019). You can read more at www.ysabelgonzalez.com. 

Rachel Horowitz spent her early years in Washington, DC, Bogota, Boston, San Francisco, and LA before moving to Vail, Colorado, when she was 13. Rachel graduated from the University of Colorado at Boulder with a degree in English Literature and has attended the Breadloaf Writing Workshop. Rachel has lived in New York City for over 20 years, where she has a career in publishing, currently at HarperCollins Children’s Books. Rachel started her publishing career at Scholastic, where she worked for fifteen years; at Doubleday, a division of Penguin Random House; at Maria B. Campbell Associates, where she ran the Children’s scouting office; and as a literary agent at The Bent Agency. Rachel’s writing is nourished through her many hours of reading, but most of all through her supportive writing group with whom she meets monthly. Rachel lives on the Upper East Side of Manhattan with her husband, their two teenagers, two cats, Alex, the mini sheepadoodle, and a turtle named Tuck. 

Lost Amsterdam is the musical Venn diagram of a plaintive sigh and a political rant. The product of songwriter Adaam James Levin-Areddy‘s tactless brooding, it’s a celebration of melancholy and a rejection of people who say “at the end of the day.” Making order out of the chaos are Ken Goshen, Vanessa Quirk, and Zev Goldstein.

Gessy Alvarez (Host) is a writer, editor, and publisher. She is the publisher of Digging Press, series editor of the Digging Press Chapbook Series, and editor-in-chief of Digging Through The Fat: a journal for cultural omnivores. Her writing projects include the novel Last Kingdom in Astoria and the short story collection Love the Abyss, a finalist for the 2022 Black Lawrence Press St. Lawrence Book Award. Her fiction, poetry, and essays have appeared in The Acentos Review, Asteri(x), Volume One Brooklyn, Feminine Collective, and other publications. Her literary work explores characters living between languages, traditions, cultures, side-stepping around the meanings of home, origin, and fate. She also hosts the literary podcast Digging Through, where she interviews artists and shares her offbeat observations about art and culture. You can read some of Gessy’s work at: gessyalvarez.com.

The audience is invited to mingle and meet with the artists after the performance.

You can view our past events here: diggingpress.com/the-lit-revue/. 

Room 31 is a new, beautiful, intimate listening room at Arlo NoMad Hotel, hosting live events, Jazz, Blues, Roots, Americana, Poetry, and more.

All shows are 21+ unless otherwise specified.

Only 30 seats; order your tickets now!

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