Brookside is thrilled to announce an evening with Lynette Reini-Grandell celebrating the release of her memoir Wild Things: A Trans-Glam-Punk-Rock Love Story (Minnesota Historical Society Press, March 2023) – a deeply personal story of love, community, and resilience.

The St. Paul Pioneer Press calls her new book “one of LambdaLiterary’s most anticipated books of the season.” She has also published two books of poems: Wild Verge (Holy Cow! Press, 2018) and Approaching the Gate (Holy Cow! Press, 2014, winner of the 2015 Northeastern Minnesota Book Award for Poetry) and performs poetry with the Bosso Poetry Company and the jazz/poetry collective, Sonoglyph.

In addition to Lynette sharing excerpts from her memoir, Venus DeMars of ‘All the Pretty Horses’ will be performing along with special guest readings from poets Brian Baumgart and Steve Vetsch. How exciting is this!
You can also check out Lynette and Venus’s interview with The Current here:
https://www.thecurrent.org/…/lynette-reini-grandell…
Specials Guest Poets:

Brian Baumgart (he/him) is the author of the poetry collection Rules for Loving Right (Sweet, 2017), and his poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction have appeared in a number of journals, including South Dakota Review, Big Muddy, Spillway, Whale Road Review, and Signal Mountain Review, among others, as well as in the anthologies Rewilding: Poems for the Environment and Working Stiff. His poetry has been nominated for both the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net awards. Brian is an English professor and previously served as the Director of Creative Writing at North Hennepin Community College. He was 2018 Artist-in-Residence at University of Minnesota’s Cedar Creek Ecological Science Reserve and currently is a coordinator for the Minnesota State Write Like Us Program. He is the father of two teenagers, both of whom are absolutely ridiculous and terrifying. For more: https://briandbaumgart.wixsite.com/website.

Scott Vetsch has bees in his bonnet; hears things wrong, which makes them right. He’s a carpenter who works on old houses, a child in a man’s body, a soul in exile. He likes a good story, whichever way it comes, loves cats and crows, inhabits worlds of his own making. He’s afraid things aren’t getting better, but hopes he’s mistaken. He burns wood, craves hamburgers and eats tofu, scoffs at money, envies the contented, and drives a truck. When he’s happy he wants beer. When he’s sad he wonders why. He knows one thing for sure, he’s a writer in a post-literate world.

Matt Mauch is the author of five books of lyrical prose and poetry, including A Northern Spring. Mauch’s work has appeared in numerous journals and has been recognized by the Minnesota State Arts Board and as a finalist for National Poetry Series and other national and international contests. Mauch lives in Minneapolis and teaches in the AFA in Creative Writing program at Normandale Community College. He and his books can be found online at mauchmauch.com.