Annie Marhefka with Ashley Elizabeth: Strangers We Know By Heart

Bird in Hand is celebrating the release of Annie Marhefka's chapbook, Strangers We Know By Heart, published by Garden Party Collective in September! Annie is an incredible engine of community around writing in Baltimore via her work as the Executive Director of Yellow Arrow Publishing, and many other initiatives, so it is especially fitting that this collection is a series of love letters to strangers.

She'll be joined by Ashley Elizabeth, winner of the 2024 Garden Party Collective Chapbook Contest, and the author who selected Annie Marhefka's chapbook as the winner of the same contest in 2025. Please join us to celebrate this exciting lineage!

Books wil be available for purchase at the event.

Annie Marhefka is a writer in Baltimore, Maryland; she is the recipient of the 2024 Eunice Williams Nonfiction Prize, has been featured on The Slowdown Show, and nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. Annie is the Executive Director at Yellow Arrow Publishing, a Baltimore-based nonprofit empowering women-identifying writers. Annie has received support from the Maryland State Arts Council, Gullkistan Center for the Arts, Martha’s Vineyard Institute for Creative Writing, and Tin House. She has a BA in creative writing from Washington College and an MBA, and is an MFA candidate at the University of Baltimore where she was Co-Managing Editor of Welter. Her collection, Strangers We Know By Heart, is available from Garden Party Collective. When Annie is not writing, she is usually trying to find her way back to the water. Follow Annie on Instagram @anniemarhefka and at anniemarhefka.com.

Ashley Elizabeth (she/her) is a Pushcart-nominated writer and winner of the 2024 Garden Party Collective Chapbook Contest. Individual poems and essays have appeared in SWWIM, The Hellebore, Rigorous, and Sage Cigarettes, among others. Ashley is the author of A Family Thing (Redacted Books/ELJ Editions, 2024) and chapbooks red line, CHARM(ed), black has every right to be angry, and you were supposed to be a friend. When she isn't teaching, reading, or working on her next poetry or essay collections, Ashley works as Chapbook Editor at Sundress Publications and Workshop Coordinator for fifth wheel press. She lives on the original land of the Piscataway (Baltimore, MD) with her partner and their cats.

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