L.A. Book Launch: Data Mind by Joanna Fuhrman

Wrestling with the experience of living online as a non-digital native Joanna Fuhrman didn’t grow up online. Her generation entered the digital age as adults, with optimism about the possibilities it would bring for community building. In the alien landscape of the internet, they indeed found moments of joy and connection, but they also watched in anguish as what had been sold as a utopian space instead magnified the anti-democratic demons of necrocapitalism. In this darkly comic and surreal collection, Fuhrman lets herself fall into the internet wormhole of these conflicting realities. With titles ranging from “You Won’t Believe How Your Favorite Childhood Star Looks Now” to “We’ll Burn That Algorithm When We Get to It,” the feminist prose poems in Data Mind remix the tropes of digital life with the puckishness and embodied urgency for which Fuhrman is celebrated. 

The author will be joined by poets Maya Salameh, author of How to Make An Algorithm in the Microwave, and Debrah Meadows, who is celebrating her own new book, Bumblebees, published by Roof Books. After the readings in the Wanda Coleman Theater, be sure to join us for a reception with light refreshments and book signings. 

Livestream: If you can’t join us in-person the event will be livestreamed on at the scheduled time of the event.

Doors Open: 7:30 PM I Readings: 8:00 PM

Joanna Fuhrman is the author of Data Mind and six previous poetry collections, most recently To a New Era. Her poems have been featured in the Academy of American Poets’ Poem-a-Day series, The Slowdown podcast, and the Pushcart Prize and Best American Poetry anthologies. She is an assistant teaching professor in creative writing at Rutgers University and a coeditor of Hanging Loose Press.

Deborah Meadows has published over a dozen books of poetry and her new book titled Bumblebees is from Roof Books (NYC). Other recent titles include Neo-bedrooms (Shearsman), and three from BlazeVOX [books]: Lecture Notes: A duration poem in twelve parts, The Demotion of Pluto: Poems and Plays, and Three Plays. She is an Emerita faculty member with California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, lives with her husband in Los Angeles’ Arts District/Little Tokyo. www.deborahmeadows.com

Maya Salameh is the author of HOW TO MAKE AN ALGORITHM IN THE MICROWAVE (University of Arkansas Press, 2022), winner of the Etel Adnan Poetry Prize, and the chapbook rooh (Paper Nautilus Press, 2020). She has served as a National Student Poet, America’s highest honor for youth poets, and received fellowships and support from the Breadloaf Environmental Writers' Conference, Sewanee Writers' Conference, Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing, and the President's Committee for the Arts and Humanities. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in POETRY, The Offing, Gulf Coast, The Rumpus, AGNI, and the LA Times, among others. She can be found @mayaslmh or mayasalameh.com.

Tickets will be available at Beyond Baroque's bookstore on the day of the event, but we recommend registering in advance through Eventbrite. Masks are encouraged while inside our center. No one turned away for lack of funds.

If you have any questions, please email us at [email protected]

Event attendees are expected to behave in a respectful and considerate manner while in our space. Beyond Baroque reserves the right to remove individuals from our events, virtual or otherwise, if they are not respecting the space, fellow attendees, or performers.

Host or Publisher Beyond Baroque Literary | Arts Center