Novels in Progress - November 2024

This fall, join us for one, two, or all three events of the series, a salon-style reading and conversation featuring the work of two writers deep in the process of a long project. This event is free and open to the public. Light refreshments will be provided. Masks are strongly encouraged!

This event is presented by:

Blue Stoop, a nonprofit "Home for Philly Writers"

Molly's Books and Records

The Literature Department at The Free Library of Philadelphia

November 2 | 2PM | Parkway Central Library - Room 108 (1901 Vine Street)

Featuring:

Thorns & Roses: A Stem by Lauren Holguin and STOPPING by Nikki Volpicelli

Thorns & Roses: A Stem by Lauren Holguin

Lola is a twenty-seven-year-old burnt out poet squeaking by as an elementary school SPED teacher who takes time off to fly from Philly to the Los Angeles she tried so hard to get away from at the passing of her Abuela, Maria De La Luz, who suffered from environmentally caused cancer induced by Borax mining in the Mojave desert. Post funeral, Lola realizes Maria de La Luz’ bossy and controlling matriarchal spirit that pleaded Lola to someday write children’s stories, is not fully gone from Earth, and instead, has transformed into the form of the families beloved sacred rose plant, invasively growing inside of Lola’s body. Lola tries to alleviate her condition by any conceivable means— burning Abuela’s favorite fish, plucking and shaving off thorns, and getting an over-the-phone exorcism from her gay ex-priest uncle, and when it all fails, Lola sets off on a roadtrip with her resentful basketball-coach older sister Dora (who has a mouth sharper than the pains in her rheumatoid arthritic limbs) and her cousins— Benny (an amateur drag queen and karaoke-loving failed actor) and Genie (a forty-year-old with Down Syndrome looking for purpose and independence secretly in FBI chat rooms) to symbolically scatter the ashes of Abuelas favorite fish in cities of significance: Trona, CA;Tucson, AZ; Yuma, AZ; and Sonora, MX, kicking up desert-dust, family secrets, and drama along the way, reaching a breaking point where all that’s left to do is demand the stubborn ghost of Abuela to reveal her intentions and rest in peace for once and all.

Lauren Holguin is a Chicanx writer, educator, and dancer from Los Angeles who calls Philly home. She is a recent grad of Rutgers Camden's MFA program, a poetry and fiction editor at Barrelhouse Mag, and co-host of the Philly reading series Spit Poetry. She currently works as a high school special education teacher in Camden, NJ. Her words have been featured in No Tokens Journal, The Fourth River, Subnivean, and Barrelhouse Magazine

STOPPING by Nikki Volpicelli

Stopping is a novel-in-stories about coming of age in and around Philadelphia during the opioid crisis that follows Danni, a teenager searching for—and refusing to accept—love, obliteration, and rescue. Years later, her life consists of staying sober, separating from her husband, and avoiding her mother’s phone calls about her little sister, Alyssa, who lives in a tent in Kensington. To reconnect with Alyssa, test her sobriety, or both, Danni returns to the neighborhood where her addiction began to volunteer at a syringe exchange, finding that her past is still very much alive, and more dangerous than ever.

Nikki Volpicelli is a graduate of the Bennington Writing Seminars. Her work has been shortlisted for The Masters Review Short Story Award for New Writers and the Craft Literature Short Story Award. Her writing has been featured in Neutral Spaces, XRAY, Entropy, Expat, and more. She lives in Philadelphia with her two chihuahuas, Gene and Bones, and her human, Eric.

Host or Publisher Blue Stoop