February’s Final Lap (& a Recap) for Singing from the Deep End!

It’s been a real honor to share my new book Singing from the Deep End with readers and audiences so far this year. I have three more events coming up this month, the first being my local book launch at the Boutelle-Day Poetry Center at Smith College on Thursday, February 19 at 7:00pm. Many thanks to Matt Donovan and Jen Jabaily-Blackburn for hosting this celebration, and if you’re in the area, you’re invited!

Next week, I head east for two readings in my old stomping grounds. Thanks to Kevin Carey for hosting Salem Poet Laureate J. D. Scrimgeour and me at Salem State University on Tuesday, February 24 at 7:30pm. I’m excited to share my work inspired by growing up on the North Shore with my mom, who went back to school when I was a girl, first to North Shore Community College, and then graduating from Salem State with her BSN. Then I’ll be going back to my motherland to sing from the deep end! I’m so looking forward to reading in my hometown at the Gloucester Writers Center on Thursday, February 26 at 7:00pm with Heather Nelson. Hope you can join us in this special place. Thanks to Eric Parkison for organizing and GWC for hosting us.

I’ve recently read in a couple of virtual or hybrid events, and you can catch those via recordings if you missed them live. On my official launch day of February 3 was an event hosted by CavanKerry Press in which I read with Kwoya Fagin Maples, whose incredible Long Eye is out next month with Hub City. Thanks to Kwoya and the CKP team!

Reading at the Grolier Poetry Book Shop is always a dream, and I got to do so for the second time on February 4, this time with Perugia poet Holli Carrell (Apostasies), and my stepmother, Christopher Jane Corkery (Love Took the Words, Slant Books). Thank you to Carla Panciera for giving a beautifully woven and generous introduction, and to James Fraser for hosting us. A recording of this event will be added to the Grolier YouTube page.

And on February 6, I read in the Couplet series hosted by Leah Umansky at Books are Magic in Brooklyn, with Nicole Cooley, Major Jackson, Keetje Kuipers, and Wayne Miller. It was magic! Thanks to the Books are Magic crew and to Leah for curating!

Singing from the Deep End was reviewed by Nina MacLaughlin in her “New England Poetry News” Substack. Thank you, Nina, for your care in reading this book and for all you do to uplift poetry and community in our region! I highly recommend following Nina on Substack to get her beautiful, thoughtful takes on area literary events, publications, and more.

Another cool thing I got to be involved in was a podcast with Christine Gelineau in honor of her memoir Almanac: A Murmuration (SUNY Press, 2025), an elegy for self and planet that walks the reader through the seasons and is shaped with vignettes that are personal, political & poetic. Christine hosted a podcast episode for each season to celebrate her book, featuring guests who conversed with her about themes found in Almanac. Thank you, Christine, for inviting me to talk with you about literary citizenship, writing community, and small press publishing for the winter solstice edition, along with our books. You can watch and listen to our conversation on the SUNY Press YouTube channel.

And to close, I was thrilled that two creative poets and Instagram mavens chose my book as a match for their projects. Amy Lorraine Long has built the supportive community “Taylor Swift as Books” around celebrating books, especially by small presses and their authors. She did an incredible job matching the dreamy cover by Mike Corrao with watery vibe stills from the Taylor Swift video for “The Fate of Ophelia” – four of them! And Dayna Patterson treated my book to a pairing for “Poetry + Fungus” with the crested coral fungus. Swoon! Check out these posts and give them some love over on the projects’ profiles at Instagram if you can: @taylorswift_as_books and @poetry_plus_fungus. Thank you, Amy & Dayna!