CategoryReading Events

Gallery of Readers presents Anna Pertzoff and Susan Cocalis reading from their work.
Sunday, June 2, 2024, at 4 PM

Eli’s Room at Northampton Center for the Arts
33 Hawley Street
Northampton, Massachusetts 

Free and open to the public. Please come join us, all are welcome!

For those who can’t or prefer not to attend in person, a Zoom session will be available from 3.45 p.m. EDT on the day of the reading. (Be aware no admittance to the Zoom session after 4:05 p.m. for security purposes). Contact Robin or Carol — or one of the readers — for secure access to the zoom link.

Susan Cocalis

Susan Cocalis, storyteller, comic, certified champion cruciverbalist, and a gratefully recovering academic, lives in Northampton, Massachusetts with her boxer. Susan’s hobbies may appear puzzling to some, but not if you know her well. She was born to be retired.

Anna Pertzoff

Anna Pertzoff holds an undergraduate degree in metalsmithing from The School of The Art Institute of Chicago and a Master’s of Education from Smith College. She is a fan of jigsaw puzzles, relishes exploring new cities and countries but hates the travel to get to them, loves to read Southern Gothic writers, non-fiction and poetry.  She is perpetually at least 6 months behind on The New Yorker and fears she’ll never catch up. She lives in Florence, Massachusetts with her amazing husband, Jeremy, and their All Things Small Sisters from Different Litters mutt pups, Penny and Peanut.

Gallery of Readers presents Elaine Buckley & Christine Lehner reading from their work.
Sunday, May 5, 2024, at 4 PM
Florence Civic Center
90 Park Street, Florence, MA
(next door to Lilly Library)

Free and open to the public. Please come join us, all are welcome!

For those who can’t or prefer not to attend in person, a Zoom session will be available from 3.45 p.m. EDT on the day of the reading. (Be aware no admittance to the Zoom session after 4:05 p.m. for security purposes). Contact Robin or Carol — or one of the readers — for secure access to the zoom link.

Elaine Buckley

In Elaine’s last position before retiring, she was an advocate for people with disabilities. Her job was assisting people in long-term facilities to return to the community. Elaine is a life-long fiction writer. Her work has appeared in Peregrine, Bull Magazine and Allium. She is working on her memoir. 

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Christine Lehner

Christine Lehner was educated in Egypt, Massachusetts, California, Rhode Island, and Mexico. She has published three books, Expecting, What to Wear to See the Pope (short stories) and Absent a Miracle, and numerous short stories in assorted literary magazines. In the past, and maybe the future, she writes the blog, Sort Quench, and Dump: https://sortquenchdump.blogspot.com/ She is only truly fluent in one language, but still tries to gain fluency in others. She lives near the Hudson River with her husband, her dog and a few thousand bees.

Gallery of Readers presents Larkin Pazanova and Celia Jeffries reading from their work.
Sunday, April 7, 2024, at 4 PM
Florence Civic Center
90 Park Street, Florence, MA
(next door to Lilly Library)

Free and open to the public. Please come join us, all are welcome!

For those who can’t or prefer not to attend in person, a Zoom session will be available from 3.45 p.m. EDT on the day of the reading. (Be aware no admittance to the Zoom session after 4:05 p.m. for security purposes). Contact Robin or Carol — or one of the readers — for secure access to the zoom link.

Celia Jeffries

Celia Jeffries is the author of the award-winning novel Blue Desert. Her work has appeared in numerous newspapers and literary magazines including Westview, Writer’s Chronicle, Solstice Literary Magazine, and Puerto del Sol, as well as the anthology Beyond the Yellow Wallpaper. Jeffries holds an MA from Brandeis and worked in news and educational publishing before earning an MFA from Lesley University. 

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Larkin Pazanova

Larkin Pazanova is a writer, visual artist and audio producer. She/they have narrated, recorded and produced two titles for Audible and recently began an adventure called Podcast for Spirit – a limited series podcast chronicling their journey with a friend to visit sacred sites connected to the divine feminine in Southwestern Europe. In between tinkering with sound files and researching healing practices in storytelling, Larkin loves crafts like quilting and paper cutting, gets her terrier puppy living his best life, and studies wisdom traditions such as Buddhism and Taiji, as well as Scandinavian and Slavic Folk medicine. They’re also thrilled to be the new host of a Gallery of Readers podcast currently in the works.

Gallery of Readers presents Norma Sims Roche and Rich McKeown reading from their work.
Sunday, February 11, 2024, at 4 PM
Florence Civic Center
90 Park Street, Florence, MA
(next door to Lilly Library)

Free and open to the public. Please come join us, all are welcome!

For those who can’t or prefer not to attend in person, a Zoom session will be available from 3.45 p.m. EDT on the day of the reading. (Be aware no admittance to the Zoom session after 4:05 p.m. for security purposes). Contact Robin or Carol — or one of the readers — for secure access to the zoom link.

Norma Sims Roche

Norma Sims Roche grew up on Cape Cod, but has lived in Northampton since graduating from UMass in 1977. She recently retired from her work as an editor of college textbooks on biology and geology, through which she learned many amazing things about our planet, and even remembers a few of them. She is grateful to all the attendees at Robin Barber’s Wednesday workshop, who have told her wonderful stories and kept her writing over the last 15 years. She writes mainly memoir, personal essays, poems, and fiction based on true events. She will paddle into her retirement years keeping the advice of her whitewater kayaking instructors in mind: “Keep your hips relaxed, lean downstream, and look where you want to go.”

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Richard McKeown

Richard McKeown is a visual artist and musician as well as a writer. He has recently retired from a long career working with people with substance use disorders. As he began to explore in writing his mixed feelings about retirement, the narrative quickly changed course when he received a diagnosis of Parkinson’s Disease. He plans to read from his memoir of Parkinson’s, tentatively called “Shoulder Season.” He lives in Southampton with his wife Carolyn, dog Jonas, and cat Max. Rich’s words to live by are, “You can never have too many guitars.” He has eleven.

Gallery of Readers presents Carolyn McKeown and Pril Cobb reading from their work.
Sunday, January14 at 4 PM
Florence Civic Center
90 Park Street, Florence, MA
(next door to Lilly Library)

Free and open to the public. Please come join us, all are welcome!

For those who can’t or prefer not to attend in person, a Zoom session will be available from 3.45 p.m. EDT on the day of the reading. (Be aware no admittance to the Zoom session after 4:05 p.m. for security purposes). Contact Robin or Carol — or one of the readers — for secure access to the zoom link.

cAROLYN mCkEOWN

Despite being a flute major in a previous life and having a degree in Environmental Journalism, Carolyn McKeown spent 40 years as a billing manager for hospitals and large group medical practices. After retiring two and a half years ago, she was shocked to find her fantasies of a spotlessly clean house, an immaculate garden and hours of free time to read the classics she never got to, would never be fulfilled. The house is in a perpetual state of dust and disarray, the garden is full of weeds and although she expects to surpass last year’s record of 116 books read, most of them have been from the 21^st century. Carolyn writes, reads, knits and procrastinates in Southampton with her husband, Rich, their redbone coonhound, Jonas, and Max, the world’s most expensive cat who has used up three of his nine lives.  

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Pril Cobb

Pril Cobb has been writing first drafts of stories, poems and non-fiction off and on for the last fifty years or so.  Since retiring from the practice of law in 2019, she has devoted more time to writing and aspires to complete second, third and fourth drafts.  Pril has participated in Robin Barber’s weekly workshop for the past three years and has taken classes at Grub Street in Boston, her local writing center.