Almost all of the 120 undersized seats in room 217 of the Museum of Art were occupied as the second annual In Print Festival got underway.
Joy Castro, Victoria Chang and Ander Monson captivated the audience as each read from their newly published books. The stage at the front spanned the room's length, but the authors read behind a singular podium positioned clear to the left.
The event's coordinator, Jill Christman, welcomed guests to the event, but let the graduate students introduce each author.
Joy Castro read first from her memoir, "The Truth Book: Escaping a Childhood of Abuse Among Jehovah's Witnesses."
The book's prologue was written from Castro's biological mother's point of view. Castro's mother paid to have an abortion, but the man who performed it was not a doctor, and the attempt failed.
Castro then read a section of her book that detailed the delicate hierarchy of Jehovah's Witnesses and the first time she questioned her faith.
Poet Victoria Chang read next from her book "Circle." Each of the poems Chang read dealt with aspects of Asian life, past and present.
One poem, "Seven Reasons for Divorce," listed the reasons a man could divorce his wife during the Shang Dynasty (1765-1123 B.C.).
Another poem, "Seven Changs," revealed her struggle to find her identity with a common name. Chang joked to the crowd that she "Googled" herself and found there was a Hawaiian runner and a violist with the same name.
The last author who presented of the evening was Ander Monson.
His first two books were printed last May: "Other Electricities," a disjointed novel, and "Vacationland," a book of poetry. A book of essays has been accepted for publication.
This is the first time an author has published three books in three genres in two years.
The poems Monson read, like every poem in "Vacationland," were elegies. Despite being elegies, the poems Monson read were offbeat and dealt little with mourning.
The idea for the In Print Festival was hatched by Jill Christman when she was the coordinator of creative writing at the University of Minnesota.
The first In Print Festival was in February 2005 in the same room as this year's.
The event was funded by a Lilly II grant, which allowed the authors to be paid more and to visit students during class time before the festival. The second In Print had a reduced budget and authors could not visit students beforehand, but the event was still a success.
The Festival continues today at 7 p.m. today in the Teachers College Room 101.
Castro, Chang and Monson will be part of a panel discussion, along with Nickole Brown, marketing director at Sarabande Books, on how they got their first books published.
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