On the first Friday of each month, a puzzling group of people gathers to do a jigsaw puzzle or two. Over the highs, lows, and drama of completing a puzzle, friendships and interesting conversation emerge from the woodwork. Puzzlers of all ages and skill levels are welcome.

Please visit Eat My Words during the month of September to see the photography of Meggie Royer. All pieces are mixed-media self-portrait photographs.

Meggie is a Midwestern poet and mixed-media artist who recently found her way into writing fiction. She has won numerous awards and has been nominated several times for the Pushcart Prize.

Her work can be found at https://meggieroyer.com.

Olivia Jakobitz will be signing books and reading an excerpt from her collection, Testimony of a Heretic.

Testimony of a Heretic is equal parts early memoir, religious criticism, and exploration of growth and freedom. If you have left the Evangelical church, or have questions about the mass exodus from those spaces, this book is for you.

Olivia is a reader, baker, yogi, and poet. She loves Minneapolis, long walks, dancing, and her community.

Ana M. Fores Tamayo will be reading from her most recent book of poetry, the bilingual Peregrina / Pilgrim.

Ana Fores-Tamayo advocates for marginalized refugee families. Working with asylum seekers is heart-wrenching, so poetry and photography are her escape. She has published in Shenandoah and Main Street Rag, among others, online & in-print, in the US & internationally. Ediciones Valparaiso in Spain published PEREGRINA, a book of poems, in June 2022. Its bilingual edition, PILGRIM / PEREGRINA,was just released by Conocimientos Press, Texas, this spring 2026. A third book of poems, PAINT THE WORLD..., was also published at Moonstone Press in Philadelphia, in December 2025. Through poetry, she keeps tilting at windmills.

Peregrina /Pilgrim is pulsing with the ache of borders, motherhood, and faith fractured by violence. This book of poetry stands as both prayer and protest — a bilingual cartography of endurance, reminding readers that to cross a border is to carry an entire world within one's voice (Ricardo Nazarío y Colón) 

Mary Moore Easter introduces this new collection, her fifth, with a vivid rendering of her open-heart surgery and the removal of a life-threatening aneurism. She recounts the vicissitudes of more than a year of healing and gradual recovery, during which time she was motivated and inspired by many sources inside and outside her culture, including her connection to ancestral West Africa.

As an added bonus, several poems are accompanied by QR codes through which readers can listen to Easter sing her songs, reveling in the link between her spoken ancestry and the legacy alive in her children and grandchildren. In the midst of widespread political turmoil, Easter’s new collection celebrates the renewal of life that surgery has made possible and the ardor that accompanies it. These poems sing, dance, and love, on the edge of the mysterious precipice that shapes our lifespan.

Mary Moore Easter is the author of four books of poetry: From the Flutes of Our Bones, The Body of the World (Minnesota Book Award Finalist, 2019), Walking from Origins, and Free Papers. Her poems have appeared in Poetry, Prairie Schooner, The Christian Century, Water~Stone, SoFloPoJo, and other publications, as well as several anthologies. Her work has been used as texts for art songs; she was Poet-in-Residence for the 2022 Source Song Festival. Born during segregation in Petersburg, Virginia, to parents on the faculty of Virginia State College (now University), she pursued a career in music and dance, eventually becoming director of Carleton College’s dance program. Awards include several Pushcart Prize-nominations, a Bush Artist Fellowship in Choreography, multiple McKnight Awards in Interdisciplinary Arts, and The Loft Literary Center’s Creative Non-Fiction Award. In 2022, Carleton College named the new studios in the Weitz Center for Creativity to honor her legacy: the Mary Easter Dance Studios.

For the month of August, Eat My Words will be displaying the artwork of Paula Cisewski. Don’t miss your opportunity to meet the artist as Paula graces us with her presence for a reception on Thursday, August 13th.

From the artist:

I work in collage, altered gel print, screenprint, linocut, quick and dirty letterpress on my sweet little Vandercook proof press, and often in a mix of these media. 

It’s easy to overlook what’s right in front of me when looking beyond myself (into a screen, for example). I work intuitively and analog with what’s on hand, partly as a practice in noticing (whether that means noticing a small detail of the natural world, a surreal juxtaposition, an emotional state, or most often a confluence of all three) and partly as a practice of avoiding overconsumption. The constraint often leads to discovery. The hyperlocal re-surprises and reconnects me to the world, to community, and to language.

50% of any sales will be split between supporting publication of beautiful books of poetry through my small press, Beauty School Editions and The Immigrant Law Center.

Paula Cisewski (Shih-Zev-ski) is the author of six full-length collections of poetry, an educator, one half of Beauty School Editions (a small experimental poetry press), and an artist. Her collaged and printed works have appeared in galleries, shops, and literary sites including FOLDER Magazine, the cover of Rain Taxi Review of Books, and the landing page of Concision Poetry Journal. 

Meggie Royer will be reading from her latest book of poetry, A Violet Stretch of Sky, published by Akinoga Press.

A Violet Stretch of Sky is inspired by Meggie’s fascination with folklore, mythology, and the experience of processing traumatic memories. In this collection, Meggie imagines beloved artistic and literary figures such as Virginia Woolf and van Gogh in conversation with women of myth, examines the complex nature of relationships marred by love and violence, and attempts to reconcile her teenage self with her adult self.

Meggie Royer is a Midwestern poet, short story writer, and mixed-media artist who has been nominated several times for the Pushcart Prize. Her work has been published in The San Antonio Review, The Rumpus, The Minnesota Review, and other publications. 

On the first Friday of each month, a puzzling group of people gathers to do a jigsaw puzzle or two. Over the highs, lows, and drama of completing a puzzle, friendships and interesting conversation emerge from the woodwork. Puzzlers of all ages and skill levels are welcome.

Local animator duo WOLLYMIGHT invites weirdos, artists, and wizards to get schooled on how to animate and be an animator. Bring a sketchbook or notepad, because there’s about to be some serious cartoon wisdom at this event.

Join Tom Driscoll and guests for a conversation and reading from his latest book Dying Man Suite: Saint Marys Hospital Notebooks 2016-2025. Local author Lee Henschel Jr and Ted King will join Tom for a panel-driven Q&A.

Ezra D. Dracula returns to Eat My Words Bookstore to host a FREE-OF-CHARGE COMICS JAM WORKSHOP!

Students will be guided through warm-up exercises, invited to discover reference material in Eat My Words’s amazing collection of books, and given tools to let go of perfectionism and improvise one-of-a-kind comics with the help of their classmates. No drawing experience necessary; materials provided or bring your own.

Olivia Jakobitz will be signing books and reading an excerpt from her collection, Testimony of a Heretic.

Testimony of a Heretic is equal parts early memoir, religious criticism, and exploration of growth and freedom. If you have left the Evangelical church, or have questions about the mass exodus from those spaces, this book is for you.

Olivia is a reader, baker, yogi, and poet. She loves Minneapolis, long walks, dancing, and her community.

Lauren Jacobson is a Minneapolis-based photographer focused on long-exposure photography and transformative self-portraiture.

From the artist:

I photograph within a framework of fixed variables: elongated shutter speeds (15–60 seconds), a single primary light source (my dad’s retro tactical flashlight), my own body as a multiplying and morphing subject, and no digital alterations to the images.

My work is informed by themes of transformation, transcendence, and body–home relationships. I am drawn to mysticism, surrealism, and magical realism, and I weave these influences into my imagery. I look to artists and visionaries such as David Lynch, Francesca Woodman, Thich Nhat Hanh, Sally Mann, and Ana Mendieta to inform my work and creative process.

I exhibit my work across the Midwest in galleries, museums, universities, and alternative spaces with the intention of reaching new audiences and welcoming personal responses and interpretations of my imagery.

You can find more of my work and announcements on my website, lauren-jacobson.com, and Instagram, @lauren.jacobson.art

Greg Watson will read from his latest collection of poetry, The Shape of Your Absence, a meditation on sudden loss, memory, grief, and gratitude. Renowned local poet and artist Julia Klatt Singer will be reading from her collections. Books will be available for purchase.

Now at our new home at 201 6th Street SE, Suite 220, Minneapolis, MN 55414.

On the first Friday of each month, a puzzling group of people gathers to do a jigsaw puzzle or two. Over the highs, lows, and drama of completing a puzzle, friendships and interesting conversation emerge from the woodwork. Puzzlers of all ages and skill levels are welcome.

Steve Fox will read from “Yard Mary,” which is included in the Wisconsin Harvest of Horror anthology and his first story collection Sometimes Creek. Hear him talk about the anthology and how it came into existence, his role in editing the work, and the importance of the creative community in our society.

Steve Fox is the winner of the Rick Bass Montana Prize for Fiction, the Zona Gale Award for Short Fiction, The Great Midwest Writing Contest, the Jade Ring Award, the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts & Letters Fiction Contest, and the Midwestern Gothic Summer Flash Contest. His fiction has appeared in New Ohio Review, MQR, Whitefish Review, and others. His short-story collection, Sometimes Creek, was published by Cornerstone Press in January 2023 and received the 2023 American Book Fest Best Book Award, was a finalist for the Chicago Writers Association 2023 Book of the Year Award. His newest story collection, These Are My People (Cornerstone Press), published December 2025, was named Finalist for the Edna Ferber Fiction Book Award. Steve lives in Wisconsin with his wife, three boys, and one dog.

Find him at stevefoxwrites.com.

Local author Don Smithmier will be reading from his debut novel, The Narrows.  

Set in the cabin country of northwestern Wisconsin, The Narrows is a story about the unexpected ways people find their way back to one another, and how redemption often begins with the decision to hold on for another season. 

Don Smithmier is a long-time Twin Cities entrepreneur and songwriter/musician with the band Rocket Club. He's also an American History nerd and baseball fanatic. He lives in Minneapolis with his wife, Annie, and spends as much time as possible at their cabin in northwestern Wisconsin, listening for the call of the loon.

Second Star Events is organizing a Book Crawl through St.Paul/Minneapolis on June 12th, offering attendees the chance to explore the city's vibrant literary scene at their own pace through a list of curated bookstores, shops, restaurants/bars, and museums.

This book crawl is an activity for “Day One” of the Gilded Hearts Ball.

Buy tickets here.

Janet Preus will be reading from her recent release, "The Thirteenth Crime: The Ghosts of Injustice in Frontier Otter Tail County."

Grounded in true stories about a string of unpunished murders and Otter Tail County’s first hanging, The Thirteenth Crime gives voice to ordinary folks caught in extraordinary circumstances and examines the skewed perception of justice on Minnesota’s frontier.

Janet Preus is a journalist, playwright, songwriter and director who lives at her cabin in the north woods. The people of rural Minnesota are her inspiration, including those who lived in the 19th century and gave her “The Thirteenth Crime,” her first book.

Now at our new home at 201 6th Street SE, Suite 220, Minneapolis, MN 55414.

On the first Friday of each month, a puzzling group of people gathers to do a jigsaw puzzle or two. Over the highs, lows, and drama of completing a puzzle, friendships and interesting conversation emerge from the woodwork. Puzzlers of all ages and skill levels are welcome.

Minnesota author Steven Lang will read from his debut novel The Art of Falling Apart, a darkly funny and surreal story about art, obsession, and the uneasy boundary between grief and imagination.

Steven Lang is an artist and writer from Minnesota whose fiction blends humor with the uncanny and emotionally off-kilter. The Art of Falling Apart is his debut novel.

The Art of Falling Apart follows an artist preparing for his first major exhibition as his life begins to unravel—his relationship falters, his neighbor’s chaos seeps through the walls, and visions of his deceased mother begin to intrude on his work. By turns unsettling and darkly funny, the novel examines the costs of artistic obsession and the strange ways grief reshapes reality.

Fresh off the book’s May 9th release, Tiffany Payne will be sharing selected passages from Piecing Me Together. This event is a perfect opportunity to meet the author, ask questions, and get your copy personalized.

Piecing Me Together bravely explores the hidden threads between toxic patriarchal religion and toxic dating patterns. Personal and therapeutic insights guide Tiffany's powerful reclamation of her narrative as she rebuilds piece by piece.

Follow Tiffany here:

• Instagram

• Website

Please join us for a poetry reading by local favorites George J. Farrah, Paula Cisewski, and Elisabeth Workman.

Please join us as S.M. Garbers reads from their latest novel: Reaper of Resistance.

Reaper of Resistance is a dark sapphic fantasy with political intrigue and morally gray characters, perfect for readers of The Poppy War and the character dynamics of Six of Crows.

As loyalty fractures, devotion turns volatile, and betrayal leaves nothing unscathed.

On the first Friday of each month, a puzzling group of people gathers to do a jigsaw puzzle or two. Over the highs, lows, and drama of completing a puzzle, friendships and interesting conversation emerge from the woodwork. Puzzlers of all ages and skill levels are welcome.

Join us as Nick Narigon reads from his debut novel, Montuga: The Spheres of Trivandré.

In Montuga: The Spheres of Trivandré, follow Faud Medina, a centuries-old Aztec shaman and shapeshifter, who grows a magical strain of marijuana inside a burial crypt in the American Southwest. To save a remote orphanage, as well as the future of humanity, Faud joins a ragtag team of shapeshifters assembled by the mysterious thunderbird Po’Pay to battle the nefarious goat man Humberto—and Faud’s own demons.

Website: https://hayseedpress.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61572907958134

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hayseedpress/?hl=en

Please join us for a reading by local poet Annette Gagliardi of her latest book, Benevolence .

Benevolence has recieved the John C. Rezmerski award.