Readings Reading #166

Tuesday Funk #166: January 6, 2026

Who cares if it's cold out, it's warm in the upstairs lounge at Hopleaf! Shake off the chill and join us on Tuesday, Jan. 6 for Chicago's favorite eclectic reading series, featuring readings by Matt Carmichael, Peter Coviello, Kelsey McGrath, Sara Paretsky, and Dmitry

Participants Reading #166

Meet the Readers: Kelsey McGrath

Kelsey McGrath (she/they) is a multi-hyphenate creative and has been in the Chicago theater scene since 2015, most recently dipping her toes in live lit and storytelling. As a performer, she's acted with Northwestern University, Northlight Theatre, Steep Theatre, Red Theater, and Lifeline Theater. As a writer,

Participants Reading #166

Meet the Readers: Dmitry Samarov

Dmitry Samarov was born in Moscow, USSR in 1970. He immigrated to the US with his family in 1978. He got in trouble in 1st grade for doodling on his Lenin Red Star pin and hasn't stopped doodling since. He graduated with a BFA in painting and printmaking

Participants Reading #166

Meet the Readers: Sara Paretsky

Sara Paretsky revolutionized the mystery world in 1982 when she introduced her Chicago detective, V.I. Warshawski, in Indemnity Only. By creating a woman PI with the grit to take on the mean streets, Paretsky challenged a genre in which women historically were vamps or victims. While Paretsky’s fiction

Participants Coviello Peter

Meet the Readers: Peter Coviello

Peter Coviello is the author of six books, including Long Players, a memoir selected as one of ARTFORUM’s Best Books of 2018; Make Yourselves Gods, about the Mormon nineteenth century; and most recently Is There God After Prince?: Dispatches from an Age of Last Things. His writing appears regularly

Carmichael Matt Reading #166

Meet the Readers: Matt Carmichael

Matt Carmichael is a futurist, author, photographer, speaker, dad and softball coach? Matt has been called "an actual photographer" by Dave Barry and an "internet guru" in Rolling Stone. A former Census Bureau director said Matt's work was important for the nation. An Emmy-winning

Debriefings Reading #165

December 2025 Debrief

The upstairs lounge at Hopleaf was filled with good cheer on Tuesday, Dec. 2, as Chicago's favorite eclectic reading series they soon would hear. A full house turned out for the 165th edition of Tuesday Funk, and though we were short a reader — Edward Moses fell ill and

Participants Reading #165

Meet the Readers: Daniel Kraus

Daniel Kraus is a New York Times bestselling writer of novels, TV, and film. His latest novel, Angel Down, was a USA Today bestseller and New York Times Notable Book of 2025. His novel Whalefall received a front-cover rave review in the New York Times Book Review, won the Alex

Gucciardi Ben Participants

Meet the Readers: Ben Gucciardi

Ben Gucciardi teaches writing, print and video journalism at Whitney Young where he also coached the school’s state champion Academic Decathlon team from 2019 to 2025. Before teaching, he was a member of the Wisconsin-based indie rock band Sat. Nite Duets, whose work has been featured in GQ, Stereogum,

Participants Reading #165

Meet the Readers: Michal Eskayo

Michal Eskayo, or Mick, is on faculty in the World Languages and ELL Department at Harold Washington College. She has been teaching writing, speech and news literacy to English Language Learners and some native speakers of English for a freaking long time. Getting this job was like winning the lottery,

Sophie Lucido Johnson Participants

Meet the Readers: Sophie Lucido Johnson

Sophie Lucido Johnson is an award-winning cartoonist and writer in Chicago. She is the author of, most recently, KIN: The Future of Family, and three other books. She is a cartoonist for The New Yorker, and has been published in The New York Times, The Guardian, and elsewhere. She has

Readings Reading #165

Tuesday Funk #165: December 2, 2025

The holidays are here again, but Chicago's favorite eclectic reading series takes no winter breaks! Join us in the upstairs lounge at Hopleaf on Tuesday, Dec. 2 for readings by Michal Eskayo, Sophie Lucido Johnson, Ben Gucciardi, Daniel Kraus, and Edward Moses! Admission to Tuesday Funk is always

Debriefings Reading #164

November 2025 Debrief

November's Tuesday Funk happened on one of the first truly autumnal days of the year, with drizzle and blustery winds whipping the leaves around. But that didn't stop people from packing the upstairs lounge at Hopleaf! Bridget Gordon got things started with some of faer poetry.

Aiken Carmen Reading #164

Meet the Readers: Carmen Aiken

Carmen Aiken is a writer living and working in Chicago, IL, who volunteers in local economy and food ecosystems and enjoys riding her bike. Carmen's novel in verse, hotspur, was published this summer by Spuyten Duvil Press, and they've recently had pieces published in Milwaukee Avenger

Participants Reading #164

Meet the Readers: Dan Sinker

Dan Sinker is a writer, maker, podcaster, and professional troublemaker who does work that attempts to make sense of a world that rarely does. At 19 years old he founded the influential underground magazine Punk Planet, which he ran for 13 years. In 2011, he gained notoriety as the creator

Participants Reading #164

Meet the Readers: Bridget Gordon

Bridget Gordon (she/her, fae/faer) is a queer trans woman and emerging poet based in Chicago. A former MFA candidate at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, she tried faer hand at sports journalism before settling into short-form writing about queer longing, identity, and liminality. Fae has

Participants Reading #164

Meet the Readers: Nicole Adabunu

Nicole Adabunu is an MFA Poetry graduate from The Iowa Writers’ Workshop. She is a 2024 Cave Canem Fellow, and her work has been published or is forthcoming in Poetry Magazine, The Academy of American Poets, The Drift, and elsewhere. She'll be reading from her hopefully soon to

Participants Reading #164

Meet the Readers: Tanya Kornilovich

Tanya Kornilovich grew up in Oregon and has been living in Chicago for the past eight years. She used to dabble in stand-up comedy, but now focuses on her true love, writing. She’s written theatre reviews for Scapi Magazine and satirical articles for Chicago Machine. Her essay, “Corona in

Readings Reading #164

Tuesday Funk #164: Nov. 4, 2025

Chicago's favorite eclectic reading series is here to help warm your heart for fall! Join us in the upstairs bar at Hopleaf on Tuesday, Nov. 4 for readings by Nicole Adabunu, Carmen Aiken, Tanya Kornilovich, Sara Paretsky and Dan Sinker! UPDATE: Unfortunately Sara Paretsky isn't able

Debriefings Reading #163

October 2025 Debrief

The 163rd edition of Tuesday Funk was on one the first cool nights we've had this fall, but the live lit kept us warm inside.

Participants Jaggi Jitesh

Meet the Readers: Jitesh Jaggi

Jitesh Jaggi is a dancer and poet from India. He ended his career in Finance one day when he lost all his data that he forgot to save on an Excel sheet and realized that he just didn't care. That tipping point led him to becoming a storyteller

Participants Lake Alan

Meet the Readers: Alan Lake

Chef/percussionist/writer/reprobate and lover of all things beautiful & delicious, Chef Alan Lake's culinary career includes East Bank Club in Chicago; Sunset Marquis in W. Hollywood; Izakaya Hiwatta in Ichinomia Japan and legendary nightclub Purpur in Zurich, Switzerland. Working around the world for over four decades,

Participants Palmer J.H.

Meet the Readers: JH Palmer

J.H. Palmer is a Gapers Block alumna. She has performed at numerous storytelling venues in Chicago, Boston, Minneapolis, and New York City, and she produced a nonfiction literary series called That’s All She Wrote from 2012 to 2017. Her work has appeared in Hypertext Review, Chicago Story Press,

Participants Harvey Miles

Meet the Readers: Miles Harvey

Miles Harvey’s collection of short stories, The Registry of Forgotten Objects (Mad Creek Books, 2024) won the Journal Non/Fiction Prize and the Society of Midland Authors award for best work of adult fiction. His nonfiction includes The King of Confidence (Little, Brown & Co., 2020) and The Island

Participants Cowie Esther

Meet the Readers: Esther Cowie

Catherine-Esther Cowie was born in St Lucia to a Tobagonian father and a St Lucian mother. She migrated with her family to Canada and then to the USA. Her poems have been published in PN Review, Prairie Schooner, West Branch Journal, The Common, SWWIM, Rhino Poetry and others. Her debut