Molia Dumbleton's fiction and poetry have been featured in The Kenyon Review Online, New England Review, Great Jones Street, Witness, Hobart, and others. She has been awarded the Seán Ó Faoláin Story Prize and the Dromineer Literary Festival Flash Fiction Award (both in Ireland), and has been named a Peter Taylor Fellow at The Kenyon Review and a Finalist for the Glimmer Train Very Short Fiction Award. A full list of publications and links to her work can be found at www.moliadumbleton.com.

Please join Molia and our other amazing readers on Tuesday, February 7, 2017 in the upstairs bar at Hopleaf. Doors open at 7pm, and the show starts at 7:30. It's free, and 21-and-over. RSVP on Facebook.

Leonard Zawadski is a poet, and he lives in Rogers Park, IL. He works as a receiving clerk for an independent bookstore in the North Shore of Chicago. Poetry of his appears or is forth-coming in The Literary Nest, Into the Void Magazine, Quail Bell Magazine, The Trumpeter: Journal of Ecosophy, Burningword Literary Journal, Five:2:One Magazine, and several other publications. When he isn't writing or reading, Leonard uses his free time to practice Zen meditation, to contemplate which tea to choose from the cupboard, or to improve his general fitness. His recently completed chapbook, Lately Fallen, is in search of publication.

Please join Leonard and our other amazing readers on Tuesday, February 7, 2017 in the upstairs bar at Hopleaf. Doors open at 7pm, and the show starts at 7:30. It's free, and 21-and-over. RSVP on Facebook.

Rising from the depths of winter, an eclectic live lit series emerges to warm your spirits: It's Tuesday Funk! We'll be back in the upstairs bar at Hopleaf on Tuesday, Feb. 7 with readings by Deborah Siegel, Leonard Zawadski, Jenn Sodini, Molia Dumbleton, and Keidra Chaney.

Doors open at 7pm -- no earlier, please -- and the show starts at 7:30 sharp. So get there early to grab a seat, but not too early. As always, admission is free, but you must be 21 or older. And come early or stay late after for dinner or more drinks downstairs.

Please RSVP on Facebook, and bring a friend. And don't forget to become a fan so you never miss an invitation to one of our readings. Sponsored by the Chicago Review of Books.

It was cold outside for the January 3, 2017 edition of Tuesday Funk, so we cuddled Andrew Huff's topical haiku close for warmth.

2017
is five syllables better
than 2016.

I vow that this year
fewer haiku will include
T. R. U. M. P.

Cold makes it winter
but it never feels right with
no snow on the ground.

Who is the dentist
who sold America on
teeth whiter than bone?

The stars dim slightly.
Millions of voices cried out,
"I love you." She knew.

2017 is a mystery, but at least 2016 is history, amirite? Tuesday Funk #101 ushered in the new year with style, PER USUAL. Kelly Swails started us off with the first chapter of her YA novel, This May Go on Your Permanent Record, about a school for world domination, followed by a series of lyrical and moving poems by another Tuesday Funk veteran, Cameron McGill. Co-host Andrew Huff promised, in haiku form, to avoid 2017 haikus about T-R-U-M-P, and then Amy Sumpter had us roaring with her story about a rogue opossum and other brushes with the strangeness of adulthood.

Sal expertly refilled our boozes, and then we sat back down.

Co-host Eden Robins read a microessay about losing and then finding her voice, and then Dmitry Samarov shared an excerpt from his memoir about art-making and influential teachers. Finally, James Gordon finished off the night with a story about a Labor Day party gone horribly, horribly wrong.

And we'll be right back here next month for Episode #102 of Tuesday Funk on Tuesday, February 7th, featuring Deborah Siegel, Leonard Zawadski, Jenn Sodini, Molly Dumbleton, and Keidra Chaney!

You know one of your New Year's Resolutions is to be more cultured, so get that one out of the way by coming to Episode #101 of Tuesday Funk! We've got James Gordon, Kelly Swails, Dmitry Samarov, Amy Sumpter, and Cameron McGill to motivate you to greatness in 2017. And of course, your faithful co-hosts remain Andrew Huff and Eden Robins.

Our readings take place at Hopleaf Bar, 5148 N. Clark St. in Chicago. We get started promptly at 7:30 pm in the upstairs lounge. Arrive early if you want a seat -- but no earlier than 7:00 pm. Our readings are free, but only those 21 and over will be admitted. No food can be brought in from the restaurant. See you there!

James Gordon is an international award winning author and poet from the South Side of Chicago. He is the Reigning Moth Grand Slam Champion and Snubfest Storytelling Champion. James can be found at www.iblowyourmind.net and on Twitter at gr8estpoetalive.

Please join James and our other amazing readers on Tuesday, January 3, 2017 in the upstairs bar at Hopleaf. Doors open at 7pm, and the show starts at 7:30. It's free, and 21-and-over. RSVP on Facebook.

Kelly Swails is an author, editor, and all around fun gal. When she isn't wrangling words, she hangs out with her husband and friends, watches geeky TV shows, plays board games, and knits a blanket that she swears will be done someday. Some know her as a crazy cat lady, but since the ratio of humans to cats in her household is well below the requirement, she doesn't qualify. You can learn more about her work at kellyswails.com.

Please join Kelly and our other amazing readers on Tuesday, January 3, 2017 in the upstairs bar at Hopleaf. Doors open at 7pm, and the show starts at 7:30. It's free, and 21-and-over. RSVP on Facebook.

Amy Sumpter has been doing comedy in Chicago for 15 years. When she isn't high kicking while doing Stand Up, she is high kicking as MCAmy, in the all female Beastie Boys Tribute band, She's Crafty.

Please join Amy and our other amazing readers on Tuesday, January 3, 2017 in the upstairs bar at Hopleaf. Doors open at 7pm, and the show starts at 7:30. It's free, and 21-and-over. RSVP on Facebook.

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. After a false start at Parsons School of Design in New York, he graduated with a BFA in painting and printmaking from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 1993. Upon graduation he promptly began driving a cab--first in Boston, then after a time, in Chicago--which eventually led to the publication of his illustrated work memoir Hack: Stories from a Chicago Cab (University of Chicago Press, 2011) and Where To? A Hack Memoir (Curbside Splendor, 2014). He has exhibited his work in all manner of bars, coffeeshops, libraries, and even the odd gallery (when he's really hard up ). He paints and writes in Chicago, Illinois. He no longer drives a cab.

Please join Dmitry and our other amazing readers on Tuesday, January 3, 2017 in the upstairs bar at Hopleaf. Doors open at 7pm, and the show starts at 7:30. It's free, and 21-and-over. RSVP on Facebook.