Tongue & Groove in Hollywood June 24

“Tongue & Groove”
A monthly offering of short fiction, personal essays, poetry, spoken word + music
Produced by Conrad Romo and this month featuring : Amelia Gray Threats ,Taffy Brodesser-Akner, Joe Hernandez-Kolski, Leslie Berliant, Will Wright and musical guest Bret Jensen

SUNDAY, JUNE 24, 2012

6-7:30 pm
The Hotel Cafe
1623 1/2 N. Cahuenga Blvd.
Hollywood, Ca 90028
$6.00

Amelia Gray is a writer living in Los Angeles, CA. She is the author of AM/PM (Featherproof Books), Museum of the Weird, (Fiction Collective 2) and THREATS (Farrar, Straus and Giroux). Her writing has appeared in American Short Fiction, McSweeney's, DIAGRAM, and Caketrain, among others.

Joe Hernandez-Kolski is a writer/performer from the city of Chicago. He has appeared twice on HBO's Russell Simmons present Def Poetry. His first solo show, "You Wanna Piece of Me?", was recently published by the University of Michigan Press in an anthology entitled, "Say Word: Voices of Hip Hop Theater." For over ten years, Joe has run Downbeat 720, LA's premier open-mic for high school performers. They will have their tenth anniversary show on Sunday, July 1st. Joe is a graduate of Princeton University.

Taffy Brodesser-Akner has written for the New York Times Magazine, the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Wall Street Journal, Playboy, Self, Redbook, and Salon. She is at work on a novel.

Leslie Berliant is a mom, poet, journalist, cause-marketing expert, co-founder of BLU MOON Foundation's Haiti Orphanage Adoption Program, and self-taught chocolatier and French pastry-maker who works to support her non-profit habit. After 13 years of living in Los Angles, she is off to a new adventure in New York where she will be expanding on her latest venture, Le Marais Chocolat organic, Fair Trade chocolate truffles and French Macarons. Her poems are published in Big City Mantra, Deliver Us, Moth Magazine and she has been a contributing writer to the Jewish Journal, Tribe Magazine, LOHAS Journal, Climate Chronicles, Celsias, Handpicked Nation, PNN and many others.

Will Wright on occasion organizes WILL WRIGHT READS, an event featuring local writers reading their latest works. He received an MFA from the Art Center College of Design in 2005. He won a AIGA 365 award for Editorial Design for FishWrap Vol. 5 and is presently celebrating the disparity of his passions for print, digital video and oil painting by "dreaming about" gardening as often as possible ever since moving to Downtown LA two years ago. And for a paycheck he is theDirector of Government & Public Affairs at AIA Los Angeles



Bret Jensen is a singer songwriter that fronts his own Los Angeles based rock band, "Bret Jensen's Death Valley Jubilee," He also plays sideman to other local LA artists in the roots / Americana genre. He was a member of Epic recording artist Sun 60 and toured extensively with that band in support of Paul Weller, Cracker, Counting Crows, Big Head Todd and The Monsters as well as co-writing and recording Sun 60's final album "Headjoy" at Daniel Lanois' Kingsway Studios in New Orleans. He has contributed music to television, commercials and feature films including MiVida Loca, The Cowboy Way, Singles and P.S. I Love You and is currently finishing his 2nd solo album with influences ranging from Townes Van Zandt to Roxy Music, Nick Cave, Johnny Cash and Leonard Cohen. He enjoys writing music and singing songs with and to his friends and fans whenever and wherever he might find them.


Come one, come all and come early! Seating is limited and we start on time! www.tongueandgroovela.com