Reading

Yiyun Li is the author of ten books, including Where Reasons End (Winner, PEN/Jean Stein Book Award) and A Thousand Years of Good Prayers (Winner, Guardian First Book Award). Her work has been translated into more than twenty languages, and her honors and awards include a MacArthur Foundation Fellowship, a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship, a Windham Campbell Prize, and more. In 2022, Yiyun was named as the director of Princeton University’s Program in Creative Writing and was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

In-person tickets for this program are SOLD OUT. You can still join us online. Having delighted the City of Asylum community with readings in 2019 and 2020, prize-winning poet and essayist Ross Gay returns to our stage to share his newly released collection of essays, Inciting Joy. In conversation with Damon Young.

Join City of Asylum and Story Club Pittsburgh for a new monthly nonfiction storytelling series, mixing the spontaneity of an open mic with the experience of live theater. Organized and hosted by the former producers of The Moth Pittsburgh. 
Every show has both spontaneous tellers and featured performers, all taking the stage to share stories based on a theme.
November's theme is : TBD

Writer, theatre professor, and Northsider Kathleen George makes her City of Asylum debut to celebrate the launch of her new novel, Mirth.
Kathleen George is the author of ten novels: a series of thrillers set in Pittsburgh; a novel about the Johnstown Flood, The Johnstown Girls; a novel about Lena Horne and jazz, The Blues Walked In; and most recently, Mirth. Kathy has also written a collection of short stories (The Man in the Buick), edited a collection of short fiction (Pittsburgh Noir), and contributed to many scholarly theatrical books and articles. She is a professor of theatre and writing at the University of Pittsburgh.

Co-Presented by the University of Pittsburgh Department of East Asian Languages & Literatures and MONKEY x Stone Bridge Press, award-winning author Hiromi Itō and esteemed translator Jeffrey Angles present a reading of "The Thorn Puller," Hiromi’s first novel to appear in English.

For the second installment of this year’s International Reading Series, City of Asylum welcomes Emmanuel Iduma for a reading of his memoir, "I Am Still With You: A Reckoning with Silence, Inheritance, and History." It is a story of grief and loss, of political reckoning, and of navigating life when so much of what has shaped it has become intangible. 

Story Club Pittsburgh (created by the former producers of The Moth Pittsburgh), organizes and hosts a monthly nonfiction storytelling series at City of Asylum. The theme for February 2023 is "Breaking Up is Hard To Do." 

We are overjoyed to host this reading for Rania Mamoun—Sudanese journalist, activist, and City of Asylum writer-in-residence—and announce the launch of her new book, "Something Evergreen Called Life." 

The Free Association Reading Series returns for this year's third installment of intimate readings. This month’s program features exceptional local writers Marcel Walker, Heather Aronson, Anouar Rahmani, and Deborah Bogen. This series is co-curated by Pat Hart and Marc Nieson. 

In her first visit to City of Asylum, Jessica Johns celebrates the release of her foreboding and mysterious debut novel, "Bad Cree."

In this program, Moses Ose Utomi shares his empowering debut novel, "Daughters of Oduma." This program is part of Pittsburgh Playhouse’s the Parable Path, a series of local events designed to enrich our communal experience with Octavia E. Butler’s "Parable of the Sower," a musical adaptation of Butler’s groundbreaking Afrofuturist novel created by Toshi Reagon and Bernice Johnson Reagon.

Presented in partnership with the Center for Bioethics & Health Law at the University of Pittsburgh, City of Asylum welcomes Travis Rieder for an eye-opening exploration of his 2019 memoir, "In Pain: A Bioethicist’s Personal Struggle with Opioids."

In this third installment of our International Reading Series, curated by Anderson Tepper, City of Asylum welcomes Zakes Mda. In this program Zakes and Anderson will discuss the breadth of Zakes’ work and the ways in which it reflects and relates to the shifting landscape of South African literature. 

To live is to tell stories. Embracing that truth, Story Club Pittsburgh (created by the former producers of The Moth Pittsburgh), organizes and hosts a monthly nonfiction storytelling series at City of Asylum. The theme for March 2023 is "Last Call." 

The trials of the outcast might be a tale as old as time, but never before has there been a story quite like Joseph Earl Thomas’ memoir, "Sink." In a series of exacting and fierce vignettes, Joseph guides readers through the unceasing cruelty that defined his circumstances, laying bare the depths of his loneliness and illuminating the vital reprieve geek culture offered him.

Jade Song shares her visceral debut novel, "Chlorine." This chilling and addictive work blurs the line between a literary coming-of-age narrative and a dark unsettling horror tale, creating a shrewd commentary on the trials of growing up in a society that puts monstrous pressure on young women and their bodies. 

For this night of subversive and subaquatic verse, award-winning poet Ed Roberson shares new poems from his latest collection, "Aquarium Works." This reading is followed by a moderated conversation with Allegheny County’s Poet Laureate Doralee Brooks.

To live is to tell stories. Embracing that truth, Story Club Pittsburgh (created by the former producers of The Moth Pittsburgh), organizes and hosts a monthly nonfiction storytelling series at City of Asylum. The theme for April 2023 is "Late Bloomer."

Lifelong activist Ruchira Gupta shares her debut novel, "I Kick and I Fly." This outstanding work of young adult fiction draws inspiration from Ruchira's experience making the Emmy-award winning documentary "The Selling of Innocents."