Author Talk with Agata Szczeszak-Brewer
FCPL Rochester to host award-winning author
Fulton County Public Library, Rochester Branch, will host award-winning author Agata Szczeszak-Brewer from 12-2 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 12, in Meeting Room B. Szczeszak-Brewer will read from and discuss her autobiographical novel, “The Hunger Book: A Memoir from Communist Poland,” as well as lead a short generative workshop on memoir writing.
“The Hunger Book” tells the story of Agata’s growing up behind the Iron Curtain in the 1980s and details her foraging for food, family trauma, and her mother’s alcoholism alongside the protective love of her grandparents, seen through the lens of her life raising a family of her own in Indiana.
The conversation with the Eugene and Marilyn Glick Indiana Authors Award honoree is part of the Indiana Authors Speaker Program, powered by Indiana Humanities and made possible through Glick Philanthropies.
Born and raised in Poland, Szczesak-Brewer came to the U.S. as an MFA student and graduated with a Ph.D. in English from the University of South Carolina. “The Hunger Book” won the 2022 Gournay Prize, was short-listed for the William Saroyan International Prize for Writing and was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award.
Her publications also include essays and short stories in Guernica, Black Warrior Review, Contrary Magazine, River Poets Journal, Entropy, Hektoen International: A Journal of Medical Humanities and Wabash Magazine.
She lives in Indiana where she teaches at Wabash College.
This event will include snacks and refreshments. For more information, contact FCPL Literacy Director David Hazledine at dhazledine@fulco.lib.in.us or (574) 223-1008. FCPL, Rochester Branch is located at 320 W. 7th St.