The reading will feature the following writers, and culminate in a reading and Q & A by the authors of Salt Pruning, Ignatius Valentine Aloysius and David Allen Sullivan:

Ignatius Valentine Aloysius is a naturalized U.S. citizen, born in India and raised in Mumbai by a Tamilian father and Anglo-Indian mother. He earned his MFA in Creative Writing from Northwestern University, where he teaches. Ignatius is the author of the literary novel Fishhead. Republic of Want (Tortoise Books) & Salt Pruning, a collaborative poetry collection written with David Allen Sullivan on Hummingbird Poetry Press. His prose & poetry have appeared in several journals, including Another Chicago Magazine, Cold Mountain Review, & The Rumpus. He is the current host of the popular reading series Sunday Salon Chicago, and is Co-Editor of The Overturning Anthology, due out in early 2025. Ignatius serves as Co-Chair of the Curatorial Board at Ragdale Foundation, where he is also a Board of Trustees member. He lives in Evanston, Illinois.

David Allen Sullivan’s books include Strong-Armed Angels, Every Seed of the Pomegranate, a book of co-translation with Abbas Kadhim from the Arabic of Iraqi Adnan Al-Sayegh, Bombs Have Not Breakfasted Yet, Black Ice, & Salt Pruning, a collaborative poetry collection written with Ignatius Valentine Aloysius on Hummingbird Poetry Press. He won the Mary Ballard Chapbook poetry prize for Take Wing. Black Butterflies Over Baghdad was selected for the Hilary Tham Capital Collection by Tim Seibles & published by Word Works. Seed Shell Ash—a book of poems about his Fulbright year teaching in Xi’an, China—is forthcoming from Salmon Press. He’s the former Santa Cruz county poet laureate & teaches at Cabrillo College, where he edits the Porter Gulch Review with his students.

Nina Sudhakar, a writer, poet, and lawyer based in Chicago. She is the author of Where to Carry the Sound (winner of the 2024 Katherine Anne Porter Prize in Short Fiction) and two poetry chapbooks. Her work has appeared in Salamander, The Rumpus, Witness, and elsewhere. She serves as Dispatches and Book Reviews Editor at The Common and on the board of the Chicago Poetry Center.

Faisal Mohyuddin is the author of Elsewhere: An Elegy (Next Page Press, 2024), The Displaced Children of Displaced Children, (Eyewear, 2018), and the chapbook The Riddle of Longing (Backbone Press, 2017). He teaches high school English in suburban Chicago and creative writing at Northwestern University’s School of Professional Studies. He is also a visual artist.