Award-winning authors who also happen to be Pitt-Greensburg writing professors—Dave Newman and Lori Jakiela—will take the University’s new LIVE AT THE LIBRARY reading series on the road when they visit the Greensburg Hempfield Area Library on Thursday, March 14, from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m.
Newman and Jakiela will be joined by three Pitt-Greensburg student writers—Caitlin Cruser, Kaiden Ciongoli, and Geneva Webber-Smith. The event, which will include book sales and signings, as well as a Q&A with the authors, is free and open to the public.
“I’m excited to connect with the wider Greensburg community, and especially to give our student writers the chance to share their work with a local audience,” says Newman, the author of seven books, most recently the memoir “The Same Dead Songs” (J.New Books, 2023). “There’s something about this area that produces some terrific writers. I feel lucky that a lot of those young writers end up at Pitt-Greensburg.”
Newman also grew up in the Hempfield area. He writes both poetry and prose drawn from his Western Pennsylvania experiences.
In addition to “The Same Dead Songs,” his work includes the novels “East Pittsburgh Downlow” (J.New Books, 2019), “Raymond Carver Will Not Raise Our Children” (Writers Tribe Books, 2012), “Two Small Birds” (Writers Tribe Books, 2014), and “Please Don’t Shoot Anyone Tonight” (World Parade, 2010), as well as two poetry collections—"The Poem Factory” (White Gorilla Press, 2015), and “The Slaughterhouse Poems” (White Gorilla Press, 2013), named one of the best books of the year by L Magazine.
His stories, essays, and reviews have appeared in Gulf Stream, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, Belt, the legendary Nerve Cowboy, Smokelong Quarterly, Ambit (U.K.), Tears in the Fence (U.K.), The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, and many other places. He appeared in the PBS documentary narrated by Rick Sebak about Pittsburgh writers and received the Andre Dubus Novella Prize for his fiction.
Newman and Jakiela coordinate the VOICES reading series that brings nationally known poets and writers to the Pitt-Greensburg community to read and work with the university’s student writers.
“It will be such a rare joy to read alongside students whose work inspires me every day,” said Jakiela, whose latest book, “They Write Your Name on a Grain of Rice: On Cancer, Love, and Living Even So,” was published by Atticus Books in 2023. “I’m grateful to the library for giving us space to share our work with the community.”
Jakiela is the author of seven books, including the 2016 memoir “Belief Is Its Own Kind of Truth, Maybe,” which received the Saroyan Prize for International Literature from Stanford University. Her essay collection, “Portrait of the Artist as a Bingo Worker: On Work and the Writing Life” (Bottom Dog Press), is the Common Read for 2023-2025 at Westmoreland County Community College.
Her work has appeared in The Washington Post, The Chicago Tribune, Pittsburgh Quarterly, Pittsburgh Magazine, and The New York Times/Modern Love column. Actress Kristen Bell chose and performed Jakiela’s Modern Love essay, “The Plain Unmarked Box Arrived,” on WBUR’s New York Times Modern Love podcast.
Jakiela’s work has been widely anthologized, and The Erma Bombeck Writers Workshop named her their Humor Writer of the Month for March 2024. Her author website is https://lorijakiela.net.
The three students who will read alongside Jakiela and Newman already have their own publishing credentials. Caitlin Cruser’s work has appeared in the national literary magazine, New York Quarterly. Geneva Webber-Smith’s work was published in the national literary magazine As It Ought to Be. Kaiden Ciongoli’s work has been published in the national literary magazine One Art.
“As part of our creative writing program, we mentor and encourage our students to begin publishing their work before they graduate,” Newman said. “We want them to feel a part of a larger writing community. We want them to know how good their work is and how much they belong. By reading in Greensburg, we hope they’ll feel the joy of connecting with a vibrant local literary scene.”
For more information about the VOICES on the Road reading, contact Newman at dpn15@pitt.edu.
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About the VOICES Series:
Building on the campus’s long-running Written/Spoken Series, VOICES showcases Pitt-Greensburg's focus on experiential learning by bringing together undergraduate student writers with award-winning authors, poets, writers, and storytellers.
For more information about the series or The Creative & Professional Writing Program at Pitt-Greensburg, please visit the campus website (https://greensburg.pitt.edu).
About Pitt-Greensburg:
Founded in 1963, the University of Pittsburgh at Greensburg is a publicly assisted, four-year, liberal arts college in southwestern Pennsylvania. Pitt-Greensburg offers 31 baccalaureate degree programs, including new majors in data analytics, nursing, and healthcare management, as well as 31 minors and four certificate programs. With nearly 1,400 students, more than 10,000 alumni, and faculty and staff numbering 260, Pitt-Greensburg provides a vibrant, diverse community that is a dynamic model of a 21st-century liberal arts education. As part of the University of Pittsburgh system, Pitt-Greensburg offers the resources of a world-renowned university combined with the individualized and immersive experiences of a small liberal arts college. Creativity and an entrepreneurial spirit permeate the campus and extend into its many collaborative projects with the Westmoreland County community. Nestled in Pennsylvania’s beautiful Laurel Highlands, the campus is surrounded by the region’s outdoor recreation venues and rich history. It is a five-minute drive from uptown Greensburg and less than an hour’s drive from Pittsburgh.