Lit Crawl Offers Free Evening Events for Readers
The 16th annual event runs through 10 p.m. on Saturday, featuring readings and trivia at three Downtown Austin bars.
By Alexei Brooks ·
Readers in Austin can attend free evening events on Saturday, Nov. 14, as part of the 16th annual Lit Crawl. The event runs from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. and is open to the public. It follows the main Texas Book Festival programming scheduled for Nov. 14 and 15 in Downtown Austin.
Sip Haus at 715 Red River hosts a 7 p.m. showcase by Torch Literary Arts featuring Black women writers, including children’s book author Renée Watson. This is followed by an hour of feminist poetry performances from Host Publications. Speakers include Jenny Browne, a former Texas Poet Laureate, and Zell Miller III, Austin’s first poet laureate. Miller published his first collection, Austin’s Indigenous Offspring, earlier this year. The night concludes with a literary humor show featuring Jason Neulander, who adapted Treasure Island into a graphic novel called The Intergalactic Nemesis.
The Side Bar at 602 E. Seventh offers a Moth-style storytelling session where Palestinian author Zaina Arafat and Mexican American writer Tomás Q. Morín discuss the theme “Do You Believe in Magic.” A later session called “Librotraficantes” features books that are banned or likely to be banned. At 9 p.m., a session titled “Noir at the Bar” presents works from authors in nonfiction, crime, film criticism, humor, and speculative fiction.
Cheer Up Charlies at 900 Red River holds both indoor and outdoor events. Inside, attendees can discuss censorship with writers from the literary magazine Huizache between 7 and 8 p.m. A literary version of Family Feud follows, where participants guess how 100 “Bookstagrammers” answered specific questions. Staff from the Writer’s League of Texas will work with authors Juli Berwald and Jess Cannon to write a story in real time based on audience input.
The outdoor stage at Cheer Up Charlies hosts Texas Poetry Crush, where writers pair with a poet they admire to share complementary poems. Horror and dark fiction authors then compete in a live trivia match. The event ends with a Literary Death Match where judges narrow down four contestants to select a winner.
