2020 Season at a Glance

January 31 - Pam Houston Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country & and Dorothy Rice Gray Is the New Black | performed by
Caro Marks and Gay Cooper
February 1 - Generative Workshop with Pam Houston
April 8 - Anita Felicelli Chimerica | performed by Kat Miller
April 22 - Tod Goldberg "Walls" | performed by David Campfield
May 6 - Book Chat with Anita Felicelli
​May 20 - Book Chat with Tod Goldberg
​June 3 - Anne Da Vigo Interview Bakersfield Boys Club
June 10 - Bill Pieper Interview Borders and Boundaries
June 24 - Book Launch | Shelley Blanton-Stroud Copy Boy
July 17 - Debra Gwartney I Am a Stranger Here Myself | 
performed by Kellie Raines
July 18 - Sands Hall Reclaiming my Decade Lost in Scientology | performed by Kelley Ogden
July 19 - Workshop with Debra Gwartney & Sands Hall
September 21 - Erika Mailman The Murderer's Maid |
performed by Nicole Berry
September 22 - Workshop with Erika Mailman
October 23 - Gabino Iglesias Coyote Songs|
performed by Andrea Guidry
​October 24 - Workshop with Gabino Iglesias
​December 18 - Stories from the upcoming TWENTY TWENTY ANTHOLOGY from authors Deborah Pittman, Maia Evrigenis, Kevin Sharp, Diane Kallas and Elison Alcovendaz | 
performed by Atim Utoffia and Brennan Villados

Find recordings of all of our 2020 performances and interviews on YouTube

January 31, Live Performance
Pam Houston's "Eating Phoebe," an excerpt from Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country, performed by Caro Marks, with Dorothy Rice's "New Year's Reckoning," an excerpt from Gray is the New Black, performed by Gay Cooper.
Sue Staats interviews author Pam Houston and author Dorothy Rice.
Pam Houston in conversation with Insight's Beth Ruyak AUDIO (15 minutes)

​February 1, Generative Workshop
​Author Pam Houston led a sold-out three-hour workshop.
Picture
Author Pam Houston
Picture
Reader Caro Marks
Picture
Author Dorothy Rice
Picture
Reader Gay Cooper
Pam Houston, author of the memoir Deep Creek: Finding Hope in the High Country, is also the author of two novels, Contents May Have Shifted and Sight Hound, two collections of short stories, Cowboys Are My Weakness and Waltzing the Cat, and a collection of essays, A Little More About Me, all published by W.W. Norton. Her fiction has been selected for volumes of The O. Henry Awards, The Pushcart Prize, Best American Travel Writing, and Best American Short Stories of the Century, among other anthologies. She is the winner of the Western States Book Award, the WILLA Award for contemporary fiction, the Evil Companions Literary Award and several teaching awards.
Dorothy Rice, is the author of Gray is the New Black: A Memoir of Self Acceptance. Her first book, The Reluctant Artist, is an art book/memoir about her father, an immigrant from the Philippines, published by Shanti Arts in 2015. She has published essays and stories in a number of literary journals. Retired from a 35-year career in environmental protection with the California State Assembly and CalEPA, she earned an MFA in creative writing from UC Riverside, Palm Desert at the age of sixty. Rice also works for 916 Ink, leading creative writing workshops with area youth, and co-directs Stories on Stage Sacramento.
Caro Marks is an attorney, writer and artist from San Francisco. She moved to Sacramento in 1992 to work for the Federal Defender for the Eastern District of California.  As a trial attorney in state and federal court, she tried close to 65 jury trials before retiring in 2012. She is a published writer and a performer in the February 2020 Vagina Monologues at the Colonial Theater. 
Gay Cooper has acted with many theater companies in town, including Resurrection Theater, Big Idea Theater, Kolt Run Creations, and California Stage. She has also worked in commercials and industrial films. She has participated in previous Chandra Prize winner celebrations and is a Stories on Stage favorite, reading for both the Sacramento and Davis series.

April 8, Anita Felicelli and Kat Miller
Actor Kat Miller read an excerpt from award-winner author Anita Felicelli's Chimerica.
April 22, Tod Goldberg and David Campfield
Actor David Campfield read the short story "Walls," from New York Times best-selling author Tod Goldberg's short story collection Other Resort Cities. ​

May 6, Book Chat with Anita Felicelli 
May 20, Book Chat with Tod Goldberg 
Both events recorded live, enjoy conversations with Anita and Tod, Stories on Stage folk and audience members. ​

Picture
Anita Felicelli and Kat Miller
Picture
Tod Goldberg and David Campfield
Anita Felicelli is the author of Chimerica: A Novel (WTAW Press) and the short story collection Love Songs for a Lost Continent (Stillhouse Press), which won the 2016 Mary Roberts Rinehart Award. Anita’s stories have appeared in The Normal School, Joyland, The Rumpus, Kweli Journal, Eckleburg, and elsewhere. Her essays, reviews, and criticism have appeared in the New York Times (Modern Love), Slate, Salon, SF Chronicle, the Los Angeles Review of Books, Babble, Romper, Electric Literature, and elsewhere. She graduated from UC Berkeley and UC Berkeley School of Law. She is a member of the National Book Critics Circle and a Voices of Our Nations alum. Her work has placed as a finalist in multiple Glimmer Train contests and received a Puffin Foundation grant, two Greater Bay Area Journalism awards, and Pushcart Prize nominations. She lives in the Bay Area with her family.
Katherine Miller is a proud member of Actor’s Equity Association, Katherine’s professional theatre career began in the US performing in regional theaters in Northern California.  A former company member of the Sacramento Theatre Company, her credits there include Gwendolen in THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EARNEST, Vicky/Brooke in NOISES OFF, The Goddess Parvati in ARRANGED MARRIAGE, Ifigenia in ELECTRICIDAD, and Padma in QUEEN OF THE REMOTE CONTROL.  As a member of the Canadian Actor’s Equity Association, credits abroad include the role of Tecmessa in Timberlake Wertenbaker’s AJAX IN AFGHANISTAN and Artemis in THE INTUITION OF IPHIGENIA by Valina Hasu Houston - Both productions were world premieres performed in Greece in 2012. Other favorite shows include FAT PIG, MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING (Capital Stage), A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM, TAMING OF THE SHREW, and OTHELLO (Sacramento Shakespeare Festival). Katherine also has local and national commercial credits.
Tod Goldberg is the NYT, national, & international bestselling author of over a dozen books, including the novels Gangster Nation (Counterpoint), The House of Secrets (Grand Central), which he co-authored with NYT bestselling author Brad Meltzer, Gangsterland (Counterpoint), a finalist for the Hammett Prize, Living Dead Girl (Soho Press), a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, Fake Liar Cheat (Pocket Books/MTV), and the popular Burn Notice series, including The Fix, The End Game, The Giveaway, The Reformed and The Bad Beat (Penguin), which were all named finalists for the Scribe Award. Tod’s short fiction has also been collected in two acclaimed collections, Simplify (OV Books), a 2006 finalist for the SCIBA Award for Fiction and winner of the Other Voices Short Story Collection Prize, and Other Resort Cities (OV Books). His books have also appeared on the USA Today, Washington Post, Chicago Tribune, Publishers Weekly, iBooks, Los Angeles Times, Wall Street Journal, and Bookscan bestseller lists. Both Gangsterland and Gangster Nation have been finalists for the International Thriller of the Year Award given by VN Magazine in Belgium. His short fiction, essays, journalism and criticism - a number of which have won awards and been anthologized - have appeared widely in national journals. Tod is also the cohost of the podcast Literary Disco and the co-host of the podcast Open Book on KCOD Coachella FM, the leading public radio station in the Coachella Valley. Tod holds an MFA in Creative Writing & Literature from Bennington College and directs the Low Residency MFA Program in Creative Writing and Writing for the Performing Arts at the University of California, Riverside. 
David Campfield began his acting career right here in Sacramento, CA, where he appeared in dozens of plays. After becoming more involved in on-camera projects, he started working in the San Francisco area. In 2014, he moved to the greater Los Angeles area for the film/TV industry. David is always glad to return to Sacramento to perform, and in recent years has traveled back to appear in "Sense and Sensibility" at STC, Playwrights' Revolution at Capital Stage, and indie film "Grunk the Smasher" by TFO Productions.

May 22, 2020 Performance (cancelled) 
#1 New York Times  best-selling, award-winning fiction and essay author, Jess Walter (We Live in Water) and award-winning fiction and essay author Joan Frank (Where You're All Going). 
May 23, 2020 Generative Workshop (cancelled)

​June 3, Anne Da Vigo and Bakersfield Boys Club

Picture
Author Ann Da Vigo
​Anne Da Vigo is a former police reporter who covered murder and mayhem at newspapers throughout California. At the Bakersfield Californian in the 70s, she covered the trial of the first of the Lords of Bakersfield cases, a series of murders that stretched for decades. She was inspired to write Bakersfield Boys Club, in part, because rich and powerful men were able, with impunity, to engage in sex trafficking vulnerable boys.
​
She is the author of a previous thriller, Thread of Gold, and one of her short stories was featured at Stories on Stage Sacramento. Purchase Bakersfield Boys Club at Capital Books on K and on Amazon other online sources.

June 10, Bill Pieper and Borders and Boundaries

Picture
Author Bill Pieper
Bill Pieper has been a Sierra rat, a desert rat and a Pacific Crest Trail hiker for much of his life. More recently, he used his Spanish for travel in Guatemala, giving rise to three stories that earned an editor’s choice award from Red Fez magazine and have been issued as a Kindle book titled Guatemala Triptych. Bill is a notable alumnus of the Squaw Valley Community of Writers and his work has received Pushcart Prize nominations and a national award from Scratch Writer magazine.

​In addition to Borders and Boundaries, Bill has two novels in print, Belonging (Comstock Bonanza Press, 2006) and What You Wish For (Pacific Slope Press, 2011), and the short story collection Forgive Me, Father (Cold River Press, 2014).​ ​His stories have appeared in The Front Porch Review, Chiron Review, Corvus Review, Blue Moon Review and elsewhere. ​​

June 24, Shelley Blanton-Stroud and Copy Boy
were LIVE on Zoom - video (1:03:54)

Picture
Author Shelley Blanton-Stroud
Blanton-Stroud grew up in California’s Central Valley, the daughter of Dust Bowl immigrants who made good on their ambition to get out of the field. She teaches college writing in Northern California and consults with writers in the energy industry. She also co-directs Stories on Stage Sacramento, and serves on the advisory board of 916 Ink, an arts-based creative writing nonprofit for children. She has also served on the Writers’ Advisory Board for the Belize Writers’ Conference. Copy Boy is her first novel, and she’s currently working on her second. She also writes and publishes flash fiction and non-fiction, which you can find at such journals as Brevity and Cleaver.
​
If you missed the virtual book launch for Shelley Blanton-Stroud's Copy Boy - co-hosted with Capital Books as a fundraiser for our nonprofit friend, 916 Ink - we have recordings to share. And, we raised over $500 for 916 Ink!
July 17, Sands Hall and Reclaiming My Decade Lost in Scientology
Friday July 17 at 5 p.m., we hosted a free, live performance of an excerpt of Sands Hall's current memoir, Reclaiming My Decade Lost in Scientology. Kellie Raines performed Sands' story. Watch the recording to experience Kellie's moving performance and to hear from author Sands Hall about the journey that became Reclaiming My Decade Lost in Scientology. Sands sings a bit too and it's amazing.

Hall’s memoir is a chronicle of her absorption into the Church of Scientology in the 1980s, at the time of the secretive illness and death of its founder, L. Ron Hubbard, and the ascension of David Miscavige, revealing what drew her into the religion, what she found intriguing and useful, how she came to confront its darker sides—and escape. Hall is Professor Emeritus of English and Creative Writing at Franklin & Marshall College, and is on the staff of the Community of Writers at Squaw Valley.

Performer Kellie Raines is an Associate Artist with KOLT Run Creations, for which she directed The Adoration of Dora. Her KOLT performance credits include Escape from Happiness, Vinegar Tom, Antigone, and My Own Stranger. Other local theatre companies where she has worked include Big Idea Theatre, Theater Galatea, and Resurrection Theatre. Her visual art has been shown locally at Archival Gallery in Sacramento and on-air in the PBS KVIE Art Auction. She has read her poetry locally for the Poetry in Davis series hosted by Dr. Andy Jones.  She loves reading for Stories on Stage Davis and Stories on Stage Sacramento.
July 18, Debra Gwartney and I Am a Stranger Here Myself
Saturday July 18 we hosted a free, live performance of an excerpt of Debra Gwartney's hybrid memoir, I Am a Stranger Here Myself. Kelley Ogden performed Debra's story.

Gwartney’s most-recent book is part history, part memoir, tapping into personal and historical details that reveal the universal need to belong and the snarl of family history, while embracing womanhood in the patriarchal American West. Gwartney teaches in the MFA Program at Pacific University.

Kelley Ogden, is a familiar face to Stories on Stage fans, and an accomplished performer, director, and producer whose work has been seen throughout the area. Co-founder of acclaimed fringe theater company KOLT Run Creations, she has performed with Capital Stage, Davis Shakespeare Festival, Sacramento Shakespeare Festival, Main Street Theatre Works, and Theater Galatea, among others. Ogden earned her BFA in performance from The Theatre School at DePaul University in Chicago.
July 19, 2020 Generative Workshops with Sands Hall & Debra Gwartney (SOLD OUT)
Sunday July 19, come as you are—in jammies, sweats or swimsuit—for a Stories on Stage Sacramento online creative writing workshop. Two sections of this hands-on workshop will each be led by both of our featured, veteran author-teachers, Debra Gwartney and Sands Hall. You’ll work in a group of no more than ten writers, exploring the topic Writing About Family. There will be time for craft talk, writing and sharing.

September 25, 2020 - Erika Mailman and Murderer's Maid 

Get into the Halloween mood early this year, with a thrilling, chilling excerpt from Erika Mailman's most-recent novel, The Murderer's Maid, a historical true crime thriller, and the winner of two historical fiction awards in 2018 (the IPPY Gold Medal Award and the National Indie Excellence Award. Mailman is also the 2007 Bram Stoker finalist for her novel, The Witch's Trinity, which was also a San Francisco Chronicle Notable Book.
The Murderer's Maid interweaves the stories of two women, the 19th century servant of infamous Lizzie Borden and the other a 21st century modern-day barista fleeing from an attempt on her life. This is one you won't want to miss. The performance will be live via Zoom and is free of charge (though we do request that you register (after registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting). The performance will also be streamed on our website and recorded for later viewing. Registration link here and via the button below.

Erika Mailman grew up in Vermont and attended Colby College and the University of Arizona, Tucson, where she received an MFA in poetry. She has been a Yaddo fellow, and now lives in Northern California, near where gold was discovered. In addition to her two award-winning novels, Erika has published extensively as a freelance journalist. She has written about travel, health, gender issues, literature and history, for publications including the Washington Post, Lit Hub and Rolling Stone. For links to many of her publications visit her website and follow Erika on Twitter at @ErikaMailman.

Nicole Berry, who will perform the excerpt, is a California-based actor and writer recognized for her work on both stage and screen. In 2020 she received a Certificate of Outstanding Achievement from SARTA for her rendition of Sonia in the comedy stage play Vanya & Sonia & Masha & Spike. She can be seen in the upcoming release of the up-all-night crime feature film First Date as Sergeant Davis. An advocate for minority voices, she has authored several short screenplays and one-act plays due for public viewing in 2021.
​
​September 26, 2020 - Writing Workshop with Erika Mailman, Delving into the Past 
Join Stories on Stage Sacramento for the next chapter in its online creative writing workshops, Delving into the Past with historical novelist/journalist Erika Mailman. Erika will lead us in a three-hour session on using research to craft a historical novel. She’ll share strategies, give us a practice prompt and save time for optional sharing and questions and answers. The workshop cost is $50.

​Author Gabino Iglesias
and Performer Andrea Guidry
October 23, 2020, VIDEO (59:21)

Stories on Stage Sacramento was proud to feature Barrio Noir author, Gabino Iglesias and an excerpt from his novel Coyote Songs.
​The excerpt "Mother" was performed by Andrea Guidry. ​​
Gabino Iglesias is a writer, editor, journalist, and book reviewer living in Austin, Texas. He is the author of the novels Coyote Songs and Zero Saints (both from Broken River Books), and Gutmouth (Eraserhead Press). Iglesias is the book reviews editor at PANK Magazine, the TV/film editor at Entropy Magazine, and a columnist for LitReactor and CLASH Media. His nonfiction has appeared in places like The New York Times, the Los Angeles Review of Books, the LA Times, El Nuevo Día, and other venues.

​His fiction has been published in places like Red Fez, Flash Fiction Offensive, Drunk Monkeys, Bizarro Central, Paragraph Line, Divergent Magazine, Cease, Cows, and many horror, crime, surrealist, and bizarro anthologies. His reviews are published in places like NPR, Vol. 1 Brooklyn, Criminal Element, The Rumpus, Heavy Feather Review, Atticus Review, Entropy, HorrorTalk, Necessary Fiction, Crimespree, and other print and online venues. He teaches at Southern New Hampshire University's MFA program. You can find him on Twitter at @Gabino_Iglesias. (Find more information on the Stories on Stage Sacramento blog.)In his second novel, Coyote Songs, ghosts and old gods guide the hands of those caught up in a violent struggle to save the soul of the American southwest. A man tasked with shuttling children over the border believes the Virgin Mary is guiding him towards final justice. A woman offers colonizer blood to the Mother of Chaos. A boy joins corpse destroyers to seek vengeance for the death of his father.These stories intertwine with those of a vengeful spirit and a hungry creature to paint a timely, compelling, pulpy portrait of revenge, family, and hope. 

Andrea Guidry is a Bay Area-based actor and voice-over artist. She recently starred in the short film Gamers and will appear in the upcoming indie film Signal to Noise. Though most of her work these days is on-camera, her first love will always be live theatre, and she’s honored to perform with Stories on Stage Sacramento.

A fan of sci-fi, fantasy, horror, speculative and “weird” fiction, Andrea says, "I lovet he imagination that these authors have to go to places I would never consider. That’s what really drew me into (Iglesias’s) story. These books twist my brain in a kind of exercise I don’t otherwise get throughout the day. Weirdness and horror and fantastical elements usually serve as a lens by which we can examine all the horrible things that exist in our society. It’s a way to look at the economic divide, the class divide, racism, sexism...All of these huge, messy, very real and visceral problems can be examined through a story that, on the surface, has nothing to do with the everyday world we live in, but, when done well, can lead to some really good introspection." (Learn more about Andrea on the Stories on Stage Sacramento blog)
​
Generative writing workshop with Gabino Iglesias
October 24, 2020, 1:00 to 4:00 pm
Join Stories on Stage Sacramento for our last online creative writing workshop of the year, Saturday, October 24, 1-4 pm (PST),
a three-hour October 24 writing workshop (live via Zoom) with author, editor, journalist, reviewer and teacher Gabino Iglesias, on the topic of "how to write the Other, right." Gabino will share strategies, give a practice prompt and make time for questions and answers. Explore otherness in fiction with Gabino Iglesias.

December 18, 2020
Join Stories on Stage Sacramento for our last performance of the year!

Picture
We put out the call for stories and essays on the theme "2020" from local, Northern California, writers, and they delivered, abundantly. Our judges (the four Stories on Stage Sacramento Board members) were challenged to choose just five pieces for this last performance of the year.

Now that we have our five stories, we couldn't be more pleased. This group of authors, and the topics that inspired their work, are as diverse and varied as this challenging, startling, at-times terrifying, undoubtedly unforgettable, year has been.

And our authors are . . . imagine a drum roll . . . 
Elison Alcovendez and "#girldad"
Maia Evrigenis and "Just Another Day at School"
Diane Kallas and "My Teeth Will Go On"
Deborah Pittman and "Dear Neighbor"
Kevin Sharp and "The Coffin"

And our actors are . . . imagine another drum roll . . . 
Brennan Villados
Atim Udoffia

Actor Brennan Villados is based out of Sacramento, California. His most recent acting credits include in The Picture of Dorian Gray with Freefall Stage, A Soldier’s Play with Celebration Arts, and Marat/Sade with Falcon’s Eye Theatre. Brennan made his directorial debut in 2019 with Romeo and Juliet for Freefall Stage’s Shakespeare in the park. He attended The American Academy of Dramatic Art and has worked for the UC Davis School of Medicine Standardized Patient Program for the last six years. His other favorite roles include Mercutio in Romeo and Juliet with Falcon’s Eye Theatre, Patrick Stone in Inventing Van Gogh with Big Idea Theatre, Eddie in Fool for Love, and Tom in the one-man show Poster of the Cosmos, both for Blank Canvas Theatre. He is delighted to be a part of this production and looks forward to discovering new ways of connecting and storytelling in this unprecedented time.

Actor Atim Udoffia is also a director and teaching artist working in theatre, film and video. Recent theatre credits include MACBETH (Sacramento Theatre Company), THE ROYALE (Aurora Theatre Company), ZENITH (SF Playhouse), THE TEMPEST (Sacramento Theatre Company) and DISGRACED (Capital Stage). Her directing debut of OTHELLO at Big Idea Theatre was well- received, and has since directed several original works for theatre, including a staged reading of THE DRILL at Capital Stage. Also a writer, Atim's Creative Nonfiction piece "Woman in Question" was selected First Runner Up by the Los Angeles Review in 2018. At the moment she is working on a short film script. After earning a cross-disciplinary degree in Human Biology from Stanford, Atim went on to complete the post-graduate drama program at the London and International School of Acting. While living in Los Angeles for several years, she studied with Judith Weston and performed in a number of plays, short films and dance-theatre productions. Atim currently teaches SEL Theatre to elementary and high school students with Northern California School of the Arts and the East Bay Center for Performing Arts.

Author Kevin Sharp is a lapsed screenwriter and current comicbook industry reporter. Despite all the excitement since, his childhood dream of working with apes still sounds like maybe the best gig in the world. Find more of his writing at kevinsharpwriter.com

Author Maia Paras Evrigenis writes and teaches in Sacramento, CA. She received her MFA from CalArts and BS from NYU Steinhardt. Maia writes fiction novels and short stories with a focus on the body and illness. She is currently pitching her first novel titled Neon Jane, a story about a character from a young adult book about cancer a decade after they’ve finally beat it. 

Author Elison Alcovendaz's work has appeared or will be appearing in The Rumpus, Psychology Today online, The Santa Monica Review, Ruminate Magazine, under the gum tree, and other publications. He received an MA in Creative Writing from Sacramento State and was recently selected for inclusion in the Best Small Fictions 2020 anthology. He lives in Sacramento with his wife and daughter. To learn more, please visit: www.elisonalcovendaz.com.

Author Deborah Pittman holds BS and MA degrees in music performance from the Brooklyn College Conservatory and has done doctoral studies at the Manhattan School of Music. She’s Professor Emeritus after 23 years as Professor of Clarinet and Musical Theatre at California State University, Sacramento. Ms. Pittman played second clarinet with the Sacramento Symphony, (1981 to 1990), as well as with the Brooklyn Philharmonic, the State Symphony of Mexico, the Orchestra of New York, the Dance Theatre of Harlem, and pit orchestras of musicals on Broadway.  She was Artist in Residence for the Sacramento Light Opera Association’s Theater Education Project and Artist in Residence at the Crocker Art Museum, where her multi-media work, Small Shoulders/Big Dreams, was created to support the 2013 Norman Rockwell American Chronicles touring exhibition. She received a Creative Economy Pilot Project Grant from the Office of the Mayor, to create this work. The Sacramento Regional Community Foundation awarded her trio,  MOD Artists, a “Transforming the Creative Economy,” grant  to create a three-part documentary on the history of Oak Park. Each event included a short film as well as live music.

Author Diane Kallas has trouble finishing projects which explains all of this: her interest in the flash fiction form,  her status as a fallen-away Catholic, retired technical writer, non-practicing attorney, amateur upholsterer, and also the piles of clean, unfolded laundry that decorate her home. Kallas's tragic-comic work has been featured in past Stories on Stage Sacramento events to great audience appreciation.

​​​2020 Photo Gallery (cut short by Covid 19):

Who We Are

Literature. Live!
​Stories on Stage Sacramento is an award-winning, nonprofit literary performance series featuring stories by local, national and international authors performed aloud by professional actors. Designated as Best of the City 2019 by Sactown Magazine and Best Virtual Music or Entertainment Experience of 2021 by Sacramento Magazine.

Location

The Auditorium at CLARA
​1425 24th Street, Sacramento, CA 95816

Contact Us