Laura E. Garrard

Port Angeles Fine Arts Center, 5:30-7 p.m.

In the Esther Webster Galley

1203 E. Lauridsen Blvd
Port Angeles, WA 98362

Readings 5:30-6:20 p.m.

Author Q&A and Book Signing to Follow.

Special Guest: Poet S. Salazar

This is a free event, open to the public.

Light Refreshments provided.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

TWO LOCAL POETS WIN PUBLICATION IN NATIONAL BOOK CONTEST:

BOOKS LAUNCH AT THE FINE ARTS CENTER ON MAY 21.

Celebrate with Port Angeles poets Linda B. Myers and Laura E. Garrard at the launch of their respective poetry chapbooks, Load-Bearing Walls and Paddling the Sweet Spot Between Life and Death. This is a free public event. Refreshments will be provided, and Port Book and News will be present to sell their books.

Myers and Garrard will read from and sign their books, which complement one another in vulnerability, candor, craft, and creativity. Local Latine author S. Salazar will also read from her poetry book based on cultural diaspora, Raíces, Relics, and Other Ghosts.

Garrard’s and Myers’ books were simultaneously selected and published through a 2025 Open Chapbook Competition with Finishing Line Press, an award-winning publishing company based in Georgetown, Ky. Myers and Garrard met one another through Olympic Peninsula Authors (OPA), and were friends prior to the contest, but were unaware of one another’s contest participation until after selection.

Myers is a co-founder of OPA, a local organization that supports writers through monthly reading and writing events and collaborations, like Poetry in the Park at the Port Angeles Fine Arts Center (PAFAC). In 2025, Garrard was nominated for the prestigious American literary Pushcart Prize and was a Finalist in the John & Eileen Allman Prize for Poetry.

Garrard’s chapbook focuses on a cancer journey, resiliency, present-minded living, and inspiration from nature. Myers’ book revolves around the subjects of aging, dying, caretaking, and reflection. Both collections of poetry utilize detailed imagery and direct but lyrical verse to convey personal observations and overcoming life challenges.

Garrard said that when first diagnosed with Stage III multiple myeloma, she was overwhelmed. “I was 51 years old going on 35 and never dreamed this would be a possibility for me, that I would have to face something so serious in my life as this.” Garrard said that she turned to present-mindedness and nature to survive difficult moments expressed in her book “so that I could survive knowing that I may not have a life as long as I thought I would have.” Having encountered cancer in 2020, Garrard’s prognosis has since changed for the positive.

Port Angeles author of Is, Is Not Tess Gallagher said about Paddling the Sweet Spot Between Life and Death, “I finished the book feeling greatly uplifted. Its cargo is a true teaching of how to live daily on the shifting edge of our own mortality and that of those we love.”

Myers said that she turned to poetry writing after completing ten novels because poetry provided the “province” to “say the really hard things, to use the language that burns.” She said that “nothing has hurt more than the secrets we keep.” Myers titled her chapbook “Load-Bearing Walls” because her poems are about the people who have supported her. “I do believe that we really need to be load-bearing walls for each other,” she said, “because life isn’t always an easy occupation.”

Local author Dianne Knox said about Load-Bearing Walls, “This chapbook sample of poems makes you crave more of her relatable character studies, relationships hopeful or gone tired, reminiscences of growing up and old in places familiar and true.”

Event attendees may view the PAFAC’s current gallery exhibit, Field Notes. According to the Center’s website, this show is “a visual love letter to the birds of the Pacific Northwest.” Contemporary artists were inspired by artist and ornithologist John James Audubon to depict birds’ beauty, migration, resilience, and interconnectedness. Featured artists include Ann Reid, Natalie Niblack, Justin Gibbens, and Anne Goetzman.

Use this link to R.S.V.P. (https://pafac.org/rsvp/) your party’s attendance count for the book launch.