Dialogue: Grotto Nights at the Library

What does it take to drown out the chatter and write the stories that challenge dominant culture? This month's Grotto Nights at the Library features Swetha Amit in conversation with authors Minna Dubin, June Martin and Savala Nolan as they spill the secrets of writing your truth. 

About the authors 

Swetha Amit (moderator) is an MFA Graduate from the University of San Francisco. She is the author of three chapbooks and the memoir A Turbulent Mind. Her words across genres appear in Had, Bending Genres, Ghost Parachute, Gone Lawn, JMWW and others. A member of the Writers Grotto, her stories have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize, Best of the Net and Best Small Fiction.

Minna Dubin is the author of MOM RAGE: The Everyday Crisis of Modern Motherhood. Her work has been featured or reviewed in the New York Times, The New Yorker, The Times Sunday Magazine, Oprah Daily, Los Angeles Review of Books, and elsewhere. She is the recipient of an artist enrichment grant from the Kentucky Foundation for Women. As a leading feminist voice on mom rage, Minna has appeared on MSNBC, Good Morning America, The Tamron Hall Show, the BBC Women's Hour and NPR. She is currently working on a novel about non-monogamy and queerness, and lives in Berkeley with her husband, two kids and no pets, because enough is enough. 

June Martin is a writer and comic artist living in Oakland. Her half-surreal novel of trans animosity and strange houses, Love/Aggression (tRaum Books 2024), is a finalist for the 2025 Lamba Award in Transgender Fiction. Her short stories have appeared in X-R-A-Y, BULL, JAKE and she is the fiction editor of New Session.

Savala Nolan is an essayist, speaker, and professor. Her first book, Don’t Let It Get You Down: Essays on Race, Gender and the Body was shortlisted for the 2022 William Saroyan Prize. Her second book, Good Woman: A Reckoning will be published in March 2026. Her writing has been featured in Vogue, Harper’s Magazine, the New York Times, NPR, TIME, Forbes and more. In 2025, Savala Nolan was awarded the MLK Living the Dream Award by the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights.

The Writers Grotto is a community of working writers and narrative artists who connect in physical and virtual space, pooling their talents to support each other, mentor and teach others and engage the wider world. The Grotto fosters a literary culture that is generous in spirit and deeply inclusive, elevating writers of all backgrounds. 

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