The Ivy presents a special evening with five graduates from the University of Baltimore MFA in creative writing and publishing. The writers will be sharing short stories from the books they wrote, designed and self-published in their final semester. All books will be available for purchase at the event.

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This panel discussed will feature readings focused on the themes of families. Each is informed by the family experiences of each writer, including losing a family member, struggling with marriage, caring for a partner with dementia, relationships between siblings and issues of substance abuse and sexuality.

We're thrilled that Betsy Boyd, the director of our program and a fiction writer, will serve as moderator.

Boyd works closely with all fiction-focused students during their final semester before graduation and book publication.

As an additional treat, Connie Anderton from the Family Tree, will talk about how her organization prevents children from being removed from their families.

About the writers:

Sarah Berger is a classical singer, writer, teacher, and maker, and a graduate of Oberlin College and the Peabody Conservatory. She recently completed an MFA in Creative Writing and Publishing Arts at the University of Baltimore, and her thesis fiction collection is entitled The Magic Tampon Machine and Other Stories. She teaches in the undergraduate writing program at the University of Baltimore, and she is working on a forthcoming novel about music students. Links to Sarah’s published writing, her singing and her other projects can all be found at www.orangesloth.com.

Amy Carpenter edits and designs books for indie authors and has written and edited articles, fiction, and poetry for several publications. She was also managing editor and artistic director for The University of Baltimore’s literary journal, Welter. She is a classically trained singer and accompanist and lives in Maryland with her husband and four children.

Luke Newman is a husband, father, retired soldier, and writer who lives in Mount Airy, Maryland, USA. He's been telling stories for as long as he can remember, often keeping his parents up in the forgotten hours by typing them out on an old Smith Carona electric word processor.Luke retired from the United States Army in 2016 and returned to school to complete his education. He earned a BA in integrated arts through the University of Baltimore, and will earn his Masters of Fine Arts in Creative Writing and Publishing at UBalt in the Spring of 2023. He lives in Mt. Airy with his wife, 4 kids, and 3 dogs.

Belinda Rae Sacco is a writer, artist, and spiritualist from Baltimore, MD. She believes in ice cream before dinner, long walks, longer dreams, and cathartic releases. Her work has previously appeared in Vignette and Welter magazines. She's a Taurus sun with a Virgo moon on the cusp of writing poetry for the rest of her life--or, at least, until she gets a craving for pho.

Dina Sokal is a child, adolescent, and adult psychiatrist. She and her husband, Alan Hirsch, have three children, Lucy, Ann, and Sam, and two grandchildren, Elisheva and Mazzy. Her current hobbies are singing, running, writing and watercoloring. She is excited to publish her first book of short stories. Alan Moore, a comic book writer, said, “For me there is very little difference between magic and art. To me the ultimate act of magic is to create something from nothing.” Dina is grateful to have experienced the magic of writing fiction and hopes to promote themes of magic and hope through her stories.

Betsy Boyd directs the Creative Writing and Publishing Arts MFA program at the University of Baltimore and is the recipient of Maryland State Arts Council awards, an Elliot Coleman Writing Fellowship, a James A. Michener Fellowship and residencies through Fundación Valparaíso, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, the Alfred and Trafford Klots International Program for Artists and the Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts. Betsy’s fiction has been published in Kenyon Review, StoryQuarterly, Shenandoah, at American Short Fiction, Eclectica, and elsewhere. Her short story “Scarecrow" received a Pushcart Prize.

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