CORONA DEL MAR TODAY

Pen On Fire Speakers Series Has A Few Openings for Nov. 17 Event

“I was in a plane crash with my father; his girlfriend, Sandra; and the pilot of our chartered Cessna. Sandra was 30. My dad was 43. I was 11. By the end of our 9-hour ordeal, I was the only survivor.”

Do you want to know more? About the story, or the writer or both? If so, you’re in luck — there are still a few seats for the Nov. 17 Pen on Fire Speakers Series to be held at SCAPE Gallery in Corona del Mar.

Local writer Barbara DeMarco-Barrett will host “An Evening with Memoirists” featuring two memoirists, Danzy Senna and Norman Ollestad. The event, which begins at 7 p.m., costs $15 including refreshments and requires advance tickets.

Ollestad wrote “Crazy for the Storm,” a Los Angeles Times bestseller and Starbucks pick that begins with the lines quoted above. Novelist Jim Harrison said, ” ‘Crazy for the Storm’ is an absolutely compelling book which I read in one long sitting. The fact that it’s true made me shudder, but then Norman Ollestad is a fine writer and every detail is convincing.”

Danzy Senna was born in Boston, the daughter of two writers, an African-American father and a white mother who met during the Civil Rights Movement. She received her B.A. from Stanford University and MFA in creative writing from the UC-Irvine. Her first novel, “Caucasia,” was an instant bestseller and received the Book-of-the-Month Stephen Crane Award for First Fiction and other awards and critical acclaim.

For more information or two register, visit the Pen on Fire website.

SCAPE is located at 2859 East Coast Highway.