Little Village Issue 338 - March 2025 by Little Village Magazine

Independent Iowa News, Culture & Events

SPRING ARTS ISSUE

The Englert's Last Misson Creek Lynch's Iowa Legacy Rozz-Tox & xBk Extend Their Roots

The Downfall of NaNo WriMo A Book Fest in Beaverdale

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Deep cuts

Iowa writers are divided over the scandal-plagued NaNoWriMo.

The late David Lynch saw smalltown Iowa with surreal clarity.

Mission Creek Festival's emerald anniversary is also a turning point.

Little Village (ISSN 2328-3351) is an independent, community-supported news and culture publication based in Iowa City, published monthly by Little Village, LLC, 623 S Dubuque St., Iowa City, IA 52240. Through journalism, essays and events, we work to improve our community according to core values: environmental sustainability, affordability and access, economic and labor justice, racial justice, gender equity, quality healthcare, quality education and critical culture. Letters to the editor(s) are always welcome. We reserve the right to fact check and edit for length and clarity. Please send letters, comments or corrections to editor@ littlevillagemag.com. Subscriptions: lv@littlevillagemag.com. The US annual subscription price is $120. All rights reserved, reproduction in whole or in part without written permission is prohibited. If you would like to reprint or collaborate on new content, reach us at lv@littlevillagemag. com. To browse back issues, visit us online at issuu.com/littlevillage.

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Luís Alberto Urrea at Mission Creek in 2015. Festival director Andre Perry sits front row center. Adam Burke / Little Village

EDITORIAL

Publisher Jordan Sellergren jordan@littlevillagemag.com

Editor-in-Chief

Emma McClatchey emma@littlevillagemag.com

Arts Editor

Chuy Renteria chuy@littlevillagemag.com

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Paul Brennan paul@littlevillagemag.com

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Kate Doolittle kate@littlevillagemag.com

Calendar/Event Listings

Emily Rundell calendar@littlevillagemag.com

En Español Editor

Claudia Pozzobon

Corrections editor@littlevillagemag.com

March Contributors

Arlette Uribe-Gonzalez, Avery Staker, Ben Skeers, Brian Visser, Broc Nelson, Colson Thayer, Ethan Edvenson, Glenn Houlihan, Ioannis Alexakis, Jenna Wang, John Busbee, K. Twaddle, Kembrew McLeod, Lauren Haldeman, Liz Rosa, Lucas Benson, Mike Kuhlenbreck, Ramona Muse Lambert, Rob

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Brezsny, Ryan Collins, Sam Locke Ward, Sara Williams, Sarah Elgatian, Shale Sage, Tom Tomorrow, Violeta Vaca Delgado

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Meet this month’s contributors!

Arlette Uribe-Gonzolez is a library assistant at the Des Moines Public Library. She spends her time knitting, snuggling with her cats, or stumbling across new hobbies (see: obsessions).

Avery Staker is a queer Des Moines-based photographer born and raised in rural Iowa.

Ben Skeers is a writer, cartoonist and social worker from West Des Moines. He is currently serving a 10-year sentence at the Correctional Release Center, in Newton, Iowa.

Brian Visseris is a librarian at the Iowa City Public Library. He likes to fall asleep listening to books and is partial to sci-fi and fantasy.

Broc Nelson is a lifelong music fan, improviser, Quad Citizen and enthusiast of all things creative, tasty and weird.

Colson Thayer is a journalism student in Des Moines and an editorial apprentice at PEOPLE

Ethan Edvenson is a Des Moines artist known for his heavily layered, mixed media drawings.

COGS.

Ioannis Alexakis is a producer, musician, sound engineer in the studio and for the stage, and a rankand-file stagehand.

Jenna Wang is a recent journalism and political science graduate of Northwestern University. She's participated in NaNoWriMo twice: in 2016 as a 9th grader at Iowa City West High, and in 2020 as a college freshman.

John Busbee produces The Culture Buzz, a weekly arts & culture radio show on kfmg.org.

K. Twaddle is an Iowa transplant and a lifelong book enthusiast. She lives in rural Iowa with her partner and three cats.

Kembrew McLeod is a founding Little Village columnist and the chair of Communication Studies at the University of Iowa.

Lauren Haldeman is a graphic novelist and poet. She has received an Iowa Arts Fellowship, a Sustainable Arts Foundation Award and fellowships from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop.

Lucas Benson is a freelance writer/newtime rucker-comedy nerd/ nonprofit consultant/pinball enthusiast/Piscean Iowa Cityzen.

Mike Kuhlenbreck is a freelance journalist and National Writers Union member based in Des Moines.

Ramona Muse Lambert makes art and music. Sometimes she’s in charge of dinner, too. Buy her art at ramonamuselambert.com.

Ryan Collins is a writer and the executive director of the Midwest Writing Center in Rock Island, Illinois

Sam Locke Ward is a cartoonist and musician from Iowa City. He self publishes the comic zines Voyage Into Misery and ’93 Grind Out.

Sara Williams is a multidisciplinary artist who was raised in Bondurant, Iowa. She currently resides near Amana.

Sarah Elgatian is a writer, activist and educator living in Iowa. She likes dark coffee, bright colors and long sentences. She dislikes meanness.

Flowers are blooming, global crises are brewing and Iowa's artists and arts presenters are providing some much-needed reasons to gather and conspire for good. Browse hundreds of events, read brand-new columns and make some plans.

Glenn Houlihan is an American Studies Ph.D. student at the University of Iowa and Chief Campus Steward of UE Local 896/

Liz Rosa is a journalism student at Drake University, juggling class, freelancing and work while still finding time for creativity.

Shale Sage a Quad Citiesbased photographer overcomplicating photography since 2017.

THANK YOU TO THIS ISSUE’S ADVERTISING PARTNERS

This issue of Little Village is supported by:

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— Release Body Modification

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— Pagliai's Pizza

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— R.S.V.P.

— George's

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Willow & Stock

Iowa Children's Museum (16)

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Iowa City Public Library Friends Foundation (68)

Iowa Public Radio (54)

John's Grocery (22)

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Kim Schillig, REALTOR (18)

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Martin Construction (29)

MYEP (12)

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Polk County Conservation (57)

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Public Space One (57)

Pure Luxe Apothecary (18)

Raygun (17)

RSFIC (16)

Shakespeare's Pub & Grill (22)

Takes Remodel (43)

Theatre Cedar Rapids (29)

The Club Car (25)

The Dandy Lion (41)

The Englert (35-38)

The Slow Down (53)

The Wedge Pizzeria (12)

Tim Conroy, REALTOR (25)

University of Iowa Stanley Museum of Art (70-71)

Wig & Pen Pizza Pub (19)

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Letters & Interactions

LV encourages readers to submit letters to Editor@LittleVillageMag.com. Please include your name, city of residence and any relevant job titles or affiliations. Letters may be edited for accuracy and style. To be considered for print publication, letters should be under 500 words. Preference is given to letters that have not been published elsewhere.

aS a 78-YEar-OLD Vietnam veteran with a spot on my lung, I watch my fellow veterans pass away, many after a lifetime of illness caused by exposure to the herbicide Agent Orange. It took Congress 30 years to pass the Agent Orange Act, finally recognizing over 50 related diseases, from cancer to diabetes, caused by exposure. Now, even our children and grandchildren have been recognized as suffering higher rates of birth defects and diseases.

Iowans shouldn’t be surprised that our state has the second-highest cancer rate in the nation—and the only rising one. We are being poisoned by Big Agriculture. Our streams, rivers and land are becoming an industrial wasteland. How much more proof do we need to realize the danger?

Every day, I live with the uncertainty of when doctors will tell me how long I have left. Will Iowans face the same fate? How

long will our politicians turn a blind eye, prioritizing corporations over the very people they are elected to represent?

It took three decades for Congress to act on Agent Orange. How long will Iowans wait to elect leaders who will fight for their health? If you have any interest at all, do not let this happen to you and your families. Speak up! Spread the word! Let people know how you feel. Don't let politicians do to Iowans what they did to Vietnam vets.

Giving your children and grandchildren a future of disease and suffering because of inaction is a terrible legacy. But that’s exactly what’s happening in Iowa.

—Joel

E. Wells, Iowa City

ThE ISraELI MUSIc GrOUP The Jerusalem Quartet is scheduled to play at Hancher Auditorium at the end of March. They are ambassadors of an apartheid government, used

HAVE AN OPINION?

to art-wash the genocide of Palestinians. We are disappointed in Hancher. No one should go.

"But… art?!" Art is political.

How can you separate the art from the artists that are trained, financially supported, endorsed and honored by a genocidal government? All four musicians have served in the IDF (the Israeli military) and continue to play shows for IDF soldiers. They have been boycotted by human rights supporters internationally (including in the U.S., all over Europe and New Zealand).

"But... antisemitism?!" Anti-Zionism isn’t antisemitic.

Zionism is a 19th century political ideology that claimed Jewish safety required a Jewish-only nation-state. The 1917 Balfour Declaration that advocated establishing a "national home for jewish people" in Palestine may sound altruistic but it wasn't. As Naomi Klein reminds us: “Zionism was an antisemitic idea from the start…." It was always presented as a way that European

SARA WILLIAMS

powers could “get rid of their Jews and establish a sub-imperial power in the Middle East.” Many Jews opposed Zionism before the Holocaust because they saw it as an antisemitic idea that would further demote them as secondand third-class citizens. In fact, the only opponent of the declaration was also the only Jewish member of the British

cabinet, Edwin Montagu.

Judith Butler, Hannah Arendt, Hajo Meyer and Albert Einstein are some other Jewish anti-Zionists of note. Anti-Zionism is not synonymous with anti-semitism. Not all Jews are Zionists and not all Zionists are Jews. In fact, there are 20-30 Christian Zionists for every one Jewish Zionist. And Christian Zionism came first.

So anyone concerned that boycotting The Jerusalem Quartet is antisemitic would be wise to check their bedfellows.

We find protection through community and connection, not through oppression and militarism. Jewish safety is, and has always been, in solidarity.

Because Palestinians.

The state of Israel has continued to displace, terrorize and commit other war crimes against the Palestinians since the Nakba began in 1947. Between October 2023 and 2024 Israel said it bombed 40,000 locations in the Gaza Strip (141 sq mi). Gaza is 25 miles long, about the distance from the Iowa City Airport to the Cedar Rapids Airport. And ranges from 3.7 to 7.5 miles at the widest. By one estimate, the bomb tonnage dropped on Gaza is more than 70,000 tons, surpassing the combined bomb tonnage dropped on Dresden, Hamburg and London in World War II. Al-Jazeera estimates 62,614 Palestinians have been killed since Oct. 7, 2023. Including 17,492 children.

"For the three immigrants [three of the Quartet came from Russia], carrying a rifle in one hand and a violin in the other is the ultimate Zionist statement." -The Israeli Press Service

The Jerusalem Quartet has demonstrated who they stand with. How about you?

—Submitted by Jaime Nevins, Iowa City, on behalf of Jewish Voice for Peace of Eastern Iowa members

Reynolds threatens to cut off state funding to Winneshiek County after sheriff says he won’t comply with ‘unconstitutional’ requests from ICE (Feb. 6)

How dare she threaten such a thing. She can’t just pull funds when someone

TRUE LOVE

RAMONA MUSE LAMBERT

MOMBOY LAUREN HALDEMAN

doesn’t agree with what she wants. She’s a disgrace. —Anita S.

He said he would follow the law and constitution and that is somehow triggering to the Cult. —Janelle R.

The full wrath of the cult is no joke upon my county. I said the other day "it's wild the eye of Sauron is hovering over Winneshiek county". 27A is a diabolical tool to remove elected officials over public statements under the guise of "immigration policy.” … As a Winneshiek resident all I can say is the state picked the wrong county of Norwegians to test code 27A on. Her statement is the groundwork of removing elected officials over simple public statements. —Kai S.

"The sheriff said in a Facebook post" is crazy. . . . —Rodrigo M.

Crazier than the Governor posting her threat to cut funding on Facebook? —Gale K.

That's the entire reason they are investigating. A Facebook post. They want to use code 27A to remove officials of social media posts. Steven Holt (judiciary chair) seems to think this statement alone (the sheriff addressing county residents on the department's ICE policy). —Kai S.

Iowa #1 for head and neck cancer #2 for all cancers. Iowan’s dying every day from Kin Reynolds policies. —Brenda M.

She’s following the lead of the president: punish whoever you don’t like, regardless of right or wrong or if it’s against the law. —Bill R.

Stand your ground and do anything and everything you can to slow their progress. Even those with boring office jobs can do a lot to diminish the damage these goons will do. —Ryan A.S.

Shiloh’s popular fireworks show played cover for an abusive cult: ‘We were conditioned for so long to be obedient and submissive’ (Feb. 6)

Pittie pup Muppet has all the cuddly charm of Kermit, the zany gusto of Gonzo and Miss Piggy's penchant for affection. Highly trainable, this 1.5-year-old can't wait to learn new things (and earn rewards). More than just a big, adorable face, he's undoubtedly the most sensational, inspirational, celebrational, Muppetational dog at the Iowa City Animal Center—and may just be your next best friend. Call to schedule a Muppet meet-and-greet: 319-356-5295.

Send your personals for consideration to editor@littlevillagemag.com with subject line “Personals.”

INTERACTIONS

A must read for people trying to understand how cults control people. —Scott G.

I was a custodian there for the last three years they were open and I didn't know any of those things. There were parts of the compound that I was not supposed to enter, but I did see the giant underground storage vault after they moved everything out of it. Pretty impressive. —George V.

I was a member, but an outsider. I did however arrange a ski trip for the youth. It was a lot of fun. Any suggestion I had was not considered. I guess this was because it was not originated by the leaders. Typical of cult organizations. We gave plenty of money and time towards repairs and special events. I felt that holding one person in such high esteem was JUST NOT RIGHT. Think they knew this and why my suggestions were never considered. The people were great, liked all of them. Never had a clue about the ugly workings and actions taking place. Sad, but deserved ending to TLW. The victims were the good people, many who still remain friends. —Brian V.D.

Letter to the editor: Oliver Weilein’s social media posts are disqualifying (Feb. 10)

Matt Hayek should have to answer for what he’s done for the city in the last 10 years before speaking a word about this election. —Matti B.

He's just a little rough around the edges. —Jason A.

alt: Oliver Weilein radically, vocally, and unequivocally values human life (especially the lives of the more disenfranchised and oppressed) more than he values the ‘sanctity’ of respectability politics. —Emmylane L.P.

Wake up dude. Our world is crumbling and you're wanting us to reject the only candidate with actual policies that actually address our community's pain because of respectability politics? His decorum isn't what you're used to, so we should just keep voting for candidates who keep selling our city to the highest bidder? Oliver is taking a stand for us against venture capitalists intent on selling our town for parts, and his posts demonstrate that. I wish Iowa City politicians talked like this more often. —Luke B.

After reading all the comments I am wondering how you all think that this type of

INTERACTIONS

commentary helps to endorse your candidate. It alienates people who are tired of hate and lies. Don't you understand that to make our community better for all we need to hear each other and find middle ground not keep spewing hate. It is so sad to me to hear this kind of dialogue .Please hear yourselves. —Kathleen B.

Laughable to even publish this. —Adam H.

I think it's cool that LV is publishing letters from supporters of both candidates. Really informative about who's on each side and what their values are. And it's obviously encouraging a lot of local discussion lol. —Justin C.

Letter to the editor: Oliver Weilein is not scary, but you are scared (Feb. 11)

I heard Oliver is involved in the Dungeon Synth musical subgenre which celebrates medieval fantasies like Orcs. Is Oliver going to bring Orcs to Iowa City? I don't have the answers, but we can't risk it. Keep Orcs out of our community! —Peter B.

I live in Coralville, so I can't vote for Oliver. I do escort clients at Emma Goldman Clinic, and Oliver has been there for the clinic and its clients. I hope Oliver, once elected, will get the city to deal with the anti-abortion protesters who try to block the alley which our clients must use to access the client parking lot. —Jeff K.

I’m still upset he hasn’t spoken out against lawn darts, the real silent killer. —Ajax L.

Iowans protest bill to give pesticide manufacturers greater protection from cancer lawsuits (Feb. 11)

Either improve science education, find honest judges to toss frivolous lawsuits or deal with this. —Eric B.

If Roundup really were a carcinogen then this law wouldn't apply to it. Are they protesting to support fraudulent lawsuits? —Pepito M.

Iowa House Republicans advance bill to extend ban on LGBTQ topics in elementary schools to middle and high schools (Feb. 13)

Jokes on them. I learned what lesbians were at the bus stop, not in a classroom. And

that's why they always fail. You can't make learning about things illegal, that's not possible. If it exists in any capacity, you're going to learn about it. That's just how being alive works. —Matthew H.

Brad Sherman — anti-abortion pastor and promoter of vaccine and election conspiracy theories — is running for governor (Feb. 18)

Meet the new boss ... same as the old boss. —Jim P.

I’m honestly shocked that someone can look at this state and say, “yep, there’s still further to the right than far right that we can go, and I can take us there better than our current governor.” —Ben M.

How in the holy name of our Lord Christ did they dig up someone worse than Kim? That's lab grown crazy in that man's wretched beard strands. —Matthew H.

He is obviously running so that Kim looks like the moderate in the race, just as Miller-Meeks’ primary opponent did.

Please don't fall for it this time. —Jason A.

The problem here is that this guy thinks he can run and win. That's the problem. 20 years ago this guy would never throw his hat in the ring with these kinds of theories. COVID opened the floodgates for people like this just as much as Trump has. —Steven P.

Iowa House Republicans advance bill making it a crime to allow minors to ‘view a drag show’ (Feb. 19)

It’s nice to know the legislature is working on these critical issues while we’re slipping into autocracy. —Gregory D.

“Knowingly” take your kid to drag? Officer I’ve never seen a man dressed as a woman in my life. I only see beautiful women on stage. —Tiffany W.

So no pro wrestling or any WWE right? —Lauren B.

Can they still watch Bugs Bunny cartoons where he puts on a dress? —Scott K.

Pssssst...I got a copy of "Some Like It Hot" here. —David H.

Most Shakespeare comedies would become crime scenes. —Stephen D.

Has anyone else seen a drag show in Vegas maybe? Say a Barbara Streisand impersonator, for instance? It's a great show! You know what happens? Singing! Lots of singing. I swear. No recruiting. Who is this hurting? —Jo C.

Can you imagine believing that is the biggest problem youths face today? How simple minded. —Britt H.

Can we just let parents decide what is appropriate for their kids and not have warped minded trumpublican thugs dictate what is appropriate? They want parents to have a say in so many things relating to their days at school, but when their phobias are triggered, they want to be the ones saying no no. —Bob B.

Rather take my kids there then into a GOP get together or any priest. —Walter J.W

NORTHSIDE MARKETPLACE NORTHSIDE MARKETPLACE

Dystopian Tales Taking on New Meaning

Recently, I’ve found myself falling back into my middle school routine of reading every dystopian book I can find. Whether it’s prompted by the dystopiathemed escape room I’ve been working on at Des Moines Public Library, or the fact Parable of the Sower was one of the most requested books at DMPL in January— despite being published more than 30 years ago—these books have been offering me a nostalgic escape from my day to day.

While my planned escape room is inspired by older classics such as George Orwell’s 1984 and Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451, I have gravitated to rereading Octavia Butler’s Parable series. The first book, Parable of the Sower, follows Lauren, a teen growing up in a near-future southern California community. Lauren has a condition which makes her hypersensitive to the emotions and pain of others, leaving her especially susceptible to the increasingly unstable society around her.

Though published in 1993, the topics brought up in the novel, like climate change and community, are still urgent. It’s no wonder that in 2006, Butler herself told The Indypendent that the Parable books “serve as cautionary tales,” and the series “calls people’s attention to the fact that so much needs to be done.”

Almost a decade later, Suzanne Collins, author of the bestselling Hunger Games trilogy, spoke similarly. She told Scholastic in 2014 that “telling a story in a futuristic world gives you this freedom to explore things that bother you in contemporary times.”

The original trilogy holds a special place in my heart, introducing me to other books in the genre like Uglies by Scott Westerfeld and Scythe by Neal Schusterman. But Collins’ 2020 installment, A Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, was my favorite from the moment I picked it up. In it, we learn more about the origins of the Hunger Games and one of the primary villains of the original trilogy, Coriolanus Snow. It doesn’t fall into the trope of attempting to make the villain a sympathetic character, but Snow is still engaging enough to follow through the 500-plus-page novel.

Her forthcoming novel, Sunrise on the Reaping, is out in March, and I can’t wait to get my hands on it.

—Arlette Uribe-Gonzalez, Des Moines Public Library

Addictive 2024 Video Games

Video games encourage creativity, problemsolving, and are an immersive way to tell a story. In other words, they’re a perfect fit for libraries!

These titles were a couple of my favorites from last year. You can check them out today at the Iowa City Public Library.

Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is a first-person adventure game for Xbox Series X that takes place between the movies Raiders of the Lost Ark and The Last Crusade. The game excels at exploration, stealth combat and puzzles worthy of the famed archeologist. Players get to traverse visually stunning locations such as Vatican City, Giza and Sukhothai, each filled with secrets.

The game sends players on a worldwide quest to prevent a Nazi scientist, Emmerich Voss, from harnessing the power of the Great Circle—culturally important sites that form a perfect circle around the globe. The narrative is fantastic and filled with exceptional writing and voice acting. (Troy Baker does an amazing impersonation of Harrison Ford.) The game itself made me feel like Indiana Jones, which is all I’ve ever wanted!

Balatro is an addictive poker game for the Nintendo Switch. The game takes traditional poker hands and then modifies them with special jokers that carry various bonuses. For example, the “Greedy Joker” gives “played cards with Diamond suit +3 multiplier.” You have the chance to acquire new Jokers between rounds, called Blinds, as well as upgrade the scoring of particular poker hands. Unlike traditional poker, the game requires puzzle-like thinking, asking players to optimize their deck with multipliers, synergies and strategic additions (or subtractions) of cards.

The game has a retro vibe with pixel art and a relaxing, lofi soundtrack. The interface is clean and easy to navigate, and the game eases you in with a well-done tutorial. Each run offers different, random challenges, making every playthrough feel fresh, unpredictable and highly replayable. The difficulty ramps up to provide a satisfying challenge while striking a balance between luck and strategy. Whether you’re looking for a casual run or aiming for a legendary high score, Balatro delivers.

We have these titles and more for the Xbox Series X, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and Playstation 4 and 5 at ICPL. All card holders are eligible to check out video games; you may have two checked out per account. Games are located on the first floor behind the Help Desk.

—Brian Visser, Iowa City Public Library

The “I” in Incarceration

A new column from behind bars.

BY BENJaMIN SKEErS

Although I’ve never considered myself a criminal, for as long as I can remember I’ve always worried about going to prison. The unrelenting fear of incarceration has long been my personal existential cross to bear. Some people obsess over what happens after we die. I panicked over whether or not I could go to the bathroom in front of other people.

Prison always seemed to be a fate worse than death: the absolute worst thing to befall a human being. I got in trouble for a lot of little things as a kid, nothing major. But the fear of being locked up seemed as real as arthritis or Alzheimer’s, something that would simply happen when I hit a certain age.

I was afraid of prison. Afraid of the other inmates, that they would all be dangerous; afraid of the boredom, afraid of the food. I bought into the image created by TV and film: a cinder block bursting with violence and suffering.

Like I said, I never considered myself a criminal. In fact, I like to think I’m a “good guy.” I’ve always been kind, and pride myself as a ride-or-die friend. I have both my bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in social work and have a 15-year career in the field. And I’ve been in prison since Jan. 9, 2024.

As I reached my mid-20s, my mental health became a liability. I have bipolar disorder, a condition that can lead to risky behavior and poor decision making. I describe my manic episodes as feeling like I’m drunk without having had a drop to drink. It’s a good feeling, with disastrous results. For a long time it manifested in emotional outbursts, mood swings and wild spending. There were bursts of creativity paired with substance abuse. And finally, in my early 40s, just as the world was opening up after a pandemic, I committed the crime that brought me here, a year into a 10-year sentence.

It is painful for me to talk about my crime. The shame still lingers, like a cancer in my very bones and cells. But if we are going to go on this journey together, it is important you hear it from me. I was in my second year of working as a therapist. I had been successful, enjoying praise from clients and colleagues alike. Sometime after the worst of COVID was over, the excitement of the vaccine rollout swept me up and I fell into a severe manic state. Having dealt with a bipolar diagnosis my

whole life, the mania wasn’t new, but this time it was extreme. I made a terrible mistake during this manic event and communicated with a client about psilocybin mushrooms. After a year on pre-trial release, I was sentenced for a controlled substance violation; conspiracy to deliver, a class C felony. I’m deeply ashamed of what I did, the harm I caused and I don’t know if I’ll ever move past it.

I used to think I’d kill myself if I ever had to go to prison. When I found out what I was facing, I attempted suicide. Call it fate, call it luck, call it divine intervention—I survived. And although I find myself writing this from my nightmare scenario, I am grateful for being given a second chance.

What have I found behind these cement walls? A mixed bag, to be sure. There are elements out of my greatest fears. I have a wife and two sons who I miss so bad it hurts. And “boredom” isn’t even the correct word for the kind of non-existence I endure. But there are blessings, too. I have the great fortune of being the GED tutor, helping guys better themselves. I have friends. I have a routine. I have hope.

Here inside they don’t call us “inmates” or “convicts” like on TV. They call us “incarcerated individuals.” But we know what we are. Prisoners. Different from free people. We’ve done things society deems so atrocious that we are kept hidden away, separated from our families. It weighs on you, this separation. It changes the way you think about yourself, the way you see yourself in the world.

A week before writing this I got “laid down.” That’s prison talk for being denied parole. A second year of separation. A second year of doubt. A second year of shame made manifest. It came as a blow to me and my family. The first year felt like a lifetime; it’s hard to imagine more. But I’m determined not to let it break me. I’m determined to be a husband and a father. I’m determined not to become bitter. And if you’ll join me, I’ll share my story.

En Español

Las mentiras de la ciencia ficción capitalista

Por más que lo intenten, los multimillonarios tecnológicos no tienen el monopolio de imaginar el futuro.

EScrITO Y TraDUcIDO POr

VIOLETa Vaca DELGaDO

La novela de ciencia ficción Snow Crash (1992) de Neil Stephenson anticipó un futuro de ciudades ultraprecarias gobernadas por grandes corporaciones, planteó la expansión de un potente cibervirus y, sobre todo, desarrolló la idea de metaverso como realidad virtual. Poco después de su publicación, varias empresas de Silicon Valley la eligieron lectura obligatoria para sus equipos creativos y, en 2021, Mark Zuckerberg, dueño de Facebook, escogió Meta como nuevo nombre de su conglomerado digital. Esta es la anécdota con la que el escritor argentino Michel Nieva comienza “Ciencia ficción capitalista. Cómo los multimillonarios nos salvarán del fin del mundo” (Anagrama, 2024), un ensayo cargado de ironía que explora los vínculos del género con el capitalismo (¡y con algunos grupos marxistas!).

El campo literario está plagado de conflictos, pero una idea común persiste entre lectores y escritores: la ciencia ficción no es literatura, al menos no una de la que enorgullecerse. No importa que autoras como Samantha Schweblin, Liliana Colanzi, Fernanda Trías o Andrea Chapela—antigua alumna del MFA en Escritura Creativa en Español de la Universidad de Iowa—estén cultivando el género con maestría. No importa que un premio Nobel de la talla de Kazuo Ishiguro escriba Nunca me abandones, ni tampoco que el mismísimo Lenin considerara relevante opinar sobre la visión que H.G. Wells tenía de los alienígenas. Ni es seria ni es literatura.

Y puede que tengan razón: “La ciencia ficción se parece menos a Shakespeare o a Cervantes que a unos robots atacando un museo,” afirma Nieva. Y es que la ciencia ficción es performativa. Hace mundo. Mientras las posiciones literarias más conservadoras insisten en despreciarla, considerándola banal, infantil o escapista, las grandes empresas tecnológicas

cUaNDO ELON MUSK

PLaNTEa EL FaLSO DILEMa

DE QUE La cOLONIZacIÓN

PLaNETarIa ES La ÚNIca

aLTErNaTIVa a La EXTINcIÓN, MIENTE. EXISTEN MÁS

OPcIONES, Y La PrUEBa

ES QUE La hUMaNIDaD ES caPaZ DE IMaGINarLaS.

se sirven de ella para transformar brutalmente la experiencia humana y el espacio. La humanidad tiene dos caminos posibles, opina Elon Musk, “quedarse en la tierra y eventualmente extinguirse, o transformarse en una civilización espacial, una especie cósmica”. ¿Por qué no convertir la tierra en el apéndice sucio y pobre de Marte?

No se trata de que debamos escribir ciencia ficción a la fuerza, ni siquiera de que nos guste. Se trata de no asumir la derrota en la batalla por la imaginación. “La ciencia ficción capitalista,” escribe Nieva, “es la violencia que restringe el monopolio de imaginar nuestro futuro a las corporaciones.” Despreciar en masa los géneros especulativos—la ciencia ficción, el terror, lo fantástico—implica ceder a las grandes empresas, y solo a ellas, el poder de diseñar futuros posibles.

¿Por qué ignorar las propuestas de Ursula K. Le Guin, Octavia E. Butler o Kim Stanley Robinson, autores que inventan realidades que nos ayudan a entender mejor la nuestra? ¿Por qué no escuchar a las comunidades indígenas que “viajan al futuro” para

avisarnos de un fin del mundo que ya padecieron? Cuando Elon Musk plantea el falso dilema de que la colonización planetaria es la única alternativa a la extinción, miente. Existen más opciones, y la prueba es que la humanidad es capaz de imaginarlas. No dejemos que solo los ricos piensen y transformen el espacio a costa del dolor de la mayoría. Quienes creemos en una existencia más justa, equitativa y diversa, estamos dispuestos a defender nuestras amenazantes propuestas. No se lo pongamos tan fácil.

Violeta Vaca Delgado (Huelva, España, 1991) es estudiante actual del MFA en Escritura Creativa en Español de la Universidad de Iowa. En España, obtuvo el grado en Matemáticas y el grado Literaturas Comparadas por la Universidad de Granada.

The Lies of Capitalist Sci-Fi

Try as they might, tech billionaires don’t have a monopoly on imagining the future.

WrITTEN aND TraNSLaTED BY

VIOLETa Vaca DELGaDO

The science fiction novel Snow Crash (1992) by Neal Stephenson anticipated a future of ultra-precarious cities ruled by massive corporations, proposed the expansion of a powerful cybervirus, and, above all, developed the idea of “metaverse” as virtual reality. Shortly after its publication, several Silicon Valley companies made it required reading for their creative teams. In 2021, Mark Zuckerberg, owner of Facebook, chose Meta as the new name for his digital conglomerate.

With this anecdote, Argentinian writer Michel Nieva begins “Capitalist Science Fiction: How Billionaires Will Save Us from the End of the World” (Anagrama, 2024), a brief, ironic essay that explores the connections between sci-fi and capitalism (and some Marxist groups, too!).

The literary field is full of conflicts, but a common assumption lingers among both readers and authors: science fiction is not literature, at least not one to be proud of, even if you happen to write it. It doesn’t matter if fascinating authors like Samantha Schweblin, Liliana Colanzi, Fernanda Trías, or Andrea Chapela—former student of the MFA in Spanish Creative Writing at the University of Iowa— are mastering the genre. It doesn’t matter that a Nobel laureate like Kazuo Ishiguro wrote Never Let Me Go,

Collage by Kate Doolittle / Little Village Public Domain images

nor that Lenin himself thought it was relevant to comment on H.G. Wells’ view of aliens. It is neither serious nor literature.

And they might be right: “Science fiction resembles less Shakespeare or Cervantes than a bunch of robots attacking a museum,” says Nieva. Because science fiction is performative. It creates the world. While the most conservative literary perspectives continue to despise the genre, considering it trivial, childish or escapist, the big tech companies are using it to radically transform human experience and space. Humankind has two possible futures, according to Elon Musk: “It’s going to become multi-planetary, or it’s going to be confined to one planet, until some eventual extinction event.” Why not turn Earth into the dirty, poor appendix of Mars?

It’s not that we should be forced to write science fiction, nor that we must like it. It’s about refusing to give up the crucial battle for imagination. “Capitalist science fiction,” writes Nieva, “is the violence that confines the monopoly of imagining our future to corporations.” To dismiss speculative genres—

WhEN ELON MUSK PrESENTS ThE FaLSE DILEMMa ThaT PLaNETarY cOLONIZaTION IS ThE ONLY aLTErNaTIVE TO EXTINcTION, hE LIES. ThErE arE MOrE OPTIONS, aND ThE PrOOF IS ThaT hUMaNITY caN IMaGINE ThEM.

science fiction, horror, the fantastic—in bulk means surrendering the power to shape the future to the big companies, and only to them.

Why ignore the proposals of Ursula K. Le Guin, Octavia E. Butler or Kim Stanley Robinson, authors who invent realities that help us better understand our own? Why not listen to indigenous communities who “travel to the future” to warn us of an end of the world they have already endured? When Elon Musk presents the false dilemma that planetary colonization is the only alternative to extinction, he lies. There are more options, and the proof is that humanity can imagine them.

We can’t let the rich think and transform space at the cost of the pain of the majority. Those of us who still believe in a more diverse, equitable and inclusive existence are ready to defend our threatening proposals. Let’s not make it so easy for them.

Violeta Vaca Delgado (Huelva, Spain, 1991) is currently an MFA student in Spanish Creative Writing at the University of Iowa. In Spain, she graduated in Mathematics and Comparative Literature from the University of Granada.

KNOWLEDGE INTO ACTION THE MUSEUM’S COLLECTION AS A CATALYST

JANUARY 7 – MAY 19, 2025

EVERYTHING LEFT UNSAID

JANUARY 23 – MARCH 30, 2025

NaNoWriMo

No More

After a series of scandals engulfed the organization behind National Novel Writing Month, some longtime Iowan participants are embracing local alternatives.

BY JENNa WaNG

Halloween night. A stream of costumed people enter the brightly lit confines of the Coralville Perkins. They set up shop in the back dining room. At the stroke of midnight, dead silence ensues—save for the rapid clicking of keys and pens scribbling on paper.

“I’m sure this is not the weirdest thing that has happened at a late-night Perkins,” writer and Iowa City resident Emily Schulz joked of the local tradition. It was the kickoff of another National Novel Writing Month, or “NaNoWriMo” for short. Those who dared would attempt to write 50,000 words between Nov. 1 and 30 to produce the roughest of novel first drafts, leaving all notions of perfectionism and procrastination behind.

What started as a challenge amongst friends in 1999 in the San Francisco Bay area soon grew into an international phenomenon. NaNoWriMo became a 501c3 nonprofit in 2006, and under its umbrella came a range of resources: a progresstracking website, a Young Writers Program, tools to prep and publish, pep talks and more. Perhaps the biggest asset it offered aspiring novelists was its community-building power. Novelists could chat with each other freely through online forums, forming local and global friendships.

When Schulz crossed the 50,000-word mark for the first time in 2009, her first instinct wasn’t to scream or shout. It was a quiet moment in a downtown Iowa City pizzeria in which everything seemed to click.

“It was a horrible book, don’t get me wrong. It will not see the light of day,” she said of the draft. “But at the same time, it’s like, ‘I can do this. I can tell an entire story. I can come in on deadline,’ and I would not have had that experience but for NaNoWriMo.”

NaNoWriMo proved that the dreaded blank white page was easier to tackle with a support system. A number of published authors have emerged with bestsellers from the challenge, such as Marissa Meyers, Sara Gruen, Erin Morgenstern and Rainbow Rowell.

Not surprisingly, the event found solid footing in Iowa. Author Grant Faulkner, an Oskaloosa native and Grinnell College grad, led the nonprofit

as an executive director for 12 years, 2012 to 2023. There are seven regional groups spread across the Hawkeye State, which include Iowa City—home to the UNESCO City of Literature and the renowned Iowa Writers Workshop—and the Central Iowa Authors (CIA for short). Other groups meet in Cedar Rapids, Siouxland and the Quad Cities.

For a decade and a half, Schultz never let a November pass without attempting the challenge. But 2024 was the year she decided to quit.

The future and legacy of NaNoWriMo is currently in peril, its organization embroiled in a series of controversies involving poor moderation of online forums, endangerment of child participants, out-of-touch statements about AI and abysmal crisis management. What’s left is a reportedly barebones organizational staff of three and a fractured global community.

Some stand by the organization. Others denounce it. Many more waver within the grey, feeling grief but not ready to completely sever ties for good. Out of the ashes, new perspectives on group writing challenges and alternatives to NaNoWriMo are arising in Iowa.

‘how not to handle the situation’

NaNoWriMo’s massive network of endurance writers—412,295 across 671 regions in six continents in 2022—have always relied on several hundred local volunteers, called municipal liaisons. MLs were responsible for organizing in-person writing events, dispensing advice and fostering relationships through regional chat rooms.

The importance of MLs became clear to the Iowa City chapter after a longtime ML, Marie Raven, moved overseas a few years ago. “It was a really

great community, and it hasn’t really come back together since she left,” Schulz said.

Writer Kendra Gauge stepped up as a co-ML for Iowa City in 2023, despite living nearly 50 minutes away in Winfield. That “ended up being the year that everything fell apart.”

The nonprofit’s many controversies are laid out on nanoscandal.com. The first major backlash came from allegations that a forum moderator was luring young chatters to a fetish website, on which they were vulnerable to predators and child sexual abuse imagery. Teenaged participants also accused moderators in the Young Writers Program forums of allowing racism and discrimination to go unpunished.

“When they were confronted with evidence that this was happening, their first thing was to just stick their heads in the sand for a bit before they did anything,” Schulz said of NaNoWriMo’s response. “It was just how not to handle the situation.”

NaNo’s leaders decided to shut down the forums entirely, which dealt a swift blow to community engagement and wiped out years of conversations.

How the organization chose to communicate with its most dedicated volunteers didn’t help. NaNoWriMo allegedly tried to install a new ML agreement that, although more comprehensive, would place far more liability on the volunteers regarding issues like child safety at in-person events, without adequate organizational support.

Gauge said some MLs showed the agreement to their attorneys and were told not to sign. Numerous MLs began to resign as their concerns went unaddressed.

The org responded by removing every ML from their system.

“They get mad at us like it’s our fault,” Des

Emily Schultz works at her favorite writing spot, The Green House in Iowa City, ahead of a deadline. Jordan Sellergren / Little Village

Moines writer Stephanie Caffrey said. “It’s our fault that things are taking so long. We are asking too many questions, we are raising too many concerns.”

As a former co-ML of the Central Iowa Authors, a community she had been writing with since she began NaNoWriMo in 2010, Caffrey noted how poor the communication has been from the acting head of the organization, Kilby Blades.

“It feels like NaNoWriMo doesn’t exist in the way it did anymore, because it really stemmed from the volunteers,” Gauge said. “Yes, you have the people at headquarters that brought all the volunteers together and gave them the mission of bringing communities together, but they can’t really do that without the volunteers. They were the ones that made it happen and made it real.”

anti-aI ableism?

The straw that broke the camel’s back for many participants came in August of 2024, when the organization released a statement on artificial intelligence.

“NaNoWriMo does not explicitly support any specific approach to writing, nor does it explicitly condemn any approach, including the use of AI,” it began.

FOr a DEcaDE aND a haLF, SchULZ NEVEr LET a NOVEMBEr PaSS WIThOUT aTTEMPTING ThE chaLLENGE. BUT 2024 WaS ThE YEar ShE DEcIDED TO QUIT.

“We also want to be clear in our belief that the categorical condemnation of Artificial Intelligence has classist and ableist undertones, and that questions around the use of AI tie to questions around privilege.”

An outpouring of criticism followed, much of it from within the NaNoWriMo community. People rejected the insinuation that disabled or lowincome writers would need AI to produce quality work. They pointed to the fact generative AI tools repackage copyrighted work, require too much electricity to power, and are prone to the same biases as their programmers, among other concerns.

“It’s like, AI did not have the crappy childhood and the level of passive aggression needed to write an interesting piece,” Schultz said. “Human artists should be the people that generate art.”

Several members on the Writers Board resigned; one, Daniel José Older, pointed to the fact NaNoWriMo took a sponsorship from ProWritingAid, a generative AI-driven editing and writing assistant tool.

“Your position on AI is vile, craven and unconscionable,” Older wrote in his resignation letter. “You are harming writers and you are harming the planet.”

The org tried to clarify its statement, saying it takes issue with “situational abuse of AI,” but the damage was done. Well-known authors distanced themselves from the organization and sponsors stepped down.

Cave Writing Magazine’s NaNoWriMo kickoff event on Nov. 1, 2024 at the Center for Language and Cultural Learning at the University of Iowa. Courtesy of Cave Writing Magazine

and a number of monthly donors.

Schulz said that even without NaNoWriMo, those in Iowa City, Cedar Rapids and the surrounding region still have access to spaces like the Writers’ Rooms—a volunteer-run organization that supports genre and topic-based “rooms” for Iowan writers to share and improve their craft.

“It was one of those few places where you can say, ‘I’m writing a book,’ and people don’t look at you like you’re weird,” she said of Iowa City. “They’re like, ‘tell me about that.’”

The Writers’ Rooms co-founders, who originally met at a NaNoWriMo session, tapped Schulz to create something similar. Now, Schulz is the co-concierge of the Parchment Lounge, which functions as a weekly free-write room every Monday at the Iowa City Public Library, offering a place for participants from near and far to “write and commiserate.”

“IT’S LIKE, aI DID NOT haVE ThE craPPY chILDhOOD aND ThE LEVEL OF PaSSIVE aGGrESSION NEEDED TO WrITE aN INTErESTING PIEcE. hUMaN

arTISTS ShOULD BE ThE PEOPLE ThaT GENEraTE arT.” — EMILY SCHULZ

University of Iowa sophomore McKenzie Capito, a NaNoWriMo participant since her freshman year of high school and an assistant executive editor of UI’s Cave Writing Magazine, said she believes the backlash was excessive.

“I think it comes down to, if we’re going to cancel someone over AI, why are we canceling this tiny nonprofit that has created a really vibrant global writing community?” said Capito, whose two novel drafts she credits to the challenge. “I think that is so powerful and that nobody else has done. I feel like I can’t overlook the good that NaNoWriMo has done for me, for the writing community overall.”

Out of the wreckage

Schulz believes the organization is not going to last much longer. She knows “nonprofits live and die by their fundraising,” and she’s seen an increase in emails from the org begging donations. According to one email sent in 2024, they’d been operating at a budget deficit four out of the past six years. The org had lost several of its grants, corporate sponsorships

Central Iowa Authors participate in a Write All Night write-in at the Johnston Public Library on Nov. 1, 2024. Courtesy of Stephanie Caffrey

CIA has rebranded as CIA Inkwell. With an active Facebook page, Discord channel and leadership board composed of all volunteers in place, the org launched Inkathon in August. Caffrey—a former ML who began her career as a published romance-suspense novelist through NaNoWriMo— said there are some key differences between NaNo and Inkathon. Participants could set their own goals instead of a hard 50,000 words, and were given trading cards as they hit new milestones.

“We were really worried that there would be some difficult people who’d be like, ‘No, it’s NaNoWriMo,’” Caffrey said. “But a lot of people were like, ‘Yes, we would rather give our donations to the group. We would rather because we see the

fruits of our labors.”

The “Write All Night” kick-off event on Nov. 1, 2024 was a familiarly jovial occasion (even if the year’s theme was “serial killers”) with a potluckfueled flurry of writing. In-person write-ins bounced between local libraries and restaurants, often to better turnout than expected.

After the run was over, the group’s compiled stats revealed that its 148 participants spent 50 hours together, writing a total of 404,500 words. Caffrey’s own 11-year-old son, who often accompanies her to events, hit his own goal of 15,000 words in his retelling of Dante’s Inferno from a middle-grade perspective.

Caffrey said one key thing that didn’t change with their emancipation from NaNoWriMo was CIA’s motto: “Yay, crap!”

“Apparently at one of the write-ins late at night, someone was like, ‘Oh my gosh, I just wrote a big steaming pile of crap,’ and then someone cheered, ‘Yay, crap!’ That became our [way of saying], ‘Yes, your writing on the page is not going to be your best work, but that’s the whole point.’ You’re not going to end November with a publishable novel, but celebrate what you have written—even if it is crap.”

While Capito supports these alternatives, she said she isn’t holding out hope that they can match the scale or sense of global community that NaNoWriMo has fostered. That’s why she plans to continue to use the platform for as long as it exists.

Schulz, Caffrey and Gauge are keeping an eye on NaNo leadership, waiting to see whether they can turn around a ship that may already be sunk.

“If someone new comes in and they take it in a new direction, I might consider it,” Caffrey said of the possibility of going back. “But right now, I feel like it’s lost its shine for me.”

“You need a community to build a community, you need the people that are going to work together, and if you get one person in the wrong position at the wrong time, it can fall apart,” Gauge said. “But I think a lot of things can also grow out of the wreckage, so to speak.”

Lynch’s Iowa Odyssey

How the beloved filmmaker brought his brand of weird Americana to the Hawkeye State.

BY MIKE KUhLENBEcK

David Lynch, called “America’s first surrealist filmmaker” by actor Dennis Hopper, died in Los Angeles at age 78 on Jan. 16, four days shy of his 79th birthday.

Whether it was filmmaking, painting, writing, music, carpentry or fast food, Lynch’s passions were boundless. Navigating a world that is “wild at heart and weird on top,” (to quote his film Wild At Heart), the director’s life, like his career, was filled with twists and turns. He turned his camera on the nooks and crannies of this strange country, including eastern Iowa.

Still from David Lynch’s The Straight Story. via STUDIOCANAL

Lynch was born on Jan. 20, 1946 in Missoula, Montana. His father’s work as a USDA scientist moved the family around the country to Boise, Idaho, Spokane, Washington, Durham, North Carolina, and Alexandria, Virginia, where he attended high school.

An Eagle Scout, Lynch was a seemingly clean-cut kid, a kind of poster child for conservative America in the Eisenhower era.

“Growing up, David Lynch had an almost blissfully happy childhood—something you would never expect from the tortured visions of childhood and parenthood that appear in every one of his films,” according Scott Knickelbine, author of the unauthorized Welcome to Twin Peaks. “But the sensitive boy did begin to realize that there was a darker reality behind the bland surroundings he grew up in.”

“...I FELL IN LOVE WITh IT. I ThINK IT WaS ThE EMOTION IN ThaT ScrIPT. EMOTION IS aN aBSTracTION, aND I WaNTED TO SEE IF I cOULD GET ThaT EMOTION TO cOME OUT OF ThE FILM.”

— DAVID LYNCH ON 'THE STRAIGHT STORY'

The seed for The Straight Story, a 1999 Lynch film shot in Iowa, was planted in co-screenwriter Mary Sweeney’s mind when she saw a human interest story in the New York Times: “Brotherly Love Powers a

Lawn Mower Trek,” published on Aug. 25, 1994. The article details the Midwestern odyssey of 73-year-old Alvin Straight, who drove 240 miles from Laurens, Iowa (about 30 miles northwest of Storm Lake) to visit his ailing 80-year-old brother, Henry, in Mount Zion, Wisconsin.

The curious news item struck a nerve with Sweeney, a film editor who dated (and was briefly married to) Lynch. She was born in Madison, Wisconsin, and the couple spent some of their summers in Madison. Two years after Alvin Straight’s death in 1996, Sweeney obtained the rights to his life story.

Originally, Lynch had “zero interest” in directing the film.

“I’d heard about it because Mary Sweeney was my girlfriend and had been talking about it for three years,” Lynch said at a 2009 AFI forum. “She and her childhood friend John Roach wrote the script, and I read it, and I fell in love with it. I think it was the emotion in that script. Emotion is an abstraction, and I wanted to see if I could get that emotion to come out of the film.”

Shooting commenced in September 1998. Laurens has a population of fewer than 1,300 people, and like a lot of small towns, the most prominent landmark is the water tower bearing its name. As Lynch recalled in Paul A. Wood’s book Weirdsville U.S.A., “It’s a very small town. There’s just this one main street, and there are several similar areas off of it, but it’s very small.”

In The Straight Story, we meet the ruggedly independent farmworker Alvin Straight, played by Richard Farnsworth, whose failing hips force him to walk using a pair of canes. Due to his poor eyesight, he is denied a driver’s license. His daughter Rose,

played by Sissy Spacek, lives with him and builds birdhouses. She speaks with a stutter, but “has a mind like a bear trap.”

The scene in which Alvin and his daughter Rose sit next to each other while watching a lightning storm through the window illustrates Lynch’s magic. The phone rings. They receive news that Alvin’s brother, changed from Henry to “Lyle” in the film, had a stroke. The brothers haven’t spoken to each other in 10 years.

“My brother and I said some unforgivable things when we last saw each other,” Alvin somberly recalls, comparing their falling out to the story of Cain and Abel. Wanting to “sit under the stars” with his brother like they did when they were kids in Montana, Alvin decides he’s going on the road one last time.

Alvin’s journey has a rocky start when his red lawnmower breaks down, forcing him back to town. Lynch has a talent for building suspense with unexpected humor—Alvin calmly walks through the kitchen with a rifle, heads to the backyard, takes aim and puts the machine “out to pasture.” He then buys a green ’66 John Deere lawnmower, hitches a trailer with his camping provisions, and hits the trail again.

Filmed along the actual route traveled by the real Alvin Straight, we see an Iowa (or “I-O-WAY,” as he calls it) that is intimately familiar, with tractors chugging along endless fields, RAGBRAI bicyclists and even a Casey’s gas station. When we enter the homes, backyards, bars and hardware stores, they look real, like they’ve been lived in. Lynch’s hawk-like eye for detail went beyond what can be seen in the frame.

As always, Lynch is fluent in the absurd; at one point, Alvin feasts on the meat of a roadkill deer while being “watched” by a herd of plastic deer decoys.

“It is important to deliver certain emotional messages, but not to make them literal, then the audience arrives there for themselves, and they feel it for themselves,” co-screenwriter John Roach said. “The minute you name it, you kill it.”

During Alvin’s odyssey, we discover the memories and tragedies beneath his weathered exterior, and the hope still twinkling in his eyes. Recounting his military service, he says, “I fought in the trenches of World War II. Why should I be afraid of a cornfield?”

The conversations and their rhythms always strike an authentic chord—simple truths, delivered without sermonizing, as when Alvin tells some young partygoers, “The worst part about getting old is remembering when you were young,” to lighthearted jabs about Wisconsin as “a real party place” filled with “cheddar heads.”

As grounded in reality as The Straight Story is, this Iowa seems as far away and mysterious as the places you only see in dreams.

The film was distributed in the U.S. by the Disney Corporation, premiering at the May 1999 Cannes Film Festival. Stranger than the Disney emblem near Lynch’s name, the film was awarded a “G” rating from the Motion Picture Association of America.

A lesser filmmaker would have reduced the locals to corny caricatures and drenched the narrative in saccharine sentimentality. Fortunately, Lynch was at the helm, and we are given a timeless story of the human heart.

“It’s falling in love with ideas, and the beautiful process of translating those ideas to film,” Lynch said in the 2009 interview. “It’s also about going into another world and experiencing that. That’s what it’s like going into a theater. It’s best, at least for me, to not know anything about the film, and the lights go down, the curtains open, and you enter another world. It’s so beautiful.”

Even after filming on The Straight Story had wrapped and Lynch returned to Los Angeles, he never really left Iowa.

A practitioner of Transcendental Meditation, he started the David Lynch Foundation in 2005, which has its center in Fairfield, Iowa. He was a frequent visitor, and always a welcome guest into this strange corner of the world.

In 2019, Lynch was awarded an honorary Academy Award. He thanked the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and “all the people who helped me along the road.”

From your fans and friends in Iowa: Good night, David.

‘I

Had a Dream About This Place’

David Lynch was famously fond of Bob’s Big Boy, visiting the greasy spoon “just about every day” in the mid-’70s/ early ‘80s. Classic American diners also feature heavily in his work, from Twin Peaks’ Double R to the dreamlike Winkie’s Diner in Mulholland Drive

“There’s a safety in thinking in a diner,” the late director wrote in his book Catching the Big Fish: Meditation, Consciousness, and Creativity. “You can have your coffee or your milk shake, and you can go off into strange dark areas, and always come back to the safety of the diner.”

Have your own Lynchian experience at one of these downhome Iowa restaurants. Find 40+ more recommendations at littlevillagemag.com/lynchian-diners.

• Drake Diner, 1111 25th St, Des Moines

• Papa Kern’s Cafe, 304 E 30th St #3718, Des Moines

• Waveland Cafe, 4708 University Ave, Des Moines

• Sugar Shack Diner, 550 36th Ave SW Suite J, Altoona

• Pleasant Hill Diner, 5015 E University Ave, Pleasant Hill

• Frontier Cafe, 831 Main St, Grinnell

• Rock N Roll Dairy Bar & Raceway, 1110 S Madison Ave, Ottumwa

• Mikhael’s, 1426 6th St SW, Cedar Rapids

• Tee’s Ice Cream & Burgers, 838 Park Ave, Muscatine

• Morg’s, 520 Mulberry St, Waterloo

• J’s Homestyle Cooking, 1724 W 31st St #4831, Cedar Falls

• Hamburg Inn No. 2, 214 N Linn St, Iowa City

• Midtown Family Restaurant, 1069 IA-1 & 200 Scott Ct, Iowa City

• Papa Ozz, 3338 John F Kennedy Rd, Dubuque

• City Limits Family Restaurant, 906 S Main St, Maquoketa

Frankie Schneckloth / Little Village

Skin in the Game

xBk is growing bigger and smaller at the same time. And they’ve got more than gigs to offer local musicians.

BY LIZ rOSa

When Tobi Parks opened a 250-capacity music venue in Des Moines’ Drake neighborhood in 2019, she was enacting her plan B.

“I think it always goes back to this idea: I was a musician [and] when I first started it was always like, yeah, you can be a musician but always have a plan B, and you’ll probably end up living that plan B. Case in point, I am a musician turned lawyer,” she said. “We need to create a pathway for artists to be able to have their art be their plan A and be able to stick with it and make it viable.”

Parks isn’t all talk. Last month, her venue xBk Live launched the Creative Entrepreneurship Program (C.E.P.), which offers a “blend of workshops, mentorship and networking opportunities led by industry experts and successful entrepreneurs. Participants will learn key business skills including marketing, financial management, and strategic planning, all tailored specifically for creative industries,” according to xBk’s website.

“We’re primarily focused on musicians and music-related performers … on the artist who wants to make a new album or wants to make a career as a musician.”

Parks is the mastermind behind the 12-week program, in which each class is a stepping stone to creating a cohesive business plan. The idea is to give musicians and creative individuals an actionable set of goals to carry out.

“I’ve done a lot of work with U.S. Banks and the Iowa Center for Economic Success—a local corporate finance group that does small business lending, primarily helping small businesses and minority business owners … I wanted to do a collaboration with them highlighting small businesses in the

Midwest,” Parks said.

“For artists to be artists we need them to think that [what] they’re [doing is] art, but also a little business. It's important to give them the training and access to capital in the same ways that other small businesses [need] to thrive … They really liked the idea to do a micro lending program facilitated through the Iowa Center, and xBk will be host to the entrepreneurship classes.”

And so, the program was born. xBk partnered with the Iowa Center of Economic Success and U.S. Bank to offer a microloan to participants who

for a loan over a grant is intentional.

“The funding that we’ve received through U.S. Bank would be facilitated through the Iowa Center. The good thing about the Iowa Center is that their whole process is around very low interest rates,” Parks explained.

“We [considered] trying to do a grant program, but with businesses, part of it is that you have skin in the game. When you look at things like a grant, you have a different mindset than if you have skin in the game; you’re betting on yourself. That’s why we made it into a micro lending program. So,

attend the majority of the C.E.P programs and exhibit a clear plan and drive for success. The choice

—TOBI PARKS

ideally, we’ll do this first round with this cohort of folks, they’ll take out their microloans [and] when they pay them back, it’ll be a revolving fund to continually be there [for future participants].”

While xBk has managed to grow and evolve in NTED TO cr E aTE SOMET h ING T haT WaS LESS a BOUT T h E NIG h TLIFE cOMPONENT a ND LSO a SM a LLE r , MO r E INTIM aTE SPac E T haT OULD BE a cr E aTIVE L a BO raTO rY. M aYBE NIG h TS W h E r E LO ca L SONGW r ITE r S ca N GET TOGET h E r a ND NOT GET SO BENT ON SELLING TI c KETS O r BOOZE. [IT’S a BOUT] cr E aTIVES GETTING TOGET h E r .”

Historic Fire House no. 11, next door to xBk, will soon house an extension of the venue and a multicultural bookstore. Avery Staker / LIttle Village

Courtney Guein, 2022 / Little Village

its first five years, music venues in general have had a rough half-decade. COVID-19, the swift drying up of state and federal pandemic assistance, skyhigh costs of living and the escalating economic, constitutional and civil rights crises caused by the new Trump administration have made local support more precious than ever.

“Our local music scene got really decimated through the pandemic,” Parks said. “It stunted a lot of our live local music scene. People weren’t getting together to jam anymore … actually going and spending time with people in the community. So, my hope is not only to make their art their career but also to help create more community. The more creative people get together, connect, swap ideas and ideate together, really great things come out of it.”

In addition to CEP, xBk will be opening an additional, smaller space to host events and shows.

Parks purchased the old firehouse building at 1163 24th St at the height of the pandemic, intending to use the space for a project. But after considering finances, she eventually renovated the building to include two retail spaces. One is rented to Nos Books, the first physical location of the family-run bookshop, and the second will be an ancillary space for xBk.

“I wanted to create something that was less about the nightlife component and also a smaller, more intimate space that could be a creative laboratory,” Parks said. “Maybe nights where local songwriters can get together and not get so bent on selling tickets or booze. [It’s about] creatives getting together.”

Like the main venue, this ancillary space will be available to book for private or public events. Artists who are interested in playing a show at xBk but don’t have a big enough crowd to book the space will be able to play shows at the smaller location in the ancillary space. They also plan to host non-music gatherings, such as a monthly sewing meet-up.

“I want it to be a space where people can get together, socialize and create new ideas in a unique spot,” Parks said.

So although this xBk project wasn’t part of Parks’ original plan, her dedication and commitment to the Des Moines arts community continues to expand.

“I wanted to create a place where anybody and everybody, regardless of their background, could come and feel comfortable and feel like they belong,” Parks said. “And, on top of that, what matters and what’s important to musicians when they play venues … I want this to be the venue that, when people come to the Midwest, they’re like ‘oh, I want to play that place.’ It all goes back to trying to create a community in Des Moines.”

The CEP meets every second Saturday of every month at 1163 24th St, Des Moines. Everyone is welcome to attend. xBk’s ancillary space is anticipated to open in March.

Book Talk

Headlining the revamped DSM Book Festival are four stellar writers from different backgrounds and genres— each with an Iowa counterpart.

BY cOLSON ThaYEr

In an increasingly digital world, connecting over a common interest in real life is even more meaningful.

“It’s person to person. It’s getting recommendations. It’s finding out from your friends or people you admire what they’re reading,” said C.J. Box, the author behind the Western mystery series Joe Pickett. “You just got to get out there and start.”

Box is one of four headlining authors for the DSM Book Festival on March 22. Beaverdale Books will host the free day of author talks, panel discussions, children’s activities (courtesy of the Des Moines Public Library), vendors and book recommendations galore.

“It’s just continuing to offer what we offer and making books and thoughts and ideas available for everybody,” said Jan Danielson Kaiser, Beaverdale Books’ events and marketing coordinator and the lead organizer for the DSM Book Festival.

In 2019, the Greater Des Moines Partnership presented the first DSM Book Festival at Capital Square downtown. After some leadership changes, Beaverdale Books took over this year’s event, with financial support from the Beaverdale Neighborhood Association.

“I think it’s kind of unique that a bookstore is putting it on—that we are the presenting sponsor,” Kaiser said. “There’s going to be so many things to learn and so many people to talk with that I could guarantee there would be something of interest to just about anybody.”

The first author presenting on March 22 is Claire Lombardo, a bestselling fiction writer (The Most Fun We Ever Had, Same As It Ever Was) from Oak Park, Illinois. Her 10 a.m. talk is moderated by fellow novelist Kali Van Baale, an Iowa resident.

At noon is presidential historian and commentator

You Never Forget Your First: A Biography of George Washington), who Kaiser considers to be “a young Doris Kearns Goodwin.” The L.A.-born, New

York-based writer’s talk is presented by the Iowa Historical Society.

A year removed from his basketball-centric presentation at Mission Creek Festival 2024, culture critic Hanif Abdurraqib (A Little Devil in America: Notes in Praise of Black Performance, There's Always This Year: On Basketball and Ascension) is DSM Book Fest’s 2 p.m. headliner. A spoken word poet from Columbus, Ohio turned essayist and MacArthur Fellow, Abdurraqib is sure to find chemistry with Iowa City spoken word performer and author Caleb “The Negro Artist” Rainey.

Rounding out the afternoon is C.J. Box, a Wyoming wordsmith with more than 30 published novels under his belt, translated into 27 languages.

“It’s always interesting to get the perspective of readers in different parts of the country, and in some cases, different parts of the world,” said Box. His 4:30 p.m. talk is moderated by Iowa’s own Heather Gudenkauf, whose novel Everyone is Watching is her 10th in the thriller/mystery genre.

Kaiser said the spread of featured authors were booked with “every demographic in mind.” The cost of entry—free—also serves this purpose.

“We just hope to make it as accessible to everybody as possible,” Kaiser said. “We’ve had wonderful comments from people who appreciate that there’s going to be free parking and that they won't have to drive all the way downtown.”

DSM Book Fest will also offer panels on “Getting Published in the Heartland” and “Inspiring Words” for aspiring authors. Fans of visual aids will enjoy the “Words from Book Illustrators” session, while romance fans shouldn’t miss “Is it Hot in Here or is it My Book?”

“I know not everybody can afford a book,” Kaiser said. “But by having a free event, they can meet people, they can hear ideas and they can be surrounded by other people with the same goal.”

It’s never been more important to convene a community around books, especially in Iowa. According to a report by PEN America, Iowa came second only to Florida in public school book bans last year, with 3,671 instances across 117 districts.

However, Iowans also are turning out to defend banned books and challenged authors. Kaiser said Beaverdale’s Books’ small staff have stayed busy planning talks and accommodating large crowds.

“We had some really major events with Jodi Picoult and Ta-Nehisi Coates and the Banned Wagon from Penguin Random House [last fall] … and this spring is promising to be the same,” she explained.

Des Moines’ bibliophiles continue to show up and show out to these events. According to Kaiser, Picoult’s sold-out talk in Iowa’s capital city was “the biggest audience of her entire book tour.” Picoult happens to be the author of the most commonly banned book during the 2023-2024 school year, Nineteen Minutes

Big names draw in big crowds, and Kaiser hopes that is the case for the 2025 DSM Book Festival. Getting such a massive event together hasn’t been easy amid the transition—the festival’s last Facebook post, from over a year ago, discussed Beaverdale taking over as the presenting sponsor and promised another festival in 2024. But that never happened.

“We should have started sooner,” Kaiser laughed. “We were going to do it last October and we just plain ran out of time.”

The lineup for March 22 is all set to go, though, and it couldn’t come soon enough.

Ethan Edvenson / Little VIllage

DSM Book Festival Franklin Event Center, March 22, 10 a.m.–7 p.m., Free

contact Buzz

True Blue Iowa

A cornerstone of American culture, the blues have a way of cleansing the soul.

BY JOhN BUSBEE

The blues. An evocative word used more than two centuries ago by John James Audubon when he wrote to his wife that he “had the blues.” Before that, the first written reference was in English playwright George Colman’s 1798 Blue Devils, most likely a term filtering down from the 1600s referring to “intense visual hallucinations that can accompany severe alcohol withdrawal.”

A momentous expansion was realized when Charlotte Forten wrote in her diary about “the blues” in 1862. Forten was a free-born Black woman from Pennsylvania, a schoolteacher. She came home one day feeling down—feeling the blues—and overcame her depression through songwriting. Her songs were popular among the enslaved in America, although she was unable to describe the manner of singing involved. Forten wrote that the songs “can’t be sung without a full heart and a troubled spirit.” That cornerstone of inspiration flourished and has become one of this country’s great contributions to the world of music.

Those pulsating rhythms, seductive chords and shaded lyrics continue to resonate today, stretching around the globe. One leading influencer for the blues is based in Iowa’s capitol city.

The Central Iowa Blues Society (CIBS) is one of the Midwest’s most proactive promotional and advocacy groups. The passion that its members have has been translated into a number of pay-it-forward, get-engaged programs and events, especially for

[BOWLES'] SEarch FOr

WOrK BrOUGhT hIM TO cEDar FaLLS, WhErE hIS LIFELONG MUSIcaL TaLENTS WErE a LEaDING ParT OF ThE rEGION’S BLUES rEVIVaL OF ThE 1960S.

introducing next-gen fans.

This volunteer-driven organization has developed a legion of blues ambassadors for their programming. For major events, such as the recent annual two-day Winter Blues Festival and their upcoming Iowa Blues Hall of Fame Induction Celebration on March 30, 2025, volunteers give two hours of their time to fill the necessary event positions. This gives them free admission to the event, offsetting their membership fee.

Initiated in 1999, the Iowa Blues Hall of Fame boasts a roster that reads like a who’s who of Iowa’s music scene. The 2025 event is co-chaired by Bryan Church and Terry Cole, and the musicians to be honored are Eddie Bowles, John Resch, Turk E. Krause and Scott Long.

Bowles (1884-1984) is of particular note, as his posthumous honoring recognizes a special blues pedigree. Growing up in New Orleans, he learned to play guitar alongside Louis Armstrong and Kid

Left and below: Eddie Bowles plays guitar during an interview. Still via Cedar Falls Channel 15 Archive footage

Ory. His search for work brought him to Cedar Falls, where his lifelong musical talents were a leading part of the region’s Blues Revival of the 1960s. Young guitarists sought out the sage Bowles, eager to learn his unique guitar-picking style. He continued playing for audiences well into his 90s.

CIBS has honed its abilities to coordinate events with a special musical panache. Hall of Famer Bob Door and his band will host. Dinner is by Flying Mango and dessert by Steve “the pie man” Vasquez. All tickets include free parking, and the evening promises to be a wonderful overview of Iowa’s current blues scene.

CIBS also holds community outreach throughout the year, including their popular “Blues in the Schools” program. A resident educator with the org, Kevin Burt—solo winner of the Iowa Blues Challenge and the International Blues Challenge— is currently leading programs on music appreciation, rock history and jazz history within Des Moines Public Schools.

“He will perform at another program, the Rick Lussie Music Appreciation Day music festival at Ruby Van Meter School, a special school that serves secondary students with significant intellectual disabilities,” Vasquez explained.

Other outreach efforts include CIBS’s “Blues with a Healing,” a music therapy program, and “Crossroads: A Journey with the Blues,” a favorite in libraries. These feature a performance with storytelling, an interactive song, a history of the blues and a student harmonica giveaway with lessons.

“We strive to educate and ensure the future of the blues through the Blues Music Education,” Vasquez said, then added with a deep smile, “and, we have a lot of fun in the process.”

Induction Celebration The River Center, Des Moines, March 30 at 5 p.m., $30

Iowa Blues Hall of Fame

Grace and Merit

Meet one of the central figures behind the Iowa City music scene.

BY GLENN hOULIhaN

Grace Merritt came to Iowa City for college and stayed for the vibrant arts scene.

“Growing up, I didn’t have that kind of music community,” she said. “Music in my hometown is like, ‘Do you want to go see the high school’s band?’”

Merritt describes her hometown of Naperville, a western suburb of Chicago, as “very sanitized with art, especially public art, especially art made by people that live there. It’s very much unlike that here. I think that’s why I fell in love with Iowa City. And the Englert really helped introduce me to a lot of those spaces, especially because of Mission Creek.”

Her first experience of Mission Creek Festival was in the spring semester of her freshman year in 2017. Volunteering to write show reviews for KRUI, the University of Iowa’s student-run radio station, Merritt headed to Gabe’s to catch the indie rock band Cloud Nothings.

“It was just really fun and awesome and exciting,” she recalled with a smile.

More than just a memorable show, the experience encouraged her to seek further opportunities with the festival. Merritt started volunteering for Mission Creek in the spring of 2018 and describes seeing Jamila Woods and Julien Baker perform that year as “formative.”

“Watching her [Baker] live loop on stage, I had never seen someone do that; I didn’t know it was possible. I didn’t know you could create such a landscape with one person on stage … It was a whole new level of performance that I encountered that weekend.”

Fast forward to 2025, and Merritt is the programming coordinator for both the Englert Theatre and Mission Creek Festival, and a central figure behind the Iowa City music scene.

We traversed the remnants of an especially vicious Iowa winter snowstorm to meet in person at the iconic venue, a place Merritt is deeply appreciative to call her office.

“I also live in a historic home,” she said. “There used to be a pirate radio station in it. There were shows there all the time—an album just released that was recorded there during the pandemic. I really like to surround myself with places that have meant something to people, and being in the Englert, there’s always such good inspiration.”

A trip to the National Independent Venue Association Conference in New Orleans last year was also a source of creativity. Between spontaneous music listening tours of the city—“The whole time I was there, I was like ‘do I have to move to New Orleans?’”—Merritt discussed the

“ThE arTS arE ThE PLacE WhErE PEOPLE LOWEr ThEIr BarrIErS aND arE WILLING TO ThINK aBOUT SOMEThING ThaT ThEY WOULDN’T haVE OThErWISE... I ThINK ThE arTS arE ThE EXacT aNTIThESIS TO WhaT’S GOING ON NaTIONaLLY.”

— GRACE MERRITT

joys and demands of organizing an independent music venue. “We all acknowledge that we are doing something that is intentionally harder than it could be. Live Nation does make certain things easier for people, in terms of running a venue, but we all choose a route that we feel supports artists in towns, communities and art better.”

One particularly generative panel at the conference asked attendees to consider whether community members would want to be in their venue if there was nothing going on. “I think about that a lot,” contemplates Merritt. “How do we make this an accessible place where people just

think it’s cool to be here when there’s nothing on stage, because I think that’s how you really make a third space happen.” Such a space materialized when Merritt guided Iowa City Flea’s winter migration indoors to the Englert in December. In a clever piece of intertextual marketing, the Mission Creek Festival lineup was announced at the event.

Outside of the blockbuster headliners (Raekwon will continue the lineage of Wu-Tang Clan members visiting Iowa City when he runs through his debut studio album Only Built 4 Cuban Linx...) Merritt is thrilled to bring Guatemalan cellist and vocalist Mabe Fratti to the festival.

“She ranges from being very haunting to very ethereal,” Merrit said. “She really makes a whole soundscape. Her vocals are absolutely gorgeous. That is the one I’m like by far the most excited for, and her going on right before Mannequin Pussy— there’s not another place I would want to be.”

We reflected on other events and people that have shaped the cultural fabric of Iowa City, with an emphasis on Chris Wiersema—a visionary presence in the Iowa City music scene who passed away last year. Gesturing to a Feed Me Weird Things sticker on her notebook, Merritt described Wiersema as her “North Star.”

“Me and Brian Johannesen, who’s the programming director here, talk about him all the time. We ran into an issue the other week with a Mission Creek thing and we just sat and talked about what Chris would do … He was remarkable for what he did here. I don’t think I’ll ever stop thinking about him. He was the best.”

We concluded our conversation by discussing the values of the Englert and Mission Creek Festival—arts, community and diversity—in a political landscape increasingly characterized by fear, intolerance and individualism.

“I believe so greatly that the arts are the place [where] you could change people’s minds. The arts are the place where people lower their barriers and are willing to think about something that they wouldn’t have otherwise, or be in conversation with something that they wouldn’t have otherwise,” Merritt said. “I think the arts are the exact antithesis to what’s going on nationally.”

Grace Merritt, programming coordinator for the Englert, smiles atop the marquee.

Kate Doolittle / Little Village

Keep Rock Island Weird

A third space in the five cities, Rozz-Tox hosts DJs, throat singers and locals looking to “do something fucking cool.”

BY rYaN cOLLINS

Rock Island, Illinois’ Rozz-Tox is that rare entertainment space that rewards awareness, nurtures community and celebrates revolutionary creativity. Everywhere you look, there’s something interesting to contemplate, literature to read, terrific music and conversation on the air, mixed with the perfume of incredible food. You’re stimulated to explore broader associations between what you’re listening to, what you’re eating, the atmosphere—all pulling you into the present.

“People that come from cities like L.A., New York, Chicago, fucking Berlin … I’d say 85 to 90

percent of the artists that come in here from other big, progressive, beautiful, massive cities, they walk in here like, ‘I wish we had something like this,’” Benjamin Fawks said.

Fawks opened Rozz-Tox in 2011 with his mother, Marisa “Missy” Sorrells (1958-2017). The space borrows its name from the eponymous manifesto written by artist Gary Panter; its ethos adheres to the directive expressed in “Item 15” from the text, “If you want a better media, go make it.”

Rozz-Tox owner Benjamin Fawks works on his laptop. Shale Sage / Little Village

Since putting a deposit down on the building that houses his business, Rozz-Tox owner and “custodian” Benjamin Fawks has a list of maintenance tasks to accomplish, including work on the windows. Shale Sage / Little Village

Rozz-Tox is a third space that encompasses “a listening bar, café, performance venue, gallery, culture cell, guesthouse, cinema, club,” as its website describes. In the nearly 14 years since opening, it’s become even more important to the community in which it resides, from Rock Island to Guangzhou, China (current home to Rozz-Tox’s sibling venue, and where Fawks opened his first space in 2007).

At the end of 2024, that community rallied to raise over $30,000 in less than a month to help cover the down payment for Fawks to buy the building at 2108 3rd Ave and “Keep Rock Island Weird”—a campaign that Fawks’ said his partner, artist Jessica Beshears, was “instrumental in getting [him] to do.” While he said the majority of donors were local, the campaign saw contributions from Rozz-Tox lovers around the world.

When asked to describe his many roles, Fawks answered simply, “custodian.”

“I like the custodian term. I think it fits because this space is not for me. It is for me, but it’s also for you. It’s also for them, for the band, for the customers—it’s for everyone. So I’m just taking care of it. I’m making sure it’s oiled up and running.”

“It is also my home,” he continued. “I sweep and mop. I do the dishes. I clean the bathrooms. And I book the shows. I’m taking care of so many different things, I feel like ‘custodian’ fits better than most.”

It’s that sense of home that makes Rozz-Tox such a beloved space; there’s an enthusiastic, personal dimension to the curation of everything, from the décor to the menu to the programming.

Events are dynamic and various: upcoming shows include DJ sets, past selections of which can be heard on Yamaguchi Radio; Filmosofia, “a free community film screening and reading discussion with philosophical narratives”; the long-running SPECTRA Reading Series; and a range of music performances and listening experiences, mostly directed by nonprofit OUTLETProgramme, which brings visionary musicians and performers to the Quad Cities from around the globe.

"I

LIKE ThE

cUSTODIaN TErM.

ThINK IT FITS BEcaUSE

ThIS SPacE IS NOT FOr ME. IT IS FOr ME, BUT IT'S aLSO FOr YOU . IT'S aLSO FOr ThEM, FOr ThE BaND, FOr ThE cUSTOMErS— IT'S FOr EVErYONE. SO I'M JUST TaKING carE OF IT. I'M MaKING SUrE IT'S OILED UP aND rUNNING."

—BENJAMIN FAWKS

The upcoming season (the first to receive grant support from the Illinois Arts Council) features several international acts, including London-based Still House Plants on March 26, who the Guardian called “the most vital band in Britain today, in every sense.” The following night, “master throat singers” Alash, from the Siberian republic of Tuva, return on March 27 after a much-celebrated performance last year.

Fawks first experienced throat singing while living in China, where he attended a cultural

exchange event. “The night progressed into a ‘jam’ with bluegrass strings and Mongolian throat singing. I hadn’t heard throat singing before, or at least not live, and I fell in love with it. I used to play it in the bar over there quite often.”

Another upcoming highlight on April 18 is Brìghde Chaimbeul, “a leading purveyor of Celtic experimentalism and a master of the Scottish smallpipes.” Fawks first heard Chaimbeul in June 2024. “I listened to her album Carry Them With Us while I was in Scotland and felt close to the music. I can’t wait to hear these sounds in this room, and to share that with others.”

What impression does Fawks hope people take from visiting Rozz-Tox? “Encouraging is a good word. Also inspiring. What I like to do with this space in general, fundamentally, but also with the booking, is inspire and encourage younger people to do something fucking cool.”

“I would like more days and nights where people just come here to bring a book or a date or a friend, get a bowl of noodles and a drink, and just chat, you know? It’s important. We need to get away—myself included. We need to get further away from screens, and back into talking to people, face-to-face.”

Time spent in such a place challenges us to be more considerate, particular and attentive—in our individual tastes, but also in where, and how, we spend our time, and who we spend it with.

A mannequin looks out on the street from the second floor guest room, which hosts bands and visiting artists. Shale Sage / Little Village

“I think it’s unique because it’s my own thing,” Fawks said, “but it also changes and evolves with the people that come here, and I try to let it. I like to think of spaces, and this space specifically, as an organic thing, something that grows, something that evolves and changes with whatever’s happening. It’s unique—it’s separate from other spaces, because it is its own thing. This place really is different for every single person. It’s—it’s a Rozz-Tox.”

BUMPER CROPS

Meet Me in the Hallway

One building in East Moline holds a handful of entertaining destinations.

BY LUcaS BENSON

Not doing things is pretty much my favorite thing to do, but I recently set aside a Saturday afternoon to hop in a car with a couple buds, Ryan and Doug, and make a pin-grimage to East Moline to check out Midwest Ale Works. By the time we arrived, Ryan and I were in the middle of an impassioned debate over which cereal from the ’90s reigned supreme while Doug sat in the back reading aloud passages from Foucault’s The Order of Things. As we piled out of the truck, we took a moment to admire the charmingly dilapidated sprawl of a brick building, which looks

like a backdrop for a scene from The Last of Us

Local brewery Midwest Ale Works (MAW) is part of a series of interconnecting stores that includes Iron + Grain Coffee House, music venue The Rust Belt, restaurant Jennie’s Boxcar and hair salon Dark Horse Aesthetics. Each business has clear demarcations, and the design of the building allows for easy cross pollination of customers.

We ordered a sampler flight of beers, which was served on a metal plate that looked like a shield from the movie Krull (and if you don’t get that reference, you probably did a lot better in school than me). MAW also offers THC drinks that range from 4 to 10 mg, an added draw for out-of-staters. (Iowa law limits beverages to just 4 mg THC.)

With drinks in hand, we made our way to the back room: a long hallway between MAW and the Rust Belt, flanked by 20 pinball machines lined up side by side in two groups of 10. The lighting had the intensity of a reading lamp, which is ideal for pinball, as this ensures you can clearly see the playfield. The hallway was wide enough and

machines spaced far enough apart to mitigate what could otherwise be a claustrophobic atmosphere.

The roster of machines is Stern heavy (X-Men, Metallica, Venom, etc.) but also includes an old school Harlem Globetrotters, a Theater of Magic for any old Bally/Williams golden era fans, Toy Story from Jersey Jack and a boutique Aliens, which are rare to find in the wild, especially in such fantastic condition. To that point, big shoutout to Dennis Keppy, who does a stellar job keeping these machines in pristine shape. He also coordinates regular tournaments at the brewery, the next of which is happening March 6-9.

After a few rounds of pinball, we decided to order from Jennie’s Boxcar, the adjoining Mexican restaurant. Along with locally sourced ingredients, the menu includes a wide variety of vegan options. Though I don’t typically order vegan, the option indicates a level of care and consideration for patron needs I like to see.

We opted for a plate of Boxcar Nachos, which came with housemade chips, fiesta queso, crema and barbacoa, and an order of seasoned chicken and barbacoa tacos served on flour tortillas, as well as sweet ancho chile rubbed shrimp tacos on corn tortillas. After taking our first bites of the artfully presented tacos, a reverent silence fell over our table. For the first time on the trip, we all shut up for a few seconds, happily savoring the flavors.

The homemade chips were the perfect consistency, free of that common excess and gutbusting melted American cheese. Instead they came with a perfectly portioned layering of fiesta queso and exceptionally prepared barbacoa, which practically melted when you picked it up. The tacos were even more on point but the surprise

Bread & Butter

Boxcar Nachos from Jennie’s Boxcar. Lucas Benson / Little Village

The Rust Belt, 533 12th Ave, East Moline, Illinois. Lucas Benson / Little Village

A row of pinball machines in a hallway inside The Rust Belt. Lucas Benson / Little Village

hit was the shrimp taco, the Pipsqueak. I typically shy away from ordering seafood in the Midwest, but the shrimp had a perfect tender texture that paired exceptionally well with the corn tortilla, red cabbage and artfully arrayed avocado. Our only critique was that there wasn’t any more of it, a minor issue that we quickly resolved by ordering another round for the table.

As our trip came to a close, the folks at the Rust Belt were just getting started. The band was warming up next door, patrons piled into Jennie’s Boxcar and a slew of local players occupied most of the machines in Midwest Ale Works.

It’s rare to find a location with such a balanced trifecta of good food and drinks, exceptional pinball and live music. All are excellent in their own right, but shine brightest when Voltroned together—not unlike the dynamic between my buddies and me.

Fortunately for us, we have an excuse to head back March 6 for the Battle at the Rust Belt Pinball Tournament. If you’re already a fan of pinball or just looking for an excuse to get out of town for a little bit to enjoy some good food and/or live music, do yourself a favor and round up a couple good buds for a good-time getaway. You won’t be sorry you did.

Sampler flight of beers from Midwest Ale Works. Lucas Benson / Little Village

Before the Flood

The cool, transportative waters

of Mission Creek Festival have nourished Iowa City’s cultural institutions for two decades.

BY KEMBrEW McLEOD

Mission Creek Festival’s namesake is a ghost river in San Francisco. It once connected the center of the city to Mission Bay, though during the past two centuries it has largely been filled in and redirected through subterranean channels. Over the years, parts of the land that Mission Creek ran through have experienced soil liquefaction, most dramatically during the Great San Francisco Earthquake of 1906, when the four-story Valencia Street Hotel sank halfway into the ground.

What an apt metaphor for this groundbreaking Iowa City institution: a partially submerged structure existing in the liminal space between sunshine and the underground. This year, Mission Creek Festival celebrates its 20th anniversary—a humble reminder

to your friendly neighborhood Little Village columnist that time really does fly.

The first one to take place in Iowa City was held from March 29 to April 1, 2006, and it featured a cool mix of bands, literary readings and other arts events that would come to define the fest.

Jeff Ray founded the original Mission Creek Music and Arts Festival in San Francisco with the goal of spotlighting the Bay Area’s more marginal artists and musicians, and he eventually invited Andre Perry to get involved as a producer.

When Perry decided to go back to school to pursue an MFA in writing, he planned to either stay in San Francisco or move to New York City—until fate intervened. “Kind of on a whim,” he said, “I applied to University of Iowa, and then got into Iowa. Then I started to take it seriously, visited Iowa City for 24 hours and had a great time, so I decided to come here.”

As Perry was wrapping up his life in San Francisco,

Ray planted the seed in his mind that maybe Mission Creek could expand to Iowa City, and that Perry should investigate. After arriving in the summer of 2005, the Iowa City transplant began attending shows at the Mill and other local venues. Pretty quickly he realized that yes, maybe this can work.

“From there, I met Tanner Illingworth,” Perry said. “He was in school at that time at Iowa. At the end of that fall, we were asking each other, ‘Should we do that thing?’ And then we were like, ‘Let’s do that thing!’ So, we went to Doug Roberson at Gabe’s, Trevor Lee Hopkins at the Mill, and the Englert.”

“Doug and Trevor immediately understood, even though we didn’t totally understand what we were asking. They were like, ‘That’s a thing you need to do, and it would be good for our scene,’ and the Englert was like, ‘Please leave our building immediately.’” He laughed. “There were a lot of other people who were just supportive as advocates, like Katie Roche

Prairie Pop

Left: Garth Greenwell does a reading at Prairie Lights for Mission Creek 2016. Emma Krauss / Little Village Below: Sqürl at Yacht Club (now Alley Cat) in 2015. Zeynab Ghandour / Little Village

Seun Kuti & Egypt 80 at Mission Creek 2012. Adrianne Behning / Little Village

Mission Creek Festival various venues, Iowa City, April 3-5, $55–250

[former Englert development director], because I was a new kid on the block.”

After the nascent promoters didn’t completely lose their shirts, they decided to do it again. And again, and again, until the festival had woven its way into the fabric of Iowa City life. Every year when winter thaws into spring, hundreds of people wait in anticipation for Mission Creek to take over the town. Over the years, it has hosted shows and readings in traditional venues and off-the-beaten-path spaces, like the second floor of the Deadwood, which was like entering a forgotten realm. (Who knew that there was an upstairs at the Deadwood???)

Mission Creek remained underground during its first three years. It surfaced in a major way in 2009 when the Wu-Tang Clan’s GZA headlined a show at the Englert, which had opened its doors to the festival and soon became Mission Creek’s primary institutional home. Perry was hired as the theater’s executive director in 2010, and he now serves as the executive director of Hancher Auditorium and UI’s Office of Performing Arts and Engagement—when not working as an executive assistant and life coach for two cute Iowa City kids.

That 2009 festival was a pivotal moment, and made a deep impression. For those who were at the Mill, the sold-out Mountain Goats show with John Vanderslice will forever be imprinted on their minds, and the same can be said of a basement house show where Zola Jesus performed. Likewise, some people were changed inalterably after they squeezed into a little room in the basement of the Jefferson Building to see the Swedish singer-songwriter Kristian Matsson perform as The Tallest Man On Earth.

“On a personal level, in my own musical evolution,

"ThErE WErE

LIKE a

hUNDrED

PEOPLE DrIPPING SWEaT IN ThIS TINY rOOM, aND I WaS SITTING crOSSLEGGED, rIGhT IN FrONT OF ThE STaGE... ThE

GUITar WaS

IN MY FacE aND I WaS ShOOTING VIDEO ON a craPPY caMcOrDEr, JUST ShaKING."

— BRIAN JOHANNESEN, ENGLERT EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR

it was very eye-opening,” recalled the Englert’s current executive director, Brian Johannesen. “There were like a hundred people dripping sweat in this tiny room, and I was sitting cross-legged, right in front of the stage. And Kristian has this weird stage presence where he loves to challenge you, so the guitar was in my face and I was shooting video on a crappy camcorder, just shaking. It was just incredible, the vibe was amazing.”

That was also the first year I got involved. I programmed a handful of cultural events for Mission Creek Festival, starting with a lecture by Harry Allen, better known as Public Enemy’s Media Assassin. The next year, I invited Allen and founding PE members Chuck D, Hank Shocklee and Keith Shocklee to discuss the 20th anniversary of Public Enemy’s Fear of a Black Planet. It was part of a UI Museum of Art exhibition that I co-curated with Deborah Whaley,

Above: Feature on Mission Creek Festival in Little Village issue 63, March 2007. Below: the fifth anniversary of MCF in Little Village issue 90 (pictured, clockwise: Sarah Cram Driscoll, Dustin Busch, Andre Perry, Connor Wyrick, Sam Locke Ward, Chris Wiersema, Josh Carroll, March 2010. Little Village

“Two Turntables and a Microphone,” and the panel discussion at the Englert was packed to the gills and buzzing with energy.

The artists stopped by KRUI for a half-hour on-air discussion of Public Enemy’s legacy, and the Bomb Squad performed an incendiary show in the Yacht Club later that night. I remember Harry Allen telling me that Iowa was his new favorite place, though he was bummed we didn’t have time to visit the future

Laurie Anderson at Mission Creek Festival 2014. Adam Burke / Little Village

birthplace of Captain James T. Kirk (all of PE are self-professed sci-fi nerds).

“That Public Enemy event was so life affirming,” Perry recalled. “I still remember them going into detail about how they made ‘Fight the Power,’ which is one of the most brilliant pieces of music ever, and how Chuck D created a message for that time, one that is still timeless. Hearing them talk about making their art was instructive, and it showed us how we can move through the world creatively.”

This year’s festival features the return of Neko Case, who will be giving a reading at UI’s Voxman Music Building from her new memoir after tearing the roof off Hancher last year. Case is one of many who will be coming back to Iowa City this spring, like Kim Gordon (who I helped bring to Mission Creek in 2011 for a conversation with Thurston Moore at the Englert and a performance at the Mill with Moore and percussionist Chris Corsano). Gordon will be returning in 2025 to facilitate a conversation with acclaimed novelist and essayist Rachel Kushner.

“I think the way the lineup came together this year is great for the 20th anniversary,” Johannesen said. “It really hits on all the different facets of Mission Creek Festival—so there’s punk and the harder stuff, there’s hip-hop, there’s experimental music and other stuff all balanced really well together. I’m also very, very excited about all the different callbacks to the people who have helped make Mission Creek what it is throughout the years, like bringing Will Whitmore back, who has been just a force for Iowa music.”

Other pillars of Mission Creek only exist as traces and memories, including beloved venues like the Mill, which was demolished in 2022. Closer to the heart are the losses of Trevor Lee Hopkins and Chris Wiersema, two promoters that formed the backbone of the Iowa City music scene and have unexpectedly died in the past two years. Nevertheless, their vision and energy continue to reverberate through the community.

In many ways, the arc of Mission Creek Festival reflects the growth of the town’s major cultural institutions during the same period. FilmScene, for example, grew from a mere idea to a series of events in partnership with the Englert, and then into a multiscreen cinema with five screens across two buildings. Likewise, in that timespan, Public Space One went from essentially squatting in an unused university basement room in the Jefferson Building—where that Tallest Man On Earth show took place—to owning and occupying three historic downtown houses, including the Close House mansion on Gilbert Street.

From the Englert and PS1 to KRUI and the mysterious second floor of the Deadwood, attending Mission Creek was like being guided through a secret history of Iowa City. Over the past two decades, it has kept Iowa spiritually healthy by feeding its population a smorgasbord of weird and wonderful things, and for that I will be forever grateful.

March a-LIST: FILM

DES MOINES AREA

Wednesday, Mar. 5, 7 p.m., Domita’s Renaissance – A Film by Domita Sanchez, Fleur cinema A special screening of Des Moines drag queen Domita Sanchez’s Pride productions from 2022 and 2024, complete with exclusive behind-the-scenes footage.

Sunday, Mar. 9, 1 p.m., National Theatre Live: Vanya, Varsity cinema Andrew Scott brings multiple characters to life in Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya, filmed live in West End, London.

Mar. 13-16, Metro9, Fleur cinema Metro9 is a unique restoration and retelling of the seminal 1927 sci-film, Metropolis

Tuesday, Mar. 25, Ex Machina – a Science on Screen Presentation, Varsity cinema A screening of the 2015 sci-fi film with pre-show talk by Martin Roth, Professor of Philosophy at Drake University, discussing artificial intelligence.

Wednesday, Mar. 26, reel rock 19, Fleur cinema Reel Rock 19 showcases three

world-premiere climbing films spanning disciplines, characters and continents.

Friday, Mar. 28, Films That Inspire Me –Legends of the Fall, Fleur cinema Fleur’s “Films That Inspire Me” series welcomes Iowa filmmaker and production sound mixer Chase Stine, who will also be debuting his short film, The Valley of the Devil

IOWA CITY AREA

Wednesday, Mar. 5, 10 p.m., Late Shift at the Grindhouse: Pulp Fiction, FilmScene The movie that put Tarantino on the map. Show up early to try the Pulp Fiction pinball machine before a SpareMe pinball tournament at 6 p.m.

Friday, Mar. 7, 10 p.m., Late Shift at the Grindhouse: The Forest Through the Trees, FilmScene Writer/Director and inaugural Refocus Film Festival guest, Jason Pitts (Voorhees: Night of the Beast) presents his new tale of horror and survival.

Mar. 15-20, Babe: Pig in the City, FilmScene “That’ll do Pig. That’ll do.” And cue the tears. Part of FilmScene’s “The Picture Show” series, free for kids.

Friday, Mar. 21, Late Shift at the Grindhouse: THRUST! The Punk cut, FilmScene Writer/director Victor Bonacore and producer Bork Torkleson join FilmScene to present the VHS “Punk Cut” of this post-apocalyptic exploitation film where girl gangs rule.

LOCAL & NOTABLE

Little Village's monthly print calendar is a non-exhaustive, curated list of arts and cultural events across LV's reader areas. Want to see more? Browse listings online at littlevillagemag.com/calendar.

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MUSIC

DES MOINES

Sunday, Mar. 9, 7 p.m., aMPErS&ONE "My First __" Tour, xBk Live “Broken Heart” singing K-pop boy group AMPERS&ONE come to Des Moines on their debut North American tour.

Mar. 12, Buckethead, 7:30 p.m., hoyt Sherman Place After a few years off the touring circuit, the guitar virtuoso embarks on a national tour with a pair of stops in Iowa.

Thursday, Mar. 20, Kiss the Tiger with The host country, xBk Energetic rock and roll from the Twin Cities.

Friday, Mar. 21, 8 p.m., xBk Live, The Macks w/ Social cinema & Munk rivers The Macks and Social Cinema stop in Des Moines on their Midwest tour with support from local hometown heroes Munk Rivers.

MUSIC

Friday, Mar. 28, The herbie hancock Institute Presents: Trumpeter Marquis hill & Vocalist Lisa henry Jazz interplay, hip-hopinfused rhythms and socially conscious spoken-word.

Friday, Mar. 28, Sona Jobarteh, hoyt Sherman Place The first professional female kora virtuoso to come from any of the five West African Griot kora-playing dynasties.

Sunday, Mar. 30, 6 p.m., Greta akers – album release w/ austin Barnhill, xBk Live Singer-songwriter and

multi-instrumentalist from Des Moines celebrates the release of her sophomore album, Always Your Girl

IOWA CITY

Friday, Mar. 7, Seth David with Oh My God am I In Public right Now? Gabe’s Part of the Englert’s “Track Zero” series with Chicago bass DJ Seth David.

Saturday, Mar. 8, Joel Sires, The Black angel An intimate performance with Cedar

Falls singer-songwriter.

Thursday, Mar. 13, Buckethead, The Englert Theatre Virtuosic electric guitar.

Saturday, Mar. 15, charlie Otto + his gear, POLYachi, Fishbait, I Will, Slacker & anchoress, Gabes Chicago’s Charlie Otto combines acoustic, synth and video elements in live performance.

Friday, Mar. 28, 8 p.m., The Whiskey Fund Free Show, Wildwood Locals the Whiskey Fund play as part of Wildwood’s “Free Show Friday Series.”

Friday, Mar. 28, Pieta Brown, The James Theater Iowa City singer-songwriter accompanied by Bo Ramsey.

Saturday, Mar. 29, Trans Vibrations 2025 with What resembles Us, Early Girl and Nightlight, Trumpet Blossom cafe Music and resistance in celebration of Trans Day of Visibility.

Saturday, Mar. 29, Dickie, The James Theater Iowa indie rock mainstay fresh off his Headful of Hiss EP release, comes to the James with band in tow.

Monday, Mar. 31, West Branch high School Jazz Bands ft. the Iowa Women’s Jazz Organization, Wildwood Jazz Bands from West Branch High School and across the state.

CEDAR RAPIDS, WATERLOO & CEDAR FALLS

Friday, Mar. 7, Trampled by Turtles, Paramount Theatre, cedar rapids Lively, longstanding bluegrass ensemble from Duluth, Minnesota.

Saturday, Mar. 8, heads of State Vol. 2, cSPS hall, cedar rapids A showcase of

Eastern Iowa musicians done up cabaret style with Layton White, Lincoln Ginsberg, Daren Barker and Dillion Rairdin.

Sunday, Mar. 9, charlie Parr, Octopus college hill, cedar Falls Minnesotan piedmont blues guitarist, singer and songwriter.

Saturday, Mar. 15, 8 p.m., Wylde Nept The Final Season (with Wes), The Ideal Theater, cedar rapids Celtic band Wylde Nept sends off Wes, their frontman going on 30 years.

Friday, Mar. 21, Katie and the honky-Tonks, Octopus college hill, cedar Falls Classic country covers and originals.

Saturday, Mar. 29, March Metal Madness, The Ideal Theater, cedar rapids Hometown thrash and groove metal with Dark Agenda, Anti Kingdom and Knucklehead.

QUAD CITIES

Friday, Mar. 7, OUTLETProgramme presents: hearsay with Tea, Yes, Yay! Avant-groove improvised soundscapes, free jazz and textural noise.

Saturday, Mar. 15, 6 p.m., Shamrockin! Metal Show, The redstone room at common chord, Davenport An all-ages metal show featuring all East IA/ QC Area bands. Lineup includes Die First, Wyvern, Ill Omen,

Braver Than I and Fungal Mass.

Thursday, Mar. 20, 6 p.m.,

The Macks w/ Social cinema & Lady Igraine, racoon Motel, Davenport The Macks and Social Cinema perform in the Quad Cities before making their way westward for a show in Des Moines.

Thursday, Mar. 27, 8 p.m., OUTLETProgramme Presents: alash, rozz-Tox, rock Island Master throat singers from Tuva, a tiny republic in the heart of Inner Asia.

DUBUQUE

Friday, Mar. 14, Joe and Vicki Price, The Lift Iowa Blues Hall of Fame duo from Decorah.

Friday, Mar. 28, Bob Log III, riff Worm, husky Martinez, The Lift Australian-Arizonan one-man band in a space suit.