Meet the Readers: Kathleen Rooney

Kathleen Rooney is a founding editor of Rose Metal Press, a nonprofit publisher of literary work in hybrid genres, and a founding member of Poems While You Wait, a collective of typewriter poets who do commissioned poetry on demand. Her fifth novel Man Overboard! was published by Gallery Books / Simon & Schuster in July of 2026 and her debut picture book Leaf Town Forever, co-written with her sister Beth and illustrated by Betsy Bowen, was released by University of Minnesota Press in 2025. Her newest poetry collection, O Western Wind, won the New Measures Poetry Prize and will be published by Parlor Press / Free Verse Editions in 2027. She lives in Chicago with her spouse, the writer Martin Seay, and teaches at DePaul University.

Please join Kathleen and our other fantastic readers on Tuesday, Sept. 1, 2026 in the upstairs bar at Hopleaf. Doors open at 7pm, and the show starts at 7:30. It's free, and 21-and-over. Please RSVP on Facebook.