It's time for a comeback: Seersucker Live returns in full force to re-ignite Savannah writers

Editor's note: Seersucker co-founder Christopher Berinato is a contributor to the Savannah Morning News and DO Savannah.

Tweed suit jackets, suede elbow patches, round wire frame glasses is the uniform. The scent of sweet tobacco in pipes and whiskey in an old fashioned soak into beards and neat pocket squares. Formal laughter and proper applause fill the exclusive echo chamber of literary devotees.

For many, this is what they picture when I say I’m going to a literary reading. It’s not their fault. It just means they haven’t had the pleasure of attending — no, experiencing a Seersucker Live event.

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Before local writer Megan Ave’Lallemant became a board member in 2022, she attended the shows pretty regularly over its decade run. “It's kind of its own animal and it is a delightful one,” she says. “I just feel like that's the best way for me to describe the experience of being at a show: it's delightful.”

With their thick red frames, bouncy blonde curls, and queer identity, Ave’Lallemant brings a vibrant energy that would no doubt disrupt the sepia tones of stuffier literary readings. And should.

Luckily, Seersucker welcomes folks like Ave’Lallemant and myself, a queer, Black woman with its only requirements being to have a good time. This was part of the vision that local author Zach Powers approached friend and writer Chris Berinato with all the way back in 2010.

First, to call Seersucker a literary reading would be a bit reductive. Before it was even Seersucker, there was a trial event called Motormouth. Powers and Berinato, along with other original board members, invited writers to RPM Autoworx and challenged them to write a story or a poem based on the theme of cars.

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After the success of that event, they changed the name to Seersucker and evolved the structure. “We decided we wanted it to be part talk show, part literary reading and part cocktail party,” Berinato explains. “We always made sure that we did it in bars, or anywhere people could drink, because it loosens tongues and makes people a little more receptive.”

I got the chance to experience this myself when I attended Seersucker’s Happy Hour for Writers at Lone Wolf. With two glasses of chardonnay flowing through my system, I found myself chatting with another author about how the characters we create take on a life of their own, how fiction writing is really a bit like necromancy. Then I spoke with a poet about what she’d been reading lately and how she balances her creative life with motherhood.

“I think writing can be very solitary and lonely,” Ave’Lallemant says. “I think that community gives us witnesses, gives us people to celebrate with, gives us people to troubleshoot with and commiserate with.”

Board member and social media coordinator Ariel Felton agrees, “I think being around other writers just makes me a better writer both in the motivation sense and then having writing buddies that you can share things with.”

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Felton also attended several Seersucker live events while pursuing her graduate degree at SCAD; she was even invited to read among a line up of other published authors in 2015. “It made me feel really cool because I was like, ‘Oh, I haven’t published anything, you know, I'm just a student,’” she says. “To be next to folks who had published books, it helped me take my writing career seriously.” And take it seriously she did, having stacked bylines in the New York Times, The Bitter Southerner, and most recently Gravy Quarterly.

It was this type of connection and community that thrived for several years before board transitions and the pandemic put the delightful animal Seersucker to sleep. “Seersucker was a staple of the literary community for a while, and then — I don't know if I want to say near the end of COVID — near whatever this phase is, I just noticed people were asking me a lot about it,” Felton explains, surprised since she’d just become a board member a little before the pandemic.

It was time for a comeback.

The board now consists of Berinato, Felton, Ave’Lallemant, Laura Davenport, Joseph Schwartzburt, Gino Orlandi, and Brian Dean. Though there are some new faces, Berinato explains the heart of the shows is much the same. What he does hope changes is the sustainability of the organization.

“We brought on new board members that are a little more familiar with how to run a nonprofit and the idea coming out of this is to become a little more organized and sustainable so that board members can come in and out, and even if I or Ariel ever leaves, it will go on forever, hopefully.”

After a few preliminary events — a couple writers’ happy hours and Seersucker Shots, a smaller literary reading that featured local authors April Tucholke and Nate Pedersen — Seersucker will make its official return on Thursday at 7 p.m. at Front Porch Improv (210 W Victory Dr.).

The show will be hosted by Berinato and Ave’Lallemant. It’ll feature readings from poet Patricia Lockwood, whose debut novel No One Is Talking About This landed on the shortlist for the 2021 Booker Prize, author Taylor Brown, who was named Georgia’s 2021 Author of the Year, and poet and Front Porch cast member Chris Williams, who will be making his fiction debut.

While everyone’s excited for The Return Episode, Ave’Lallemant is most excited to wear the signature Seersucker blazer. The tongue-in-cheek reference to the typical stuffy literary uniform pretty much sums up all you need to know about Seersucker.

But if that’s not enough, follow them on Instagram (@seersucker912) and Facebook, and come experience the delight for yourself.

This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: Savannah GA events: Seersucker Live Return with Patricia Lockwood