Pop Up Art Event Report- How the Book Talk Went

Thursday night Perspective Gallery hosted a Pop Up Book Talk Event  for Virginia Tech Alumnus Lisa Muir. 

 Lisa received her M.A. in English from Virginia Tech and her Ph.D in American and Ethnic Literature from West Virginia University.  Lisa has taught composition, research, literature,  and creative writing, mostly at the college level. Some who have lived in Blacksburg may remember her from her years teaching at Blacksburg High School.  She is also the National Chair for Creative Fiction for the annual Pop Culture Conference.  Today she is an Instructor of English at Wilkesboro Community College in North Carolina. 


Taking Down the Moon is a collection of fifteen short stories set in places as close as North Carolina's Blue Ridge Mountains where Lisa resides, to as far away as New Zealand.

The short stories are beautifully crafted  "each story weav(ing) its own tale of discovery, loss, and independence."  And while I thought the slim book would be something I would quickly finish, I found that I needed to digest each read and sit with the messages that drifted in and out of my thoughts before beginning the next story, similar to a four course meal requiring a bit of hunger and conversation to bind the experience into your being. 

Lisa read three of her stories to the group in attendance, sharing with the attendees some background as to what inspired each of the stories.

For the namesake of the book Taking Down the Moon Lisa was inspired by an art work she had seen in New Zealand, and loved, but didn't buy.

Two mice, one who met his watery, drunken, death in a beer bottle Lisa picked up while cleaning up litter along her roadside, inspired the story of Lottie's Cave Road.

And then, in a moment that totally explains the intensity of the creative process, Lisa shared that she wrote one of the stories in the parking lot of a Kohl's Department Store, because "it just had to come out then otherwise I'd never remember the story the way it showed up whole in my mind."

I highly recommend the book, which is available at the usual online book sources. 

Supporting Hokie creative work is the best thing you can do today.

-Robin Scully Boucher, Art Program Director Perspective Gallery