Find Inspiration and Creative Community at the Sierra Poetry Festival April 18, 2026

Ten years ago I sat with a group of poets and artists brainstorming a new literary festival to take place in Nevada County. Who knew back then how successful this event would be, how it would become a gathering opportunity for artists throughout the Bay Area, Lake Tahoe, and beyond, to build creative networks and find inspiration in the synergistic sharing. The Sierra Poetry Festival is one of my favorite events each year. And this year we celebrate our ten year anniversary with some special extras.

 

Sierra Poetry Festival is a project of Nevada County Arts Council. This year’s mainstage event will take place on April 18, 2026, at The Center for the Arts, in Grass Valley, CA, attended by some of our most exciting local, national, and international poets and performers. Our keynote presenters are Brenda Hillman and Robert Hass! Tickets are now available.

Part of the community appeal is the opportunity for local poets to perform an original poem on stage. This year we have two Open Mic Competitions, one in Truckee on March 12 and another in Grass Valley on April 16, that offer two winners each this opportunity. The Tangled Roots Open Mic at Alibi in downtown Truckee runs 6-7:30 pm on March 12. Join us to cheer on local poets and writers on stage. On April 16, head down to the Iron Door in the basement of the Holbrooke Hotel in Grass Valley at 5:30 pm for another Open Mic Competition opportunity. These two events are a blast - meet other writers and join a community.

March 21st is World Poetry Day, and more events continue through the month of April with the SPF Fringe, a month and more of FREE poetry events happening in locations across Nevada County.

 

Sierra Poetry Festival marks National Poetry Month from the rolling foothills of California’s Gold Country to the rugged High Sierra, bringing a rich literary community together to celebrate the spoken word and reach out to new audiences in fresh ways. Through Sierra Poetry Festival we also celebrate California Arts, Culture & Creativity Month and we draw attention to our two coveted California Cultural Districts.

How to participate in the Nevada County Reads book choice for 2026: Northwoods by Daniel Mason

·       “Can there be art without the human in it? Maybe that is what I wish to capture: beast as seen by beast, tree as seen by tree. I jest, but not really.”- from Northwoods

Here's how it works. Nevada County Library chooses the book, provides free Honor copies to the community, and creates opportunities for readers to get together and talk, share reactions, listen to each other, and connect through moving and thought-provoking literature.

·       “Sometimes, overwhelmed, she retreats into the forests of the past. She has come to think of them as her private Archive, herself as Archivist, and she had found that the only way to understand the world as something other than a tale of loss is to see it as a tale of change.”- from Northwoods

The book chosen to be the one all of Nevada County reads is North Woods by Daniel Mason (2023), a work of historical fiction. It tells the story of a New England house through its inhabitants, human and otherwise, across centuries. The author found inspiration in many sources, including Tom Wessels’ Reading the Forested Landscape and William Cronon’s Changes in the Land, as well as Thoreau's Walden and Annie Dillard.  

I'll be leading a writing workshop at the Truckee Library on March 24th for readers and writers to glean inspiration and insights from this novel. The workshop will be from 4:30-6 pm on a Tuesday night. In this workshop we’ll look at some fascinating writers who influenced this time period of over 400 years that this novel covers and find inspiration for our own story reading and writing. If you havn't read the book, no problem. Join us to connect with your community and learn about the book. We will draw knowledge and insights from other writers of the time period as well. 

As part of the program, the author will be reading and presenting on the book in Nevada City on April 11. Daniel Mason is a physician, author, and assistant professor of psychiatry at Stanford University. His most recent book, North Woods (2023), is a work of historical fiction that tells the story of a New England house through its inhabitants, human and otherwise, across centuries.  

To write the book, he says that he stayed in upstate New York during the pandemic and spent a lot of time wandering in the woods, astonished by the evidence of land use and human history in the Northeast, as well as the dynamic seasonal changes. "I thought it would be fun to explore a single plot of woods and the changes that happen over time."

He says two books that fueled his research are "Tom Wessels’ Reading the Forested Landscape: A Natural History of New England taught me how to look for the forests of the past. It’s a masterpiece that changed the way I look at the natural world. William Cronon’s Changes in the Land: Indians, Colonists, and the Ecology of New England helped me appreciate how human land use has shaped New England ecology."

The book ultimately follows the time frame of a tree, and over 400 years, the thread pulling through the story is the forest succession as it mutually influences human living and culture, and vice versa.

Join me on March 24 at The Truckee Library whether you are a writer or a reader for some scintillating conversation around literature and how we can find our own ways into our own stories by reading other stories.