Lost in the Letters set to open storefront in Candler Park

Lost in the Letters was founded by Scott Daughtridge DeMer, author of the novella “Then Then Then” (Kernpunkt Press, $14.99), which published in April. He grew up in Acworth and studied psychology in Kentucky, planning to become a social worker. But while living in New York City after college, he began to pursue writing and found inspiration from the tight community of scrappy, DIY writers he befriended there. When he moved to Atlanta in 2012, he set out to re-create that like-minded community.

“People really gravitated toward it,” said DeMer about the organization’s origins. “The motivation really was to make space for people to come together and learn from each other, to be inspired by each other, to be in conversation so that we can all deepen our investment in our own creative practices.”

Roxane Gay, Jericho Brown, Leesa Cross-Smith, Carmen Maria Machado, George Singleton and Sabrina Orah Mark are just a few of the writers Lost in the Letters has hosted at its events. Only their books, and those by other writers who have participated in the organization’s events, will be sold in the new bookstore. It is an intentionally curated group of authors and poets.

“We bring in people who are renowned and who have won awards and who have published books that have been well received … as well as folks that maybe don’t have a book but have been publishing their work in journals and magazines, to some people who don’t have any publications,” said DeMer. “But all those folks, creative writing is their primary work. They’re doing the work to push the boundaries on their own individual and personal levels and using their practice to push the boundaries of the wider creative writing realm as well.”

Credit: Lost in the Letters

Credit: Lost in the Letters

One of the organization’s main initiatives is to provide studio space for writers. It’s been doing so on a limited basis at the Art Papers office in Little Five Points, but the new Candler Park space will allow them to expand that offering.

“Visual artists have studio spaces, musicians have studio spaces, but writers don’t often have studio spaces,” DeMer said. “Writers just kind of have this expectation that we’ll work from home, but that can be a distracting place, that can be a not super productive place. So, the idea was to make a space for people who are writing and reading, to be able to get out of their houses, to be able to come have a focused work time and then be able to commune with people doing similar work as well.”

Currently all Lost in the Letter events are free, but DeMer is still working out the logistics for the organization’s new model as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit. At the moment he is leaning toward a membership-based operation.

Upcoming Lost in the Letter events include a reading and workshop in collaboration with Trees Atlanta on Aug. 14 and the Letters Festival in November.

The organization’s goal is to give writers “access and opportunities to harness their own creative impulses,” said DeMer, who notes that its success is measured by depth not breadth.

“Growth for us has always looked like connecting with our audience on a deeper level and not always on a wider level,” he said. “Success for us doesn’t look like we have 1,000 or 10,000 people coming to all of our events. … We know that we exist within a niche, but we want to maximize that niche that we are currently living in to do the best work that we can to make sure it’s high quality, to make sure that it’s accessible and to make sure that people can find themselves in it.”

Suzanne Van Atten is a book critic and contributing editor to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. She may be reached at Suzanne.VanAtten@ajc.com.