Meet our Great Minds Panelists: Kathleen Alcalá, Kira Jane Buxton, and Rashida J. Smith

This September, Great Minds returns for an evening about the futures we can still write. Here's who's joining us.

Kathleen Alcalá

Magical realism, Jewish mysticism, and nineteenth-century Mexico walk into a novel. Kathleen Alcalá's Spirits of the Ordinary is the result, and it's still turning heads decades after its first publication. Born in Compton to Mexican parents and raised in San Bernardino, Alcalá built her literary foundation at Stanford, the University of Washington, and the University of New Orleans, then went on to both graduate from and teach at the Clarion West Science Fiction and Fantasy Workshop.

She's since written six books, including The Flower in the Skull and The Deepest Roots: Finding Food and Community on a Pacific Northwest Island, earning a Western States Book Award, a Governor's Writers Award, an International Latino Book Award, and two Artist Trust Fellowships along the way. She's also been recognized by the national Latino writers group Con Tinta, held a Whiteley Fellowship, and served as a Writer in Residence at Hugo House, where she still teaches.

Most recently, she's a contributing writer to New Suns: Original Speculative Fiction by People of Color. She's also a Hedgebrook alumna, and now calls the Pacific Northwest home.

Kira Jane Buxton

Ever wonder what the apocalypse looks like from a crow's point of view? Kira Jane Buxton did, and wrote Hollow Kingdom about it, foul-mouthed narrator crow included. The novel was an Indie Next pick and a finalist for the Thurber Prize for American Humor, the Audie Awards, and the Washington State Book Awards, and it landed on "best of 2019" lists from NPR, Book Riot, and Good Housekeeping. She followed it with Feral Creatures, and her newest novel, Tartufo, swaps crows for a giant truffle that turns a sleepy, fading Tuscan village upside down, for better or worse.

Buxton's writing has also shown up in The New York Times, The New Yorker, McSweeney's, The Rumpus, and Huffington Post. She calls Seattle home and shares it with a small menagerie that includes three cats, a dog, two crows, a charm of hummingbirds, five Steller's jays, two dark-eyed juncos, two squirrels, and a husband.

Before any of that, Buxton got her start as a writer inside a Hedgebrook farmhouse. She’s one of over 2,000 writers in residence alumnae who are part of Hedgebrook’s undeniable voice in shaping communities and culture.

Rashida J. Smith

Our moderator has a secret identity. By day, Rashida J. Smith is the Program Director at Clarion West, where she oversees the organization's full slate of classes, workshops, and programs for the speculative fiction community. By pen name, she's Jasmine Silvera, author of two fantasy romance trilogies, the Grace Bloods series, and the Tooth & Spell books.

Smith went through the Clarion West workshop herself back in 2005, then spent three years on its board before joining the staff in January 2020. In her time there, she's worked as Workshop Administrator and Online Program Coordinator, helped build the organization's first virtual six-week workshop, developed its Write-a-thon programs, and launched its Flash Fiction Groups, so she's had a hand in nearly every corner of Clarion West's programming.

That means she knows exactly what it takes to wrangle a room full of speculative fiction writers into a great conversation, on the page and on stage, and also has a well-documented weakness for oatmeal raisin cookies.

Sirjana Kaur

This September, Great Minds welcomes Sirjana Kaur, Seattle Arts & Lectures' 2026/27 Youth Poet Laureate, for a reading that opens up the evening's exploration of the futures we still have the power to write. A second-generation Punjabi American, Kaur uses language to explore memory, girlhood, identity, and faith, moving easily between crossword poems, spoken word, and tactile forms. Her work has been recognized by the National Student Poets Program, the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards, and Polyphony Lit.

When she's not writing, she's translating Punjabi texts with her grandmother or riding transit around Seattle in search of the city's stories.

Join Us

Readers and writers alike are invited to imagine together the future we still have the power to write. Expect a conversation that moves from reckoning to hope, original songs from Bushwick BookClub Seattle inspired by the authors' work, and an audience Q&A. We'll close with a reception featuring light bites and apple cider from our retreat center on Whidbey Island, and you'll leave with a curated reading list to keep the conversation going long after the night ends.

Thursday, September 17 | 6–9 PM

Hugo House, Seattle

A huge thanks to our partners at Clarion West, Seattle Arts & Lectures, Bushwick BookClub Seattle, and Hugo House for making this evening possible.