UKIAH, Calif. – Now in its 11th year, the Friends of the Mendocino College Library, an affiliate of the Mendocino College Foundation, is offering its fall reading series. 

This series will kick off with well-known Ukiah Poet Laureate Bill Churchill.

The first reading, with Churchill, will take place on Thursday, Oct. 16, at 7 p.m. in room 4210 on the Mendocino College Ukiah Campus, 1000 Hensley Creek Road in Ukiah. Room 4210 can be found upstairs in the new college library.

Churchill is currently serving as the Ukiah poet laureate and teaches at Mendocino College and Santa Rosa Junior College, where he also has been a California Poet in the Schools since 1998.

His publications include Song of Seasons, Controlled Burn, Durmiendo Con Fantasmas/Sleeping with Ghosts and El Velo/The Veil.

Churchill's work has been included in journals such as First Leaves, Americas Review, Santa Clara Review and Frontera-Esquina.

He also has been a featured poet at the Summer Dream Poetry Festival in Vancouver, B.C. in 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2013.

Following the reading, there will be an open mic session to allow audience members to recite their poetry. Sign ups will take place prior to the reading and during the break.

Additional authors in the series include Lake County Poet Laureate Casey Carney on Nov. 16 at Mendocino College’s new Lake Center in Lakeport, and novelist Waights Taylor Jr. on Nov. 20 at the Ukiah Campus.

For more information, please check the college Web site at www.mendocino.edu or call 707-468-3051.