Greenfield writer, musician and teacher Daniel Hales will celebrate the release of his book, “Run Story” with a multimedia event on Saturday, Sept. 1 starting at 8 p.m.
During the free event, which will be held at Jane Doe, Jr. at 267 Main St. in Greenfield, Hales will read from his book, accompanied by video projections. Following the reading, there will be live music by two local rock bands: The frost heaves and hales (fronted by Hales himself) and The Big Why, which includes Leo Hwang, Greenfield Community College dean of humanities, on bass.
Run Story, published by Holyoke-based Shape&Nature Press, is a hybrid book that tells the stories of children in a residential facility for “emotionally and behaviorally disturbed” youth through an intriguing mix of notes, diary entries, homework assignments, poems, video game cheats, staff notes, special programs, official paperwork, and lots and lots of “resolve work” — where children that leave The Center without permission are required to write an account of what they did while “on a run.”
Although “Run Story” is entirely fictional, Hales drew a great deal of inspiration from the residential facility and special education school in western Massachusetts that he worked at for more than 20 years.
Michael Earl Craig, former poet laureate of Montana, writes of “Run Story”: “The kids at The Center appear at times to be students, at times to be patients, at times to be inmates. They are molting. Or maybe dreaming of molting. The book is both heartbreaking and comedic, immersing the reader in a world of chaos but also progress, and sometimes even transcendence.”