The Austin Review's Launch Party Is GO

Shame on us for even mentioning "noms."

For, verily, we are little other than Deep & Serious Connoisseurs of Literature here in the arts section of your Austin Chronicle. Do we not host the annual Short Story Contest, the latest winners of which are methodically being chosen even as you read these words? Do we not retain a dedicated, case-hardened phalanx of proofreaders to save us from our own editorial missteps of spelling and grammar? Do we –

But, OK, so we heard that this release party for The Austin Review, a new literary journal that "draws inspiration from the flourishing art scene of Austin," a nonprofit magazine of cultural goodness run by Michael Barrett, Tatiana Ryckman, Shannon Schaefer Perri, and Wendy M. Walker –

We heard that Mettle was among those catering the soirée!

And so we got a skoshie overexcited. Abashedly so, in retrospect. Because we have a certain love for what those culinary wizards at Mettle can do.

But, yes, harrumph – of course we're also looking forward to hearing the tales The Austin Review's growing stable of writers can spin, to meeting fellow travelers along the locally twisted belles-lettres boulevard, to engaging a bit of artisanal-brewski action there in the good offices of The LIVESTRONG Foundation where this first-issue launch takes place on Saturday night from 6-9pm.

Welcome, Austin Review, to the upholstered foyer of this city's bookish pandemonium; we trust you'll stick around for years to come.