A Writer's Guide to East Lansing: Libraries, Bookstores, Writing Groups, and Presses

The Downtown Lansing branch of Capital Area District Libraries has three second-floor study rooms, first come, first served, each with a whiteboard and outlets. Meeting rooms run from a 95-seat auditorium down to rooms for 25 to 50. Reserve one by application; you need a CADL card in good standing. On the way out, look in the Book Burrow, which sells discarded library books.

East Lansing Public Library lets you book a study room online for up to two hours, as far as 30 days ahead. It also has meeting rooms and a Maker Studio, and it runs an annual writing contest.

Michigan State's Main Library has study rooms you can reserve online. The Hollander Makerspace and the Digital Scholarship Lab are in the building too. Visitors park in Lot 62, on Red Cedar Drive by Spartan Stadium.

MSU Libraries says its collection of comic books and graphic novels is the largest in the world. Literary first editions and archives sit alongside zines and artists' books. To see anything, register for an account, request the items, and reserve a reading-room appointment. The collections also offer Visiting Scholar Grants.

The state library serves Michigan residents in person and is open Monday through Saturday. Writers working on Michigan subjects can use its family history resources and its newspapers on microfilm. Rare books are here too, and the Michigan Center for the Book is based in the building.

The Okemos branch of Capital Area District Libraries has a public meeting room that holds up to 90. A writing group can reserve it by application with a CADL card in good standing.

Schuler Books is an independent Michigan bookseller with four stores, and this one in Okemos serves the Lansing area. Author events and storytimes run through the year. Its Chapbook Cafe has seating, so you can work beside the shelves.

Hooked is a bookstore and café on Lansing's east side. It runs in-store book clubs, a Bring Your Own Book Club among them, and hosts author signings. It is open daily.

Everybody Reads calls itself a bookstore and neighborhood center. Its calendar carries author talks and open mics, and the store hosts A Rally of Writers each year.

A Novel Concept is a women-owned bookstore in downtown Lansing that sells new and used books, with an emphasis on women, writers of color, and LGBTQ+ and international authors. It hosts book clubs and workshops. Check its calendar for readings.

Strange Matter's downtown Lansing café seats more than 35. A bakery shares the space with breakfast and lunch vendors, so you can stay through lunch. It is open daily, and street parking is free on weekends.

Strange Matter's flagship, on Lansing's east side, seats 40 or more, with bar seating and a bakery case. Parking is free on the street and in the lot behind. It opens daily.

The campus Strange Matter is a small counter with little seating of its own, but the Union's first floor has plenty of public seating. In the evening the building locks, and you need an MSU ID to get in.

Hooked's café serves coffee through the day and has a wine bar. Book clubs and signings take place among the tables, and you can reserve a table for a private event.

Crunchy's has served burgers and craft beer on Grand River Avenue since 1982. On Monday nights The Weekly Crunch brings comics from around the Midwest to its stage, with no cover. Karaoke nights fill out the calendar.

The Peanut Barrel opened in 1973, and its first menu of burgers, cold beer, and peanuts is still served. Crunchy's owner, Michael Krueger, bought it in 2023 from Joe and Jennifer Bell, who had run it since 1979.

MSU's Residential College in the Arts and Humanities opened the Center for Poetry in 2007 to encourage the reading, writing, and discussion of poetry. Poets come for readings and conversations in The Poetry Gallery and The Poets Roundtable. Students can enter its contests. The center also keeps a page of local writing groups and is home to the Wheelbarrow Books imprint, published with MSU Press.

The Michigan Center for the Book is a Library of Michigan program and the state affiliate of the Library of Congress's National Center for the Book, chartered in 1986. It runs Michigan Notable Books and the Michigan Author Award. Writers can also browse its Michigan Literary Landmarks and booklists.

The Arts Council of Greater Lansing names a poet laureate for a two-year term from among poets living in Clinton, Eaton, and Ingham counties. The laureate gives free public readings and leads workshops in each county. Writing a poem about Greater Lansing is part of the job.

MSU Libraries pays article processing charges for MSU corresponding authors through read-and-publish agreements with many publishers, Oxford and Cambridge among them. Check the terms for your journal. The Libraries also run the MSU Commons open access repository and help with research data management.

Michigan Humanities is the state humanities council. Its grants include Arts and Humanities Touring Grants and Gathering Grants, and it runs the Great Michigan Read and Poetry Out Loud.

Michigan State University Press publishes books on Michigan and the Great Lakes, along with scholarly books in fields that run from Indigenous studies and African American history to rhetoric. It has a journals list as well. The press also publishes and distributes the RCAH Center for Poetry's Wheelbarrow Books.

The Academy of Management Journal publishes empirical research, by any method, that tests or builds management theory and contributes to management practice. Its editor, Quinetta M. Roberson, is John A. Hannah Distinguished Professor of Management and Psychology in MSU's Eli Broad College of Business. Preparing an article for the Academy of Management Journal

The Michigan Author Award honors a living writer's career. Nominees must live in Michigan, have lived there long, or write work identified with the state, and they need at least three books for adults, teens, or children published over five years or more. The Michigan Library Association created the award; the Library of Michigan and the Michigan Center for the Book now run it.

Each year the Library of Michigan picks twenty books by Michigan authors or about Michigan and the Great Lakes, honoring them the year after they come out. Many of the chosen authors take part in a statewide tour.

The RCAH Center for Poetry gives this book prize every year, alternating between first books and books by poets who have published before. Winners come out under the Wheelbarrow Books imprint from MSU Press.

The Arts Council of Greater Lansing gives this grant to visual, performing, and literary artists, or artist-led teams, at any career level. Applicants must be Arts Council members. It funds placemaking projects and free programming in Greater Lansing.

Editors For Students keeps a guide to grants and writing resources for Michigan State students.

Publishing Services prints on-demand paperbacks and staple-bound booklets and zines for anyone, with or without an MSU affiliation; student and MSU department jobs move up the queue. It can also bind loose pages into a plain-cover paperback. That makes a good reading copy of a thesis or manuscript.