About us

We're the ones at the bookstore, at the book club, at the event with the drink in our hand (more on that later). We've been close enough to this community long enough to see exactly what was missing. The energy was here. The nonprofit infrastructure wasn't.

The big literary events happen hours away. Seattle, Portland — worth the drive sometimes, but not every time, and not for everyone. The Tri-Cities has the readers for something better. Author readings, book fairs, bookish balls, grants for indie authors working outside the big publishing houses. We think this place can be a real literary hub in the Pacific Northwest, and we built Folklore to help get it there.

Folklore fundraises to bring authors out to the Tri-Cities. We buy books from local stores for every event we run, underwrite author visits, and back the people already doing the work here. The other things we do still exist and still do what they do. Folklore is what sits underneath: the fundraising structure, the money that goes back in. None of us draws a salary from it.

Folklore Society is Washington-incorporated and pursuing 501(c)(3) status. Every dollar that comes through Folklore goes back into the literary community it came from.

We also operate as a licensed pop-up bar at a small number of literary events each year. That work underwrites some of what we do, and it's one of the ways we show up for partners whose events we believe in. But it isn't what we are. What we are is a nonprofit that exists so the Tri-Cities can have the reading life it deserves.