A most unusual benefit auction took place on Capitol Hill this week. Thursday night, eager benefactors gathered to bid dollar by dollar for each word of a Rebecca Brown story.

Proceeds from the auction — with words priced from $2 to $5 each — went to benefit March’s APRIL Festival.

The celebration of “Authors, Publishers, and Readers of Independent Literature” begins with a night of readings March 25th at Chop Suey. You can learn more at aprilfestival.com.

Thursday night, the literary auction filled the space of 10th Ave vintage fashion shop Kaleidoscope Vision with bidders plied with free beer from Elysian Brewery plucking up the choicest of the author’s words as Brown, the first writer-in-residence at Hugo House, read from her work.