Ray Bradbury’s writing has inspired generation after generation of writers with his iconic works such as Fahrenheit 451, The Martian Chronicles, Something Wicked this Way Comes, The Illustrated Man, Dandelion Wine and many others. Several of Ray Bradbury’s stories have been adapted for film and television. Twenty seven of Ray Bradbury’s stories were adapted for the classic EC Comic Books of the 1950s in such titles as Tales from the Crypt, Vault of Horror, Haunt of Fear, Crime Suspenstories, Shock Suspenstories, Weird Science-Fantasy, Weird Science, and Weird Fantasy. Ray Bradbury just turned 90 years old in 2010 and he is still active and involved with creating new works.

Ray Bradbury is appearing in person to sign Ray Bradbury’s Chrysalis, a new Science Fiction film based on his short story and just released on DVD. Appearing with Ray for the 12:00 P.M.-2:00 P.M. signing will be Cast Members Glen Vaughan, Corey Landis, Elina Madison, Darren Kendrick, Larry Kirk, Producer Roger Lay, Jr., Composer Brandon Moore, and Creature Effects Designer Lee Romaire. Ray Bradbury’s Chrysalis DVD, Poster, and CD will be available for purchase at the Convention.

The Los Angeles Comic Book and Science Fiction Convention will be held at the historic landmark the Shrine Auditorium Expo Center, 700 West 32nd Street, in Los Angeles, across the street from USC College. Also featured is a large Dealer’s Room full of Old and New Comic Books, Graphic Novels, Toys, Action Figures, Movie Memorabilia, Trading Cards, DVDs and many other Collectibles available for purchase at over one hundred tables. Show hours are 10:00 A.M.-5:00 P.M. Admission is $8.00, five years and under are free. A Resident Evil: Afterlife 3D Mini-Movie Poster will be given away free to everyone attending courtesy of Sony Pictures. Check http://www.comicbookscifi.com/ or call (818) 954-8432 for more information.

Oct 14 2010 – Bonita Richter Presents “How to Raise Your Fees Workshop” – Garlands in Barrington, Ill
Executive Coach Bonita Richter is pleased to announce a groundbreaking workshop where savvy women entrepreneurs can learn how to confidently sell their services and raise their fees. Richter’s “How to Raise Your Fees Workshop” will be held on Thursday, Oct. 14, 2010, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. at The Garlands in Barrington, Ill. A registration fee of $297 is available through Sept. 15 and includes workshop materials, continental breakfast, lunch and snack; cost is $497 after Sept. 15.

Richter’s systematic and proven approach is designed to help women entrepreneurs raise their fees up to 40 percent. “Most sales training systems employ a masculine approach to selling, which conflicts with a woman’s approach,” explained Richter. “This is why so many women feel uncomfortable discussing fees.”

Richter used the system to build her executive coaching business and found the authentic approach to pricing services and guiding clients through a sales conversation process improved her confidence and produced more sales. “I quickly found myself generating more income, because I was closing 80 percent of my sales calls,” added Richter.

Recognizing that the process could also help her clients increase their income, Richter created the “How to Raise Your Fees Workshop,” a hands-on experience focused on the specific steps needed to raise fees and win clients. Attendance is limited so that each entrepreneur has an opportunity to receive spotlight coaching during the full day event. Time-saving scripts, checklists, templates and examples make it easy to immediately put the system to work.

The authentic selling system is ideal for women consultants, coaches, copywriters, freelance writers, publicists, web designers, speakers and trainers. For more information or to register, visit http://www.bonitarichter.com/.

Sept 11-12 2010 – Women Writers Event Remembers Katrina – New Orleans

Hurricane Katrina made landfall in New Orleans on Aug. 29, 2010, five years ago this month. To honor the suffering it caused, and in a year when the eyes of the world are once again trained on the Gulf Coast after the oil spill, the Kentucky Women Writers Conference will feature poet Patricia Smith, the author of “Blood Dazzler,” a collection of poetry on Hurricane Katrina. The Kentucky Women Writers Conference runs Sept. 11-12.

“Blood Dazzler,” which chronicles the devastation wreaked by Katrina on individual lives, was a National Book Award finalist and one of NPR’s Top 5 books of 2008. Smith’s poems capture the transformation of the hurricane as it approaches shore, from Aug. 23, 2005, the day Tropical Depression Twelve developed, through Aug. 28 when it became a Category 5 storm with its “scarlet glare fixed on the trembling crescent,” to the heartbreaking aftermath. Throughout, the book evokes the horror that unfolded in New Orleans as the nation watched on television. Assuming the voices of politicians, the dying, their survivors, and the voice of the hurricane itself, Smith follows the inadequate relief effort and stands witness to families held captive on rooftops and in the Superdome. Of the critically acclaimed collection, South Carolina poet laureate Marjory Wentworth wrote, “‘Blood Dazzler’ is the narrative of a shameful tragedy, but it is lyrical and beautiful, like a hymn we want to sing over and over until it lives in our collective memory.”

Smith is currently working on a dance/theater production based on “Blood Dazzler” with Paloma McGregor, of the Urban Bush Women. The production is expected to premiere at The Kitchen in New York City this fall.

A four-time individual champion of the National Poetry Slam, Smith will perform as headliner and serve as celebrity judge for this year’s Gypsy Poetry Slam. The opening event of the Kentucky Women Writers Conference, the Gypsy Poetry Slam will be held Sept. 10,. This is the noted poet’s second appearance at the slam, and the event’s fifth anniversary. Smith will also teach a two-part poetry workshop for conference registrants Sept. 11-12. For more details, visit the event online at http://www.kentuckywomenwriters.org/ or call (859) 257-2874.

Amy Goodman, Award-Winning Journalist, Opens Calhoun Performing Arts Series, Sept. 27, 2010 – New York
Amy Goodman, best-selling author and award-winning executive producer and host of the national independent news program Democracy Now!, will address the role of independent media in promoting social justice on Monday, September 27, 7pm, in an evening talk hosted by the Calhoun 2010-2011 Performing Arts Series. A Q&A and signing of her latest book, Breaking the Sound Barrier, will follow the talk. Tickets for the event,which is being held in the Mary Lea Johnson Performing Arts Center at The Calhoun School, 433 West End Avenue @ 81st Street, are $5 for seniors and students; $10 for adults, and may be purchased online at www.calhoun.org/reservations.

Ms. Goodman is the first journalist to receive the Right Livelihood Award–widely known as the “Alternative Nobel Prize”– for “developing an innovative model of truly independent grassroots political journalism that brings to millions of people the alternative voices that are often excluded by the mainstream media.” Her reporting on East Timor and Nigeria has won numerous awards, including the George Polk Award, the Robert F. Kennedy Prize for International Reporting, and the Alfred I. duPont-Columbia Award. She has also received awards from the Associated Press, United Press International, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and Project Censored. Ms. Goodman was one of the first recipients of Independent Media’s Izzy Award. PULSE named her one of the 20 Top Global Media Figures of 2009, and she received the James Aronson Award for Social Justice Reporting in 2007 for a weekly podcast syndicated by King Features. Time Magazine named Democracy Now its “Pick of the Podcasts.”

The author of four New York Times best sellers, Ms. Goodman’s latest book, Breaking the Sound Barrier, proves the power of independent journalism in the struggle for a better world. She co-authored the first three bestsellers with her brother, journalist David Goodman: Standing Up to the Madness: Ordinary Heroes in Extraordinary Times (2008), Static: Government Liars, Media Cheerleaders, and the People Who Fight Back (2006) and The Exception to the Rulers: Exposing Oily Politicians, War Profiteers, and the Media That Love Them (2004).  For more information about Amy Goodman, see http://www.democracynow.org/.

Sept 18 2010 – Twelve Poetic Dance works – San Francisco, CA
Twelve Poetic Dance works – a fusion of dance with poetry – by selected Art Dance groups and soloists, embracing poetry as something to dance about, will be featured at the 17th annual Dancing Poetry Festival. Costumes, Music, and Motion highlight this year’s festival, which will be held at the California Palace of the Legion of Honor’s exquisite Florence Gould Theater, 100 – 34th Avenue, San Francisco, CA, on Sept. 18, 2010, noon – 4:00 p.m.

A delightful and rare fusion of the arts of dance and poetry. Sponsored by Artists Embassy International and featuring the renowned Natica Angilly’s Poetic Dance Theater Company, with Poet Laureate Man of Letters, Richard Angilly. For reservations/advanced tickets email dancingpoetry@aol.com or call: 510-235-0361. Information at: http://www.dancingpoetry.com/. $15 General admission, $12 Seniors, $8 Youth. An exciting, fun-filled afternoon for the whole family.

Artists Embassy International expands performance outreach, as it moves poetry from the page to the stage, presenting exceptional local, international, cultural exchanges. AEI is a non-profit tax-exempt volunteer organization, furthering intercultural understanding, friendship and goodwill through the universal language of the arts. Poets, dancers, musicians, visual artists, and arts enthusiasts are invited to this wonderful poetic happening. Tax-deductible donations accepted.

Related posts:

1. Writing Events – 18th Edition
2. Writing Events – 21th Edition
3. Writing Events – 26th Edition

Ashe County’s Literary Festival, in its third year, will run from September 14 – September 18, 2010, in West Jefferson, NC.

Preface events kicked-off with a Community Read of Daniel Wallace’s Big Fish.

Featured authors include: Fred Chappell, John Hart, Robert Morgan, and Daniel Wallace.

Festival culminates with On the Same Plate Luncheon and Panel Discussion with authors on Saturday, September 18 at noon.

Festival co-chairs Jane Lonon, executive director of the Ashe County Arts Council, and Jim McQueen, director of the Ashe County Library, announced this year’s line-up and schedule. In a statement about the festival, Lonon said, “This year we truly have something for everyone. Festival events promote reading, writing, and the pure enjoyment of the written word. North Carolina authors are nationally and internationally known and we have some of the very best joining us to share their writing and insights—particularly concerning how a sense of place influences their writing.”

Authors slated for this year’s festival include: Fred Chappell, Julia Ebel, Georgann Eubanks, John Hart, D. G. Martin, Robert Morgan, Ed Southern and Daniel Wallace. Authors will read from recent works, participate in Q&A sessions and/or a panel discussion, and will meet in small groups with for “an hour with an author” sessions.

A complete list of festival events and other information is available at www.onthesamepagefestival.org. A few highlights include: Ed Southern, Sports in the Carolinas: From Death Valley to Tobacco Road; Georgann Eubanks, Many Beginnings: a creative writing workshop; Cinnamon Cinema! the 2003 movie: Big Fish; Daniel Wallace, reading and Q&A; Fred Chappell, with Susan Chappell, reading and Q&A; An Hour with an Author sessions; Robert Morgan, reading and Q&A; John Hart, reading and Q&A; Julia Ebel, reading and Q&A; and On the Same Plate Luncheon and Panel Discussion with Fred Chappell, Georgann Eubanks, John Hart, Robert Morgan, and Daniel Wallace, moderated by D. G. Martin.

Once again the recipient of a grant from the North Carolina Humanities Council, a statewide nonprofit affiliated with the National Endowment for the Humanities, the 2010 Festival has received support from Skyline Membership Corp., South Arts, Ashe County, the West Jefferson TDA, the Friends of the Ashe County Public Library, and Caddell Communications, as well as a number of individual contributors.

Ashe County is located in the High Country of northwestern North Carolina and West Jefferson is its largest town. These websites provide information, including lodging and restaurants: http://www.ashechamber.com/, http://www.ashecountyarts.org/, and http://www.visitwestjefferson.org/.

Upcoming Literary Events at Kepler’s: Aug. 25 – Nov. 7, 2010
All events are free and take place at Kepler’s unless otherwise noted.

Kepler’s Books
1010 El Camino Real
Menlo Park, CA 94025
650.324.4321

Howard Norman
Wednesday, August 25, 7:00 p.m.
What Is Left the Daughter

Seventeen-year-old Wyatt Hillyer is suddenly orphaned when his parents, within hours of each other, jump off two different bridges–the result of their separate involvements with the same compelling neighbor. The suicides cause Wyatt to move to small-town Middle Economy to live with his uncle, aunt, and cousin Tilda.

Setting in motion the novel’s chain of life-altering passions and the wartime perfidy at its core is the arrival of the German student Hans Mohring. Actual historical incidents–including a German U-boat’s sinking of the Nova Scotia–Newfoundland ferry Caribou, on which Aunt Constance Hillyer might or might not be traveling–lend intense narrative power to Norman’s uncannily layered story.

Norman is a three-time winner of National Endowment for the Arts fellowships and a winner of the Lannan Award for fiction. His 1987 novel, The Northern Lights, was nominated for a National Book Award, as was his 1994 novel The Bird Artist. He is also author of the novels The Museum Guard, The Haunting of L, and Devotion. His books have been translated into twelve languages. Norman teaches in the MFA program at the University of Maryland.

Brad Herzog
Monday, August 30, 7:00 p.m.

Turn Left at the Trojan Horse: A Would-Be Hero’s American Odyssey BUY NOW

“Herzog’s third travel memoir follows the highways cross-country examining the idea of the hero along the way. He captures stunning details of the American landscape. The hero’s return, is irresistible…a near-perfect ending.” –Kirkus Reviews

Turn Left at the Trojan Horse has been described as On the Road meets Eat, Pray, Love because it goes well beyond a road trip. More than just a funny and profound narrative of Brad Herzog’s cross-country trek toward a college reunion in Ithaca (New York) and more than another reimagining of Odysseus’s ancient journey (he visits places like Troy, OR… Iliad, MT… Apollo, PA…), it is a memoir exploring the parameters of a heroic existence – by chronicling the lives of people in America’s oft-ignored spaces, by examining the universal truths embedded in ancient myths, and by undertaking a fair bit of self-evaluation. It is the memoir of an Everyman searching for the hero within.

Brad Herzog has been described as a “modern-day Steinbeck” and a “Picasso of the Winnebago,” and Lonely Planet has ranked his travel memoirs among eight classics of the genre, along with books like Travels with Charley and On the Road. As an award-winning freelance writer, he has chronicled some of the nation’s most unusual and intriguing subcultures, from nudists to North Pole explorers and from Pez collectors to pro mini golfers. Please visit him at bradherzog.com

Discoveries: ‘Turn Left at the Trojan Horse’

Discoveries: ‘Turn Left at the Trojan Horse’. 54817224-12163112-187104. Turn Left at the Trojan Horse. Add your voice to the mix! …

discussions.latimes.com/20/lanews/la-ca-discoveries11…/10

“This is how a quest should be done…Herzog’s stitching is so good, so seamless — he follows Odysseus’ story until it becomes his own.” — Los Angeles Times

September Events

Rick Moody
Thursday, September 2, 7:00 p.m.
The Four Fingers of Death
Montese Crandall is a downtrodden writer whose rare collection of baseball cards won’t sustain him, financially or emotionally, through the grave illness of his wife. Luckily, he swindles himself a job churning out a novelization of the 2025 remake of a 1963 horror classic, “The Crawling Hand.” Crandall tells therein of the United States, in a bid to regain global eminence, launching at last its doomed manned mission to the desolation of Mars. Three space pods with nine Americans on board travel three months, expecting to spend three years as the planet’s first colonists. When a secret mission to retrieve a flesh-eating bacterium for use in bio-warfare is uncovered, mayhem ensues.

THE FOUR FINGERS OF DEATH is Rick Moody’s ninth book. He has received the PEN/Martha Albrand Award, the Addison Metcalf Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Paris Review’s Aga Khan Prize, and a Guggenheim Fellowship.

Deborah Willis
Thursday, September 9, 7:00 p.m.
Vanishing

This debut short story collection explores emotional and physical absences, the ways in which people leave and are left, and whether it’s ever possible to move on. With a remarkable economy of words, moments of dark humor, and wisdom and dexterity far beyond her years, Willis captures an incredible array of characters that will linger in the imagination, proving that nothing is ever truly forgotten. In these fourteen stories, secrets are both kept and unearthed, and lives are shaped by missing lovers, parents, and children.

“The emotional range and depth of these stories, their clarity and deftness, is astonishing.” –Alice Munro“Short-listed for a Governor-General’s Award, the stories in Vanishing show the magic of fiction at its best: fully realized worlds inseparable from the uncanny fact that they exist as mere words, magnificently strung together. Willis’s creative sleight-of-hand illuminates human intricacies as if tapping directly into your own.” –The Globe and Mail, one of Jim Bartley’s Top Five Books of the Year

Deborah Willis, 28, was born and raised in Calgary, Alberta. Her work has appeared in various journals and publications, and she was a winner of PRISM International’s annual fiction prize. She graduated from the University of Victoria, and has worked as a horseback riding instructor, a waitress, a short-order cook, a tour-guide in a French castle, a house-cleaner, and a newspaper reporter. She is fluent in French, and currently works as a bookseller at Munro’s Books in Victoria, British Columbia. Shortlisted for the Governor General’s Literary Award and longlisted for the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award, Vanishing and Other Stories is her first book of fiction.

William Gibson
Friday, September 10, 7:00 p.m.
Zero History

The iconic visionary returns with his first new novel since the New York Times bestseller Spook Country.

Hollis Henry worked for the global marketing magnate Hubertus Bigend once before. She never meant to repeat the experience. But she’s broke, and Bigend never feels it’s beneath him to use whatever power comes his way — in this case, the power of money to bring Hollis onto his team again. Not that she knows what the “team” is up to, not at first.

Milgrim is even more thoroughly owned by Bigend. He’s worth owning for his useful gift of seeming to disappear in almost any setting, and his Russian is perfectly idiomatic – so much so that he spoke Russian with his therapist, in the secret Swiss clinic where Bigend paid for him to be cured of the addiction that would have killed him.

Garreth has a passion for extreme sports. Most recently he jumped off the highest building in the world, opening his chute at the last moment, and he has a new thighbone made of rattan baked into bone, entirely experimental, to show for it. Garreth isn’t owned by Bigend at all. Garreth has friends from whom he can call in the kinds of favors that a man like Bigend will find he needs, when things go unexpectedly sideways, in a world a man like Bigend is accustomed to controlling.

As when a Department of Defense contract for combat-wear turns out to be the gateway drug for arms dealers so shadowy that even Bigend, whose subtlety and power in the private sector would be hard to overstate, finds himself outmaneuvered and adrift in a seriously dangerous world.

Mr. Gibson will sign copies of his older titles if you purchase a copy of Zero History from Kepler’s. Please have your receipt with you.

Monique Truong
Monday, September 27, 7:00 p.m.
Bitter in the Mouth

From Monique Truong, the bestselling and award-winning author of The Book of Salt, comes a brilliant, mesmerizing, beautifully written novel about a young woman’s search for identity and family, as she uncovers the secrets of her past and of history.

Growing up in the small town of Boiling Springs, North Carolina, in the 70’s and 80’s, Linda believes that she is profoundly different from everyone else, including the members of her own family. Now in her thirties, Linda looks back at her past when she navigated her way through life with the help of her great-uncle Harper, who loves her and loves to dance, and her best friend Kelly, with whom Linda exchanges almost daily letters.

For as long as she can remember, Linda has experienced a secret sense—she can “taste” words, which have the power to disrupt, dismay, or delight. She falls for names and what they evoke. As with all bodies, Linda’s is a mystery to her, in this and in other ways. Even as Linda makes her way north to Yale and New York City, she still does not know the truth about her past. Then, when a personal tragedy compels Linda to return to Boiling Springs, she gets to know a mother she never knew and uncovers a startling story of a life, a family.

This astonishing novel questions many assumptions—about what it means to be a family and to be a friend, to be foreign and to be familiar, to be connected and to be disconnected—from others and from the past, our bodies, our histories, and ourselves.

John Vaillant
Tuesday, September 28, 7:00 p.m.
The Tiger: A True Story of Vengeance and Survival

It’s December 1997, and a man-eating tiger is on the prowl outside a remote village in Russia’s Far East. The tiger isn’t just killing people, it’s annihilating them, and a team of men and their dogs must hunt it on foot through the forest in the brutal cold. As the trackers sift through the gruesome remains of the victims, they discover that these attacks aren’t random: the tiger is apparently engaged in a vendetta. Injured, starving, and extremely dangerous, the tiger must be found before it strikes again.

This ancient, tenuous relationship between man and predator is at the very heart of this remarkable book. Throughout we encounter surprising theories of how humans and tigers may have evolved to coexist, how we may have developed as scavengers rather than hunters, and how early Homo sapiens may have fit seamlessly into the tiger’s ecosystem. Above all, we come to understand the endangered Siberian tiger, a highly intelligent super-predator that can grow to ten feet long, weigh more than six hundred pounds, and range daily over vast territories of forest and mountain.

Beautifully written and deeply informative, The Tiger circles around three main characters: Vladimir Markov, a poacher killed by the tiger; Yuri Trush, the lead tracker; and the tiger himself. It is an absolutely gripping tale of man and nature that leads inexorably to a final showdown in a clearing deep in the taiga.

John Vaillant is also the author of The Golden Spruce. He has written for The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Outside, National Geographic, and Men’s Journal, among others. He lives in Vancouver, British Columbia.

October Events

Stina Katchadourian
Wednesday, October 6, 7:00 p.m.

The Lapp King’s Daughter: A Family’s Journey Through Finland’s Wars BUY NOW

From 1939 to 1945, Finland fought three wars: the Winter War of 1939, when the Soviet Union attacked the country; the Continuation War, when Finland fought the Soviet Union alongside Germany; and the Lapland War of 1944-45 against Germany.

Stina Katchadourian’s memoir tells the story of how these three wars uprooted the lives of one Finnish family. The book draws on the author’s childhood memories and also on the correspondence between her parents, who were separated during most of World War II, with the father on the front, fighting the Soviets.

Very little has previously been written about Finland’s dramatic political history during World War II. How this small country retained its independence despite facing occupation by the Soviet Union or domination by Nazi Germany is told in riveting detail in this eyewitness account, which also includes family photos, maps, historical photos and other unique material from Swedish and Finnish archives.

Katchadourian grew up in Finland as part of its Swedish-speaking minority and moved to the United States in 1966. She is the author of two nonfiction books, Efronia, An Armenian Love Story and Great Need Over the Water, and has published book-length translations of poetry by Märta Tikkanen, Edith Södergran, and Tua Forsström.

Stina Katchadourian also works as a journalist for Scandinavian media. She regularly contributes to a Helsinki newspaper and has made numerous programs for Finnish radio and television.

She holds an M.A. from Stanford University and has been an Affiliated Scholar at Stanford’s Institute for Research on Women and Gender. She has held residencies at the Djerassi Foundation in Woodside, California, and the MacDowell Foundation in New Hampshire. She has served on the Board of the Global Fund for Women and currently serves on the Board of the Bay Area Chapter of the Finlandia Foundation, and is an honorary member of the Finland-Swedish Literature Society. Her prizes include the Leif and Inger Sjögren Translation Prize of the American-Scandinavia Society and the Södergran Prize.

Lan Samantha Chang
Thursday, October 7, 7:00 p.m.
All Is Forgotten, Nothing Is Lost

At the renowned writing school in Bonneville, every student is simultaneously terrified of and attracted to the charismatic and mysterious poet and professor Miranda Sturgis, whose high standards for art are both intimidating and inspiring. As two students, Roman and Bernard, strive to win her admiration, the lines between mentorship, friendship, and love are blurred.

All Is Forgotten, Nothing Is Lost offers a starkly honest portrait of people caught up in the drive to write and of the personal bargains and self-deceptions that such an ambition can entail. Lan Samantha Chang was brave to write this book, to turn her novelist’s eye onto a world she knows intimately, and her bravery pays off in the unflinching final scenes. (Adam Haslett, author of Union Atlantic )

What a lovely, fierce book about love, betrayal, loss, and time’s dominion over us all. Fleet, preternaturally attuned to the ebb and flow of personal history, All Is Forgotten, Nothing Is Lost is, well, unforgettable. Lan Samantha Chang sees deeply into her characters, right down to their souls, but she wields her intelligence with the compassion of a master. (Scott Spencer, author of A Ship Made of Paper )

Lucy, Roman, Bernard, and Miranda are characters you won’t soon forget. In their passionate, demanding, wrecked, and joyous literary lives, they thrive on their belief in language’s absolute authority. This deeply affecting–and elegant–novel by Lan Samantha Chang definitely offers what Leonard Cohen calls his whole career in song: All day and night, versions of the erotic. I wish I could live long enough to discover this novel in an attic trunk a hundred years in the future, and exclaim, so this is what ‘poetic education’ really meant. (Howard Norman, author of What Is Left the Daughter )

Lan Samantha Chang’s fiction has appeared in Atlantic Monthly, Story and The Best American Short Stories 1994 and 1996. Chang is the author of the award-winning books Hunger and Inheritance. She is the recipient of the Wallace Stegner and Truman Capote fellowships at Stanford University. She also received, from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, a Teaching-Writing fellowship and a Michener-Copernicus fellowship. Her many awards include a Guggenheim Fellowship, and she was a finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. She lives in Iowa City, Iowa, where she directs the University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop.

Giovanni Tempesta
Monday, October 11, 7:00 p.m.
Acque, Lutulente E Chiare: Waters, Muddy and Clear

The 30 poems collected in Waters, muddy and clear, will let the reader penetrate Tempesta’s nostalgic Italian heart. His verses, some in rhymes, are about love, desire, passion and compassion, fear and rejection, and the irony of life in all its aspects.

Translating poetry is an arduous task but he succeeded in recreating in English, the emotional impact of his original poems in Italian. At the end, he even invites the readers to give their own interpretation of the final poem, My Lady. Giovanni is a firm believer that we are all poets in one way or another, and that poetry lives inside of us. Poetry is part of each and every one of us, without exception. It is like a remote and hidden prisoner. He feels that man, like Michelangelo and his David, must do nothing but give it freedom from its imprisonment. Once sent forth, however, poetry belongs to us no longer, thus we often do not feel worthy of it. We hold the doubt that it was really our delivery, that it was hidden inside us for so long.

Giovanni Tempesta has been a Professor of Italian Language and Culture at Stanford University since 1983. Over the years, he has also taught Latin, Greek and French in Northern California and Italy. He was born and raised in Italy and moved to California in 1972.

Meet-and-Greet Signing: Alex Ross
Friday, October 15, 2:30 p.m.
Listen to This
The Rest Is Noise

Ross’s award-winning international bestseller, The Rest Is Noise, has become a contemporary classic, establishing him as one of our most popular and acclaimed cultural historians. Listen to This, which takes its title from a beloved 2004 essay in which Ross described his late-blooming discovery of pop music, showcases the best of Ross’s writing from more than a decade at The New Yorker. These pieces, dedicated to classical and popular artists alike, are at once erudite and lively. In a previously unpublished essay, Ross brilliantly retells hundreds of years of music history—from Renaissance dances to Led Zeppelin—through a few iconic bass lines of celebration and lament. He vibrantly sketches canonical composers such as Schubert, Verdi, and Brahms; gives us in-depth interviews with modern pop masters such as Björk and Radiohead; and introduces us to music students at a Newark high school and to indie-rock hipsters in Beijing.

Ross has been the music critic for The New Yorker since 1996. He is the author of the international bestseller The Rest Is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century, which was a finalist for the 2008 Pulitzer Prize and won the 2007 National Book Critics Circle Award.

NOTE: This is a meet-and-greet booksigning. The author will not give a formal presentation.

Jimmy Carter
Tuesday, October 26, 7:00 p.m.
White House Diary

The edited, annotated diary of President Jimmy Carter–filled with insights into his presidency, his relationships with friends and foes, and his lasting impact on issues that still preoccupy America and the world

Each day during his presidency, Jimmy Carter made several entries in a private diary, recording his thoughts, impressions, delights, and frustrations. He offered unvarnished assessments of cabinet members, congressmen, and foreign leaders; he narrated the progress of secret negotiations such as those that led to the Camp David Accords. When his four-year term came to an end in early 1981, the diary amounted to more than five thousand pages. But this extraordinary document has never been made public—until now.

Jimmy Carter, our thirty-ninth president, received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002. The author of numerous bestsellers—including An Hour Before Daylight and Palestine Peace Not Apartheid—he and his wife, Rosalynn, live in Plains, Georgia, but continue to travel around the world in support of numerous philanthropic efforts.

NOTE: This is a meet-and-greet book-signing. President Carter will not be giving a formal presentation.

TICKETED EVENT. Please check keplers.com often for details and updates.

Bo Caldwell
Wednesday, October 27, 7:00 p.m.
City of Tranquil Light

Will Kiehn is seemingly destined for life as a humble farmer in the Midwest when, having felt a call from God, he travels to the vast North China Plain in the early twentieth-century. There he is surprised by love and weds a strong and determined fellow missionary, Katherine. They soon find themselves witnesses to the crumbling of a more than two-thousand-year-old dynasty that plunges the country into decades of civil war. As the couple works to improve the lives of the people of Kuang P’ing Ch’eng— City of Tranquil Light, a place they come to love—and face incredible hardship, will their faith and relationship be enough to sustain them?

Told through Will and Katherine’s alternating viewpoints—and inspired by the lives of the author’s maternal grandparents—City of Tranquil Light is a tender and elegiac portrait of a young marriage set against the backdrop of the shifting face of a beautiful but torn nation. A deeply spiritual book, it shows how those who work to teach others often have the most to learn.

Caldwell is the author of the national bestseller The Distant Land of My Father. Her short fiction has been published in Ploughshares, Story, Epoch, and other literary journals. A former Stegner Fellow in Creative Writing at Stanford University, she lives in Northern California with her husband, novelist Ron Hansen.

November Events

Thomas McGuane
Tuesday, November 2, 7:00 p.m.
Driving on the Rim 

From one of America’s most acclaimed literary figures (“an important as well as brilliant novelist”—The New York Times Book Review) a major new novel that hilariously takes the pulse of our times.

The unforgettable voyager of this dark comic journey is I. B. “Berl” Pickett, M.D., the die of whose uncharmed life was probably cast as soon as his mother got the bright idea to name him after Irving Berlin. The boyhood insults to any chance of normalcy piled on apace thereafter. What would have become of this soul had he not gone to medical school, thanks to the surrogate parenting of a local physician and solitary bird hunter?

But there is meaning to life beyond professional accreditation, even in the noblest of callings. Berl’s been on a mission to find it these past few years, though with scant equipment or basis for hope. Hard to say (for the moment anyway) whether his mission has been aided or set back by his having fallen under suspicion of negligent homicide in the death of his former lover.

Fortunately, he will find his deliverance in continuing to practice medicine one way or another, as well as in the few human connections he has made, wittingly or not, over the years. The landscape, too, will furnish a hint in what might yet prove, if not a certifiable epiphany, a semi-spiritual awakening in I. B. Pickett, M.D., the inglorious but sole hero of Thomas McGuane’s uproarious and profound exploration of the threads by which we all are hanging.

Geoffrey Wolff
Thursday, November 4, 7:00 p.m.
The Hard Way Around: The Passages of Joshua Slocum 
Introduction by Geoffrey’s brother, Tobias Wolff

Joshua Slocum escaped a Dickensian childhood in Nova Scotia in 1860, at the age of sixteen, as an ordinary seaman. Despite his third-grade education, Slocum’s rise through the ranks was mercurial: just a decade later he was commander of his own ship, the first of many. His journey had already taken him nearly everywhere—but his crowning glory was yet to come.

In 1895 he set sail—by himself—in the small sloop Spray. More than three years and forty-six thousand miles later, he became the first man to circumnavigate the globe solo, a feat that wouldn’t be replicated for another quarter century. His account of that voyage, Sailing Alone Around the World, soon made him famous. A decade later, he set off alone once more—and was lost at sea.

An acclaimed novelist, essayist, biographer, and critic, Geoffrey Wolff is a prominent voice in contemporary American literature. Educated at Cambridge and at Princeton, from which he graduated summa cum laude, he is Professor Emeritus of English and Comparative Literature at UC Irvine, where he was the Director of the Graduate Fiction Program from 1995 to 2006. Previously, he served on the faculties of Istanbul University and Princeton University and has been a book editor at the Washington Post and Newsweek. He received the Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 1994 and his honors also include fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts. During 2007, he was a Fellow of the American Academy in Berlin.

Betty Auchard
Sunday, November 7, 2:00 p.m.
The Home for the Friendless: Finding Hope, Love, and Family

Life for Betty and her family is so rich with turmoil that it rivals any present-day reality television. Her parents marry young, but don’t know how to stay together. In between their separations and reunions, constant housing changes and job layoffs, Betty, her brother, and her sister are shuffled off to live with a variety of relatives, and eventually, a children’s shelter called the Home for the Friendless. Yet despite her circumstances, Betty’s irreverent nature allows her to see humor and opportunity. With both candor and charm, Betty narrates this poignant but hilarious story of an uncommon childhood that is filled with resourcefulness, remarkable escapades, and an abundance of love.

Betty Auchard was a retired art teacher when her husband of 49 years died. For her, writing became a way to heal, eventually taking on a life of its own. Her first book was Dancing in My Nightgown, These short, upbeat, inspiring stories tell us how this spunky septuagenarian survives—she decides to dance instead of sitting on the sidelines. Her stories have been published in the Chocolate for a Woman’s Soul series and the San Jose Mercury News and other periodicals.

In addition to writing full time, Betty presents the stories from her life to audiences in California’s Bay Area and beyond. She still lives happily within driving distance of her four children and ten grandchildren.

Pam Grange
Kepler’s Author Events Manager
1010 El Camino Real
Menlo Park, CA 94025

Direct: 650.856.0978
Store: 650.324.4321
pam@keplers.com
http://www.keplers.com/

Oct 7-9 2010 – 2010 Mid-Atlantic Black Film Festival – Norfolk, Virginia
The organizers of the Mid-Atlantic Black Film Festival (MABFF) have announced a final call for submissions for the 2010 festival. The premiere African-American short film festival returns for its fourth year from October 7 – 9, 2010 with three days of screenings and workshops at the historic Crispus Attucks Theatre in Norfolk, Virginia. During the three-day festival, veteran TV and film stars Ted Lange (“The Love Boat”, “That’s My Mama”, and “Friday Foster” with Pam Grier), Judy Pace (“Cotton Comes To Harlem”, “Brian’s Song”, Spike Lee’s “Sucker Free City”) and Beverly Todd (“Crash”, “The Bucket List”, “Lean on Me”) will attend as celebrity guests and will each be honored with MABFF’s Living Legend Award.

As in previous years, the MABFF is accepting entries in the categories of Short Film, Animation, Documentary, Music Video, and Student Film. This year, the festival is also introducing exciting new categories, including a Screenplay Competition, an Original TV Pilot Competition, and a Web Series Competition. Submission forms and general requirements for all categories can be downloaded online at www.mabff.org or www.withoutabox.com.

The festival will kick off on Thursday, October 7th with a selection of opening day screenings and workshops followed by an Opening Night Ceremony Gala hosted by Beverly Todd and Judy Pace.

Beginning on Thursday, October 7th, Emmy-winning producer/LAWEBFEST founder Michael Ajakwe, Jr. will conduct a two-day Web Series Workshop with informative sessions on Writing, Producing, Marketing and Monetizing Your Web Series.

As part of the festival program, members from the Organization of Black Screenwriters (OBS) will join MABFF in hosting a three-day TV and screenwriting workshop and will also judge the festival’s screenplay and Original TV Pilot competitions. On Thursday, October 7th, OBS will conduct an Intensive half-day TV Writing Workshop followed by an Intensive half-day Screenwriting Workshop on Friday, October 8th. On Saturday, October 9th, the workshop will culminate with a special screening of “For Love of Amy”, veteran actor Ted Lange’s feature film directorial debut. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with both Lange and the film’s screenwriter/producer/star, Vincent Alston, who will share how he raised the money to complete his first feature film. During the award ceremony later that evening, the two filmmakers will be presented with MABFF’s inaugural Outstanding First Film Award for their achievement.

On Friday, October 8th, celebrity honorees Ted Lange, Judy Pace, and Beverly Todd will join award-winning filmmaker Monty Ross (Spike Lee’s “Malcolm X”, “Do the Right Thing”, “Mo’ Better Blues”, “School Daze”) and Michael Ajakwe, Jr. (“Martin”, “Soul Food”, “Sister, Sister”, “Eve”, “Love That Girl”, “Talk Soup”, “Entertainment Tonight”) for ”Black Hollywood Then and Now,” a blue ribbon panel of industry veterans discussing the state of Black Hollywood and how it has evolved over the last forty years.

Closing night festivities on October 9th will feature finalist screenings of the short film and web series competitions, culminating with the MABFF Award Ceremony at which winners for the various festival competitions will be announced along with the recognition and presentation of awards to this year’s distinguished VIP honorees.

For more information about MABFF, please visit http://www.mabff.org/.

Related posts:

1. Writing Events – 18th Edition
2. Writing Events – 27th Edition
3. Writing Events – 35th Edition

The highlight of the ceremony will be the announcement of the year’s two Grand Prize winners who will each receive $5,000. Quarterly winners also receive cash prizes from $500 to $1,000. Their winning stories and illustrations will appear in the annual anthology L. Ron Hubbard Presents Writers and Illustrators of the Future, Volume 26 (Galaxy Press, 2010). Also being released is a special coffee table book edition of L. Ron Hubbard Presents Writers of the Future: The First 25 Years, a photographic retrospective of the 25 years of the contest and containing over 1,000 images.

Participating in the ceremony will be best-selling authors Kevin J. Anderson, Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle, Tim Powers and Sean Williams who will serve as presenters along with new contest judges Dean Wesley Smith, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Eric Flint and Mike Resnick. The evening will include a special presentation from June Scobee Rodgers, Ph.D. Founding Chairman, Challenger Center for Space Science Education.

Throughout the contests’ 25-year history, over 600 writers and illustrators have been honored. “By our best estimates,” says New York Times’ best-selling author Anderson (Dune prequels, The Edge of the World), “contest winners have published more than 700 novels and 3,000 short stories. Many have appeared on the New York Times bestseller list, even reaching the #1 slot.”

The Writers of the Future writing contest (http://www.writersofthefuture.com/) was initiated by L. Ron Hubbard in 1983 to provide a means for aspiring writers to get a much-needed break — its winners have gone on to sell an impressive 31 million copies of their works combined. Due to the success of the Writing Contest, the companion Illustrators of the Future Contest was created in 1988.

Feb 12 2011 – 3rd Annual “Business of Pet Writing” Conference – New York City
The Pet Socialite, Inc. is excited to announce plans for the 3rd Annual Business of Pet Writing Conference, taking place Saturday, February 12, 2011 in New York City. As one of the largest pet writing conferences in the United States, the event brings together national pet writers with leading veterinarians, publishing and pet industry professionals. Together they participate in an intense day of workshops, seminars and one-on-one meetings focused on the cutting edge of pet journalism and the ever-growing popularity of pet-related books.

To compete in the marketplace, pet writers need to be on top of their game learning from industry insiders. The line-up for the conference is a virtual who’s who of the publishing world including Folio Literary Management’s Jeff Kleinman, 5 time Billboard Magazine Award winner Valerie Smaldone and AOL.com’s Chrissy Perisco.

Seminars and workshops include: better blogging, the art of column writing, building your brand with an internet show, book publishing trends, building your freelance portfolio, narrative and creative non-fiction, how to create a saleable proposal and more. Participating writers will have the rare opportunity to meet with editors and agents on a one-on-one basis to pitch book and article ideas. Notable veterinarians and prominent representatives from the pet food industry will assist pet writers with research, book and article ideas. A major focus of the conference will also center around the importance of newer, virtual communication vehicles like websites, blogs and social media.

“Like most industries affected by the fluctuating economy and changing technological developments, publishing is also changing on a daily basis,” said Charlotte Reed, President of The Pet Socialite, Inc. and founder of the conference. “I’m happy to present the latest innovations in the pet publishing field from industry professionals in the know.”

The Pet Socialite, Inc. is offering a scholarship in memory of Mordecai Siegal, author of 35 pet books including Good Dog, Bad Dog (Henry Holt and Co., revised edition 1991), The Cornell Book of Cats (Villard Books, 1st edition 1989), and UC Davis Book of Dogs (Collins Reference, 1995). Applicants can apply for the scholarship online via: http://www.petwritingconference.com/.

Oct 9-14 2010 – Future of Social Media – San Francisco, California
Chas Salmore, CEO of Marketingworks, (“MWKS”) will be speaking at the Direct Marketing Association’s (DMA) DMA2010 Conference and Exhibition on the Future of Social Media. DMA2010, the global ROI marketing event will take place October 9-14, at the Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco, California.

Chas Salmore will be offering insight into the world of digital media marketing on October 11th 2010 by presenting The Basics – Social Media Trends & Online Marketing Solutions. Chas Salmore will additionally present A Brand Story: From Idea To Results Using Social Media Marketing and How to Ignite Powerful Viral Effects with Digital Word of Mouth on October 13th, 2010. Thousands of cross media/channel marketing professionals from over 50 countries are scheduled to be in attendance to learn from the remarkable lineup of speakers as well as attend sessions by the thought-leaders behind some of today’s most successful household brands.

“With social network marketing spending to exceed $24 billion by 2015, it is imperative that brands and marketers learn the critical do’s and don’ts to succeed in the ever-expanding world of social media,” noted Chas Salmore, CEO, Marketingworks, (“MWKS”). “The DMA 2010 Conference and Exhibition is the ideal forum to learn from industry leaders cutting-edge trends and tips.”

“With the landscape of Social Media changing at such a rapid pace, it’s imperative to keep up with the newest technology, platforms, statistics, strategies and techniques”, added Salmore.

“DMA2010 will feature hundreds of educational sessions, roundtables, forums, and case studies led by the best and brightest the marketing and media communities,” said Paul A. McDonnough, DMA vice president, conferences and events. “We’re proud to have Marketingworks be part of such an important event.”

For conference information or to register, please visit http://www.dma2010org/.

Related posts:

1. Writing Events – 18th Edition
2. Writing Events – 26th Edition
3. Writing Events – 27th Edition

Prince recognizes the need to assist future authors by navigating through the writing process. Approximately 80% of Americans today say they want to write a book; however the percentage of people who follow through is actually closer to 20%, say Joseph Epstein in a New York Times article. “The writing and self-publishing process was much easier than I thought. I want to share that knowledge so more people can get their own story out”, says Prince.

In addition to following one’s dream, becoming an author and having your own book has become a proven way to attract speaking engagements, generate residual income and provide a starting point for additional products. In this workshop, Prince will share ways to increase cash flow by writing a book and taking that message to a market.

Participants of this workshop will learn how to get started, the costs and steps involved in the writing and publishing process, and so much more. Each attendee will leave with an outline of their own book to jump start their journey of becoming an author.

About Michelle Prince

Michelle Prince is a sought after motivational speaker and best-selling author of, “Winning In Life Now.” She has worked for and is endorsed by Zig Ziglar who wrote the foreword to her book. Michelle has been featured on SIRIUS Satellite Radio as well as several syndicated radio shows around the country. She was recently awarded the “2010 Goal Achievement” award by hitting more goals in the last 18 months than 97% of people do in a lifetime. Michelle is a radio show host, Examiner Dallas Life Coach writer, owner of her own publishing company and founder of Prince Performance Group, empowering others to perform at their best. For more information, go to http://www.anyonecanwriteabook.com/.

Aug 19 2010 – FREE Journal Writing Teleclass
For too long, stories of the lives and journeys of African Americans have been told by others. With the publication of America I AM Journal, edited by Clarence Reynolds (SmileyBooks, Trade Paperback Original; $11.95) African Americans can now take pride in the creation of their own personal chronicles.

The award-winning America I AM: The African American Imprint traveling exhibition, now on tour in Cincinnati, traces the indelible imprint African Americans have made on America over 500 years. This inspiring volume reflects the themes of the twelve exhibit galleries and presents over 200 historical and contemporary quotations from the minds of great leaders and everyday history makers, including W.E.B. Du Bois, Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass, Madame C.J. Walker, Mary McLeod Bethune, John Johnson, Tony Dungy, and Serena Williams. Each page features a powerful image, a stirring message, and an open invitation to readers to record their own unique life story. An avid journal keeper, Smiley believes that “journaling is a perfect place to develop and refine your vision.”

In celebration of the American I AM Journal, editor Clarence Reynolds and Cheryl Woodruff, president of SmileyBooks, invite aspiring and seasoned journal keepers to participate with them in a LIVE FREE 90-minute audio journal-writing workshop. The August 19th teleclass will offer pointers on the craft, as well as an introduction to the impact of journaling on personal reflection, political action, and family history.

Register here

Aug 19 2010 – The Great American Bargain Book Show – Boston, MA
The Great American Bargain Book Show (GABBS), an annual industry trade show for the remainder and off-price book resale industry now in its second year in Boston, has announced the addition of two important conference sessions running one each day of the event in Boston.

According to Larry May, founder of GABBS, “The remainder book business is a very important and significant part of the book retail industry, and with the addition of the Industry Perspective Series we are helping attendees and participants learn where some of our market leaders see the business going. The retail sector has been hit as many markets have with the economic downturn, but through the Industry Perspective Series we are highlighting growth areas and presenting thought-leaders from both book publishing and book buying to talk about where growth opportunities may lay, and how to best target growth programs in the coming years.”

Joining the program as panelists for the Publisher’s Perspective on Thursday, August 19 at 9:00 AM are Michael Friedman, publishing industry consultant and long time publishing executive with Barnes & Noble and Friedman/Fairfax Publishing Company; and Charles Nurnberg, President & Publisher at Imagine Publishing. The Publisher’s Perspective will look at how the market for books has evolved and where both independent and larger publishers are seeing the opportunities for books in the coming years.

The Buyer’s Perspective on Friday, August 20 at 9:00 AM includes David Strymish of New England Mobile Book Fair and eCookbooks in Newton, MA, one of the most successful independent book retailers in the Northeast; and Barbara Seibert of Purple Turtle Productions, a successful independent online bookseller. The Buyers will talk about how their world has evolved and changed with new channels opening up and product lifecycles moving faster.

The Great American Bargain Book Show runs Thursday and Friday, August 19 and 20, 2010 at the Hynes Convention Center. It is open to the trade only, with online registration at http://www.gabbs.net/. GABBS 2010 will attract several hundred buyers from across the United States, with heavy concentration in the Northeast. Buyers represent off-price retailers, general merchandise and household products retailers, booksellers and online retailers. The Boston area is home to a number of major off-price retail chains. Over 400 seller tables will be included at this event, a slight increase over 2009. The Industry Perspective Series at Great American Bargain Book Show is sponsored in part by World Publications Group, East Bridgewater, MA.

Watch a short interview with Larry May online at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8cbJ9mcVHTE&feature=channel

Aug 17 2010 – Social Media Forum – San Francisco, CA
Incisive Media’s ClickZ announced today that day two of Connected Marketing Week, which is being held at the Moscone Center in San Francisco, August 16-20, 2010, will feature the Online Marketing Summit (OMS) Social Media Forum. Hundreds of marketing professionals are expected to gather for this one-day social media forum on Tuesday, August 17, to learn about social media best practices, strategies and tactics from leading names in the field.

“We are delighted to include OMS in the Connected Marketing Week agenda,” said Matt McGowan, publisher and head of U.S. for Incisive Media. “Whether you are a B2B firm or more focused on B2C, OMS will have the top authors, academics, brand marketers and Internet pioneers to answer any questions you may have about social media marketing. We think that OMS will be a popular attraction at Connected Marketing Week because it is going to cover so much ground in so little time.”

“The Online Marketing Summit is excited to provide a full day of social media education at Connected Marketing Week in San Francisco,” said Aaron Kahlow, CEO of Online Marketing Connect. “Attendees of OMS sessions can expect to learn how to execute on social media best practices and how to integrate effective social media strategies and tactics into the entire marketing mix.”

The Social Media Forum will begin with a keynote by Jeff Hayzlett, the former CMO of Kodak, who will talk about new ways to look at a company’s online marketing and sales strategy. He will also focus on some of the newest ways to win with social media, redefine an elevator pitch and transform a business.

B2B Social Media Track:

11AM-12PM “Generating New Business Leads With Corporate Blogging”

This social media workshop will explore the medium of business blogging and how companies can tie their blogs to search engine results.

1PM-2PM “The Ten Imperatives of the Marketing Revolution”

This online marketing session will help attendees overcome challenges associated with proliferation of new channels, ROI pressures and customers’ growing appetite for personal relationships with brands.

2:30PM-3:30PM “Case Study: Using Social Media and Lead Nurturing for Demand Generation”

Jon Miller, Marketo’s vice president of marketing, shares his company’s specific tactics they used to drive revenue, content and social media use to generate leads.

3:45PM-4:45PM “The SEO Value of Social Media”

Ray “Catfish” Comstock will explain to attendees how to align a social media campaign with SEO best practices and a good optimization strategy to maximize the ROI of a social media program.

B2C Social Media Track:

11AM-12PM “Social Media is About Socializing!”

Attendees will learn how to use social media to make genuine and lasting connections with their target audiences to drive and measure true ROI, as laid out in practical steps by Harry Gold, CEO of Overdrive Interactive.

1PM-2PM “Closing the Gap on ROI Measurement”

This session will provide actionable insights and methodologies into defining what to measure, how to measure, how to calculate value from online engagement, and how to build a compelling ROI business case.

2:30PM-3:30PM “Using Data-Driven Decisions to Enhance Cross-Channel Marketing”

Participants will hear tips and tactics on how to strategize and execute a cross-channel campaign from Kevin Akerman of Experian Marketing Services.

3:45PM-4:45PM “Panel: Privacy, Trust, Mobile, Social, Local and Emerging Trends”

Audiences will hear from local and national thought leaders on how emerging trends in online marketing are affecting campaign efforts and tips on how to stay ahead of the curve directly from those setting the pace and making the news.

You can register for the OMS Social Media Forum here.

Aug 19 2010 – The 5th Annual New York”s Funniest Reporter Show – New York
The 5th Annual New York’s Funniest Reporter Show (http://www.nyfunniestreporter.com/) will take place on Thursday, August 19th at 6:00 pm at Gotham Comedy Club (208 West 23rd St).

It will feature eight media professionals each doing five minutes of stand up comedy in order to raise money for the Humane Society of New York (http://www.humanesocietyny.org/). At the end of the night, a winner will be declared.

Appearing on the show this year will be: Wendy Diamond (Animal Fair Magazine), Cooper Lawrence (Cooper Lawrence Show), Ellis Henican (Fox News & Newsday), Meredith Daniels (Newsday), Lauren Sivan (Fox News), Marlaina Schiavo (CNN), and Robert George (New York Post). 2009 NYFR Winner Marianne Schaberg will be performing in the show but, will not be competing.

Judging the competition will be: Judith Regan (Sirius / XM), Jeffrey Gurian (Comedy Writer / Filmmaker), and Tasha Harris (Founder & Editor-In-Chief of StageTime Magazine). The show emcee will be comedian Ryan Reiss.

“In five short years, the show has become a New York tradition. We’ve been so honored to have over twenty six media professionals participate in the event and raise money for worthy charities.” Said New York’s Funniest Reporter Show Co-Producer, Ryan McCormick.

The cost of admission is $15 in advance and $20 at the door. To make a reservation, please call (212) 367-9000.

The 5th Annual New York’s Funniest Reporter competition is produced by Goldman McCormick Public Relations (http://www.goldmanmccormick.com/) and is part of the 8th Annual New York City Underground Comedy Festival (http://www.nycundergroundcomedyfestival.com/).

Aug 23 2010 – Step-by-Step Process to Plan and Write a Nonfiction Book- FREE Teleseminar
On August 23, 2010 at 1:00 p.m. ET, Melinda Copp of The Writer’s Sherpa, LLC, will present “FINALLY Write Your Book–Six Secrets to Getting it Out of Your Head and Written!” a free teleseminar detailing a proven six-step process for writing a book that successfully weaves together the author’s personal experiences with the message they want to share.

Writing a book is a great way to share life experiences, attract ideal leads and clients to a business, and establish expertise. However, most aspiring authors never finish their books oftentimes because they don’t know how to put all the pieces together successfully.

“Writing a book without understanding how books work and what structure makes them successful is like building a house without a blueprint,” said Melinda Copp, who has worked with authors to write nonfiction books on a variety of topics. “Coming up with book ideas is never a problem, but putting those ideas into a structure that effectively leads the reader from one place to another, while keeping them hooked, is much more challenging. It often stops would-be authors from finishing the book successfully.”

This call will reveal:
* The secret to overcoming the biggest obstacles holding aspiring authors back from ever completing their book;
* How to design a book to be powerful, unique, and client attractive;
* Why, if a person has a big message to share, writing a book is the best way to accomplish that;
* And the six steps to planning, writing, and finishing a book readers will love.

This free teleseminar will also launch a new home study system that walks aspiring nonfiction authors through the book-writing process, step-by-step.

“I think it’s a shame that so many stories are never told, and so many people never get their books completed,” said Copp. “This system, compiled over years of coaching books out of clients, is my best solution to that problem.”

Anyone interested in sharing their message and spreading their mission by writing a business, self-help, or nonfiction book can sign up for this free call at www.writerssherpaprograms.com/freecall.html.

Oct 8-9 2010 – James River Writers Conference – Richmond, VA
“Staggering talent and exceptional expertise,” is the shorthand outlook for this fall’s eighth annual James River Writers Conference, according to this year’s conference chair, Kris Spisak Petroski, a Richmond-based writer and college writing instructor.

Set for October 8 and 9 at the Library of Virginia in downtown Richmond, JRW’s signature event “is created by writers for writers, where Richmond’s lively literary community meets national publishing luminaries and institutions, where Southern hospitality meets creative drive and ambition,” Petroski said.

Headliners will include:

Silas House, New York Times bestselling author and recipient of the James Still Award for Writing about the Appalachian South from the Fellowship of Southern Writers.

Mike Olmert, Emmy Award winning screenwriter.

Charles J. Shields, writer of the New York Times bestselling Mockingbird: A Portrait of Harper Lee.

Charles Todd, New York Times bestselling mystery author.

Jacqueline Woodson, winner of the Newbery Honor Medal, the Caldecott Honor, the Coretta Scott King Award, the Margaret A. Edwards Award for Lifetime Achievement, and many others

The conference will also feature one-on-one meetings with literary agents, the popular first-page critique session, and for the first time this year pre-conference Query Writing and Short Story workshops on October 7.

Conference participants will have the opportunity to concentrate on the art and business of writing and to rub elbows with a wide variety of published authors and editors.

In addition to major presentations, break-out groups will examine a variety of genres as well as techniques for crafting dialogue and plot, shaping characters and pacing, and finding out how to get published.

Significant support for the conference comes from Dominion, a national energy company headquartered in Richmond, as well as the Richmond Times-Dispatch and the Library of Virginia, which opens its lecture hall and break-out rooms for the two-day event.

Early registration is $175 for both days. After September 1, registration will be $195. Pre-conference workshop registration is $40. Registration and further details, including information on hotel accommodations, are available on JRW’s Web site - http://www.jamesriverwriters.org/ - and by calling 804-433-3790.

Aug 13 2010 – Social Media and SEO Seminars and Events – Pittsburgh, PA
The Pittsburgh Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Group will hold a seminar at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh on Friday, August 13th titled, “Search and Social Media: Being Found Online.”

The seminar will be the first in an ongoing series of monthly seminars addressing local business needs for education on search engine optimization, social media, and Internet marketing.

Social media network sites like Twitter and FaceBook are playing an integral role in how businesses are being found online and how people are making purchasing decisions over the Internet. This hour long seminar will show business owners, entrepreneurs, and marketing professionals how they can integrate social media tools into their Internet marketing strategy. Attendees will also learn how blogging plays a role in being found online, and how to market a blog through other social media channels.

The seminar runs from 11:00 a.m. to noon on August 13th at The Art Institute of Pittsburgh, room 730. Although the seminar is intended for Pittsburgh SEO Group members, anyone interested in learning more about search and social media is welcome to attend. The cost of attendance is $35 for Pittsburgh SEO Members and $40 for walk-ins. “Early Bird” registration is $25 and ends August 6th. Membership to the Pittsburgh SEO Group is free.

Jami Broom of Clicks Internet Marketing will be presenting with John Carman of Avenue Design Studios. A ten minute Q & A will ensue.

Attendees may register at http://www.meetup.com/pittsburgh-seo-group/calendar/14253955.

About Pittsburgh SEO Group: The Pittsburgh SEO Group is a free membership group that meets monthly to discuss topics related to search engine optimization, pay per click advertising, social media, and web design. More information can be found by going to http://www.clicksinternetmarketing.com/pittsburgh-seo-group/

Oct 7-10 2010 – 2010 Screenwriting Expo – Los Angeles, CA
Screenplay consultant Robert Flaxman, founder of Deep Feed-Back, announced today that he will present his top-rated seminar, “Seducing the Studio Reader,” at the 2010 Screenwriting Expo.

The 2010 Screenwriting Expo will be held October 7 - October 10 at the Hilton Los Angeles Airport. Flaxman’s informative presentation is on Friday, October 8 at 11:00 AM - 12:30 PM.

In 2008, the Screenwriting Expo labeled Flaxman “one of the top screenwriting analysts in the world.” The “Seducing the Studio Reader” seminar explores multiple techniques that will keep a reader in the screenwriter’s “created reality” throughout an entire script. You’ll study the most common mistakes made by professional and advanced screenwriters.

Reviews from past “Seducing the Studio Reader” attendees include: “Best seminar I attended all weekend. Remarkable! Great presentation. … Great. Dry sense of humor. … Super excellent … Great tips!”

About the 2010 Screenwriting Expo

The annual Screenwriting Expo is the biggest, most comprehensive, and most prestigious educational and networking meeting of screenwriters and aspiring screenwriters in the world. Now in its eighth year, the Expo offers more than 200 educational seminars and sessions with writers; the Golden Pitch, the biggest screenplay pitch festival in existence; a prestigious roster of screenwriting Guests of Honor; a unique on-site scene-writing competition for prizes, the CS Open; and a series of evening networking receptions for working and aspiring writers.

Related posts:

1. Writing Events – 18th Edition
2. Writing Events – 21th Edition
3. Writing Events – 23th Edition

Also featured as event presenters are former Congressman Harold Ford, Jr., former Senator Fred Thompson, and Bryan Batt, an actor who is perhaps best known as Sal from the hit series “Mad Men.”

Now in its 22nd year, the Southern Festival of Books is a free, three-day celebration of the written word, providing its nearly 20,000 book-loving guests the opportunity to get up close and personal with their favorite authors. Making its debut this year is the much-anticipated Chapter 16 pavilion, which will bring the newly launched www.chapter16.org website of Tennessee literati to life.

Back by popular demand: Southern favorites Rick Bragg; Brad Watson; Marshall Chapman, They Came to Nashville; and Tom Franklin. Click here for the full lineup and information about each author.

Also back by popular demand: the @SoFestofBooks Twitter “Speed Reader” contest, which kicks off today and runs each week leading up to the Festival. @SoFestofBooks will give daily clues abut authors appearing at the Festival. The first person to guess the author correctly wins front-of-the-line book signing privileges for an author of their choosing. Winners and the week’s featured author will be announced by 5 p.m. CDT each Friday throughout the contest. Weekly contest winners will receive a Speed Reader pass and a 2010 Festival poster. Must be 18 or older to play. All answers must be submitted as an @reply to @SoFestofBooks. Direct messages will not be considered.

The Southern Festival of Books is presented by Humanities Tennessee, a non-profit organization that promotes humanities education across Tennessee. The Festival is proudly sponsored by the National Endowment for Humanities, the Metro Nashville Arts Commission, Dollar General, Nashville Scene, Ingram Book Company, Vanderbilt and the Tennessee Arts Commission. Join us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter @SoFestofBooks.

Website: http://www.humanitiestennessee.org/festival/index.php

Writers’ Podcasts for August
During the month of August, Writers in the Sky will be offering interviews with three authors who are individually writing fiction series, and an business pioneer turned author, who has written a memoir on success in the special event industry.

The month begins with an escape into a paranormal/sci-fi series that will stir creative juices and set the tone for a month of focusing on series authors. Week two takes listeners into the world of children’s series writing; with the following week offering a memoir written by the queen of the special event industry. August comes to completion with a returning and critically-acclaimed author, who will be unveiling book one in a fiction series delving into the world of art and the artistic muse.

On August 6, author Rowena Portch introduces The Protected, the first novel in her Spirian Series. Portch successfully gifts the reader with a heroine and a story that will capture as well as excite the imagination and joins WITS podcast host Vonnie Faroqui to talk about her plans for the series. When author Rowena Portch lost her vision to retinitis pigmentosa, she retired from her successful career as an editor at Microsoft to focus on her healing and writing work. Portch had already been writing professionally for over 30 years, across different genres and for various publications. She will be bringing years of experience and insight into the publishing world to WITS Podcast listeners.

On August 13, author Dawn Menge returns for a third visit to the Writers in the Sky Podcast to discuss the newest book in her series for children featuring the character of Queen Vernita. In this installment, Queen Vernita Visits Sir Heathybean the Astronomer, readers will learn many wonderful details about the planets and other celestial bodies; and, as always when spending time with Queen Vernita, the repetition of months and days of the week is continued as a learning tool. During the interview with WITS team member Sarah Moore, Dawn Menge will be discussing how she is working to expand the interest in Queen Vernita with the release of each new book, the new characters readers can expect to meet in Queen Vernita Visits Sir Heathybean the Astronomer, and perhaps invite a special guest from the pages of the book to join part of the conversation.

On August 20, Faroqui will interview event planner and business woman Andrea Michaels about her foray into writing, Reflections of a Successful Wallflower, a memoir of her experiences. Michaels is an award-winning and highly-regarded leader in the special events industry, a true pioneer, and will be sharing the memories of a lifetime as she reflects on the many lessons learned along the path to success and her decision to write about them.

The podcast series for August ends on the 27th with The Drawing Lesson and an interview with returning guest author Mary Martin. Ms. Martin will share the inspiration behind her latest series A Trilogy of Remembrance, which focuses on the art world, art politics, and creative madness as well as malicious intrigue. Discover the secrets of a fabulous author as she discusses how she changed her writing style from The Osgoode Trilogy, three novels of legal suspense, to create her latest literary art offering. Martin’s Drawing Lesson is already receiving highly-regarded critical acclaim in Canada and is sure to please American readers.

About Writers in the Sky: Writers in the Sky blog, podcast, and newsletter is a three-fold production filled with information about writing, publishing, and book publicity created by Yvonne Perry as part of Writers in the Sky Creative Writing Services.

Listening to Writers in the Sky Podcast on a computer is easy. Go to http://yvonneperry.blogspot.com. On the right sidebar there is a list of archived shows. Click on the interview you would like to hear and it will open a post that has a link to the audio file.

Sept 26-28 2010 – 2010 Southern Public Relations Federation Conference
In the world of public relations, the only thing that is constant is change. During the 2010 Southern Public Relations Federation (SPRF.org) regional conference, Evolution 2010, to be held September 26-28, attendees will learn about the latest trends, how to maximize their effectiveness in their job, reenergize their career, and network with fellow Gulf Coast practitioners.

The three-day conference, hosted this year by the Public Relations Association of Louisiana, will feature a variety of nationally renowned speakers, media and crisis communication panels, information-packed breakout sessions, as well as student sessions — a first for the regional conference. The event will be held at the historic and newly restored Hilton Capitol Center in downtown Baton Rouge.

Sunday evening’s welcome reception will feature Louisiana native, Kevin Sekhani and his band outside on the Hilton’s pool deck overlooking the Mississippi River. Monday night’s Wine Walk and stroll around downtown Baton Rouge at a variety of bars and restaurants will be a great opportunity for conference attendees to network.

National speaker and author, Jean Gatz, addresses thousands each year on improving people performance. As one of Evolution 2010′s keynote speakers, she will present Business As Usual is Over, The Survivor’s Guide for Change. Additionally, Evolution 2010 will include an assorted array of breakout sessions that will enable attendees to choose topics most applicable to their job responsibilities or career aspirations. Some of the speakers and topics include: Ed Schipul (Twitter: @eschipul), “Personal Branding Era: Opportunities and Threats”; Michael Gass (@Michaelgass), “A Formula for Fueling Agency New Business Through Social Media”; Stephanie Riegel, “Media Training Refresher”; Greg Cangialosi (@gregcangialosi), “How Email Marketing Augments PR Campaigns”; and Davina Brewer (@3HatsComm), “Kicking the Tires, Vetting the Client: Advice for Solo Independent and Freelance Pros.”

For a full list of conference events and to register online, visit http://www.evolution2010.com/. Also, follow us on Twitter at @SPRF2010 and join our “Evolution 2010″ SPRF Conference Facebook group for daily and weekly updates and to interact with fellow conference participants. Hotel reservations must be booked directly through the Hilton at 225.344.5866 or 800.955.6962, and mention “SPRF 2010″ to receive a special room rate specifically for Evolution 2010 attendees.

Related posts:

1. Writing Events – 20th Edition
2. Writing Events – 24th Edition
3. Writing Events – 25th Edition

The Infinity Publishing “Gathering of Authors” will take place at the Radisson Hotel and Conference Center in Valley Forge, Penn., directly across from the famous Valley Forge National Park and approximately 30 minutes from the Philadelphia International Airport. Full registration is $695, and includes meals, two nights’ lodging at the Radisson, and all conference activities. For complete conference details and to register for the event, please click here to download the online registration form.

“We are pleased to once again operate this year’s conference as a not-for-profit event, redirecting all of the registration fees back into the event itself so we can keep the costs to attend as low as possible,” said Arthur Gutch, chief executive officer of Infinity Publishing. “At Infinity, we consider our annual gathering of authors an important extension of our commitment to working with authors on an in-depth, personalized basis.”

According to Gutch, this year the company is introducing a new scholarship program to defray the costs of attending the event for authors in a recovering economic climate. The top scholarship award is a full registration for the 2010 Authors’ Conference, including travel expenses and a complete publishing package. To apply for scholarship consideration, interested authors must go to www.authorsconference.com, download the “Scholarship Application” and answer three essay questions regarding their desire to attend the conference and publish their book.

The Infinity Publishing conference is open to all authors, regardless of how or with whom they have published their books, as well as aspiring writers who are striving to learn more about how to publish their own works. The event will feature keynote speeches from noted industry professionals and a variety of dynamic discussions on timely publishing topics, such as common book promotion challenges and how to leverage the power of social media to increase book sales.

Infinity Publishing provides the opportunity for authors who are seeking to maintain control over the publishing process, to carry out their visions for their books. Infinity currently has more than 4,000 active authors who have collectively published more than 6,000 titles with the company.

Website: http://www.authorsconference.com/

Related posts:

1. Writing Events – 18th Edition
2. Writing Events – 26th Edition
3. Writing Events – 27th Edition

Lead by workshop leader and writing coach Barbara Simpson, this four week workshop will encourage writing to get out what is inside of you. Whether it takes the form of poetry, fiction, nonfiction, a play or a song, no one can tell your story but you. Healing can occur through writing and the sharing of that writing. In this safe, confidential and non-judgmental writing group, you will have the opportunity to see writing as an art form which belongs to everyone. Attendance at all four sessions of this workshop is strongly encouraged

This program will take place on Tuesdays, August 10 – 31, from 6:30 – 8:30 pm at the Box Factory for the Arts, 1101 Broad St., St. Joseph. There is no charge for this program. Classes are for adults only and size is limited to ten participants on a first-come first-serve basis. Call Lory’s Place at 269-983-2707 to register.

Hospice at Home also offers ongoing groups that meet during the evening for adults and children at Lory’s Place Grief Healing and Education Center. The groups include regularly scheduled age-appropriate support group sessions that allow children and adults to interact with peers who have suffered similar loss. Groups for children and adults who are anticipating a loss or who have experienced a loss through pregnancy are also available, as well as educational and workplace grief programs. All community bereavement services are provided free of charge thanks to local community contributions.
For more information contact Hospice at Home at 269-429-7100 or 1-800-HOSPICE, or go to http://www.hospiceathomecares.org/ or contact Lory’s Place at 269-983-2707 or 1-800-717-3812, or go to http://www.lorysplace.org/.

Sept 25 2010 – 2010 National Book Festival – Washington, DC
The 10th Annual National Book Festival, organized and sponsored by the Library of Congress, will be held Saturday, Sept. 25 on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., between 3rd and 7th Streets from 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. As the official book retailer for the event, Borders will have a store in the Book Sales Pavilion, so attendees can quickly and conveniently pick up their books before heading over to the Author Signing Pavilions located nearby.

The event will feature a number of authors including Suzanne Collins, Linda Sue Park, Katherine Paterson, Jane Smiley, Scott Turow and Gordon S. Wood with more to sign on in the coming weeks.

http://www.loc.gov/bookfest/

Related posts:

1. Writing Events – 18th Edition
2. Writing Events – 26th Edition
3. Writing Events – 27th Edition

Authors who write about change in realms as diverse as the environment, spirituality, politics, health, technology, personal growth, business and the economy are encouraged to attend. Information and online registration are available at www.SFwritingforChange.org. Call 415-673-0939 or 925-560-1403. The Hilton Financial District is offering an attendee room rate of $119 (based on availability). Attendance is limited to 150 people.

July 28-31 2010 – Top Industry Insiders Offer Insight And Advice On Getting Published
What writer doesn’t dream of seeing his or her work published? Looking to publish your fiction, nonfiction or poetry, but don’t know where to begin?

Let published professionals and industry experts show you how at the fourteenth annual Anhinga Writers’ Studio 2010 Summer Workshops in Gainesville, July 28-31 at the Hilton University of Florida Hotel and Conference Center. The Anhinga Writers’ Studio offers hands-on instruction in fiction, poetry, and nonfiction taught by top authors, editors and agents.

This year’s faculty includes pioneering magazine publisher George Hirsch, self-publishing guru Peter Bowerman, and literary agent Anne Hawkins, along with poets, novelists, memoirists and journalists. Join us this year and let your writing take wing!

Website: http://www.anhingawriters.org/

July 17 2010 – National Press Club to ‘Beat the Deadline’ with 5K Charity Race
The National Press Club, the world’s leading professional organization for journalists, goes on the record with its annual “Beat the Deadline 5K,” Saturday, July 17, in the heart of the nation’s capitol.

“We welcome everyone to have a good time for a great cause,” said Richard S. Dunham, president of the Eric Friedheim National Journalism Library board. “Our race sponsors and participants play a major role in helping us fulfill our commitment to diversity in journalism and cutting-edge training programs.”

The nation’s premier race saluting journalists and their news sources attracts national news personalities, media professionals, politicians, and pundits. Among this year’s exclusive celebrity lineup are CNN’s Jill Dougherty, Newsweek’s Eleanor Clift, ABC News’ Jonathan Karl and Rick Klein, Washington Post ‘MisFits’ Vick Hallett and Lenny Bernstein, K Street Kate, and ABC/WJLA’s Courtney Robinson.

Race marshal and celebrity fitness guru Tony Horton, creator of P90X Extreme Home Fitness, will lead competitors in a pre-race warm up at 7:45 a.m. The race begins at 8:00 a.m. with a route that winds along Pennsylvania Avenue between the National Press Building and the U.S. Capitol. For the first time at this year’s event, officials will implement chip timing for race participants.

Race proceeds go to NPC’s non-profit Eric Friedheim National Journalism Library to benefit training and scholarships for journalism. Major event sponsors include Bloomberg, C-SPAN, Kiplinger, McGraw-Hill, Roll Call, Texas on the Potomac, P90X, Sysco, Toyota, State Department Federal Credit Union, All American League of Lobbyists, John Farr Lighting Design, NBWA America Beer Distributors, and Quadrangle.

For complete race details and online registration, visit www.press.org/5K. Participants are invited to a post-race Awards Ceremony and breakfast in the National Press Club. Top finalists will receive cash awards, and all registrants are eligible for door prize drawings.

As part of “Beat the Deadline” weekend, Horton will address a National Press Club Speakers Series luncheon at 1:00 p.m., Friday, July 16. The fitness trainer will call for the development of a functional fitness physical training program within the U.S. military. For reservations, contact reservations@press.org or 202.662.7501.

July 19-24 2010 – New Voices International Youth Poetry Slam Festival Comes To L.A.
Over 600 poets from more than 50 cities will participate in the six-day event, which also will include celebrity guests Common, Rosario Dawson, Hill Harper, and others.

Youth Speaks Inc., the nation’s leading spoken word organization, is bringing its 13th Annual Brave New Voices International Youth Poetry Slam Festival to Los Angeles from July 19 to 24. Convening the top young poets and spoken word artists, aged 13-19, from across the United States and internationally, Brave New Voices 2010 will feature a diverse group of young writers, trendsetters and community and cultural leaders, as well as world-class workshops led by renowned poets and artists. Acclaimed hip-hop artist Common will emcee the event finals, which will be judged by Hill Harper, Rosario Dawson, and other socially conscious celebrities and community leaders. Additionally, entertainment mogul Russell Simmons is producing a compelling new special for HBO about Brave New Voices. As many as 1,000 youth (poets and audience members) from varied parts of the United States and beyond will take part in this one-of-a-kind event.

Having grown bigger each year since its inception in 1998, Brave New Voices presents the voices of 21st Century America and its significant demographic diversity. The festival highlights arts education and performance, local program development and national movement organizing. Through the multiple conference events, workshops, and spoken word competitions, a new generation of artists and leaders can transcend traditional stereotypes by speaking their truths and listening to the truths of others. The 2008 event (and its six-month build up) was filmed by HBO and presented by Russell Simmons as part of a seven-episode series that aired in 2009.

The Grand Slam Finals of the festival will be hosted at the Saban Theater (formerly the Wilshire Theater) on Friday, July 23 at 7:00 p.m.

“Brave New Voices 2010 is going to be a remarkable event that will continue to build our community among an ever-growing number of youth who are returning to literature and reinvesting in education through the power of the spoken word,” said James Kass, founder and executive director of Youth Speaks. “This is a special forum that enables a generation of young artists and leaders to speak for themselves and their communities. The ideas espoused through their poetry can help change our world for the better,” he added.
Russell Simmons noted, “Brave New Voices is building bridges across radically diverse ethnic, racial and socio-economic lines. This is the future of our global community, and people everywhere should take notice and get involved.”

An abbreviated schedule of festival events is listed below:
Monday, July 19, 2010
Opening Ceremonies
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
Brave New Leaders Conference
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Brave New Voices Speak Green, featuring Van Jones and Tom Feegel
Quarter-Finals of The Brave New Voices International Youth Poetry Slam
Thursday, July 22, 2010
Semi-Finals of The Brave New Voices International Youth Poetry Slam
Friday, July 23, 2010
Grand Slam Finals of The Brave New Voices International Youth Poetry Slam (at the Saban Theater)
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Brave New Teachers Conference

Sponsors for this year’s event include the Ford Foundation, Nathan Cummings Foundation, Redford Center, US Green Building Council and American Airlines. For more information about Brave New Voices 2010, please visit http://www.bravenewvoices.org/ or contact Jeannine Schechter Jacobi at jeannine@freshpr.net.

Related posts:

1. Writing Events – 19th Edition
2. Writing Events – 29th Edition
3. Writing Events – 32th Edition

The Anhinga Writers’ Studio offers hands-on instruction in fiction, poetry, and nonfiction taught by top authors, editors and agents. This year’s faculty includes pioneering magazine publisher George Hirsch, self-publishing guru Peter Bowerman, and literary agent Anne Hawkins, along with poets, novelists, memoirists and journalists. For more information or to register for the conference, visit http://www.anhingawriters.org/, email info@anhingawriters.org, or call (352) 379-8782. Join us this year and let your writing take wing!

July 9 2010 – Literary Magazine Celebrates Relaunch
The Intercultural Alliance of Artists & Scholars, Inc. (The IAAS) announced the publication of phati’tude Literary Magazine with its relaunch issue: MULTICULTURALISM: IN SEARCH OF A NEW PERSPECTIVE and its Summer issue, THE LAVENDER ISSUE: LGBT LITERATURE TODAY. Both publications will be available for sale on our website on July 15, 2010 on Amazon.com. Each issue features writers from the U.S., Canada, England, Scotland, Australia, New Zealand

The organization is hosting a premiere party at the Bowery Poetry Club on Friday, July 9, 2010, from 7:30 pm to 9:30pm. The literary event, open to the general public, will feature poetry readings, video screenings and other performances by Tara Betts, Timothy Liu, Angelo Nikolopoulos, Jeffrey Perkins, Devi Lockwood, Jon Sands and Jesus Papoleto Melendez. Special guest David Henderson

The $5 Admission will be donated to the Bowery Arts and Sciences, the non-profit arm of the Bowery Poetry Club. Details are available on both websites: http://www.phatitude.org/ and http://www.bowerypoetryclub.com/.

“We encourage lovers of the written word to attend the event, purchase the book ($18 printed, $10 e-book), visit the phati’tude website, make a donation and spread the word to others as a way of supporting contemporary poetry and literature,” added Michelle Aragón, Director, Marketing & Communications. “We want everyone to catch phati’tude and pass it on!”

July 16 – 25 2010 – Fairfield University’s MFA in Creative Writing Program
Fairfield University’s low residency MFA in Creative Writing, with concentrations in fiction, creative nonfiction, poetry, and screen writing, presents a summer and winter series of public readings by noted authors at Enders Island, where graduate students spend four exciting and rigorous 10-day residency periods during the two-year program.

The readings this summer take place from July 16 through July 25 and begin at 7 p.m. in the Chapel of Our Lady of the Assumption. Bank Square Books in Mystic is partnering with Fairfield to make the authors’ books available, with book signings following the readings. Admission is free and seating, which is limited, will be on a first-come, first serve basis.

Access is by way of Mason’s Island Road with signs showing the way to Enders Island.

Friday, July 16

Eugenia Kim’s debut novel, The Calligrapher’s Daughter ( Holt ), won the 2009 Borders Original Voices award, is a Washington Post Critic’s Pick and Best Book for 2009, and a Publishers Weekly First Fiction Pick.

Leila Philip, author of three books, including the award-winning memoir, A Family Place: A Hudson Valley Farm, Three Centuries, Five Wars, One Family ( Viking 2001, Penguin 2002 ) which was recently republished by SUNY press as an Excelsior Edition ( 2009 ) with an updated epilogue, photographic essay, and additional historical materials.

Rachel Basch is the author of two novels: The Passion of Reverend Nash ( W.W. Norton ), named one of the five best novels of 2003 by The Christian Science Monitor, and Degrees of Love ( W.W. Norton, Harper Paperbacks ) which was translated into Dutch and German and was a selection of the Hartford Courant’s Book Club.

Saturday, July 17

Josip Novakovich, a native of Croatia, has published a novel, April Fool’s Day, three story collections ( Infidelities: Stories of War and Lust, Yolk, and Salvation and Other Disasters ) and two collections of narrative essays. His work was anthologized in Best American Poetry, the Pushcart Prize collection, and O. Henry Prize Stories.

Kim Bridgford’s books include Undone, Instead of Maps, and In the Extreme: Sonnets about World Records, winner of the Donald Justice Prize. She is working on a three-book poetry/photography project with visual artist Jo Yarrington, focusing on journey and sacred space in Iceland, Venezuela, and Bhutan and was the 2007-08 Connecticut Touring Poet.

Paul Lisicky is the author of Lawnboy and Famous Builder, both published by Graywolf Press. His work has appeared in many anthologies and magazines and he has a novel, The Burning House, from Etruscan Press due out in Spring 2011.

Sunday, July 18

Hollis Seamon is the author of a short story collection, Body Work ( Spring Harbor Press 2000 ), and a mystery novel, Flesh ( Avocet Press 2005 ). Her short stories have appeared in many literary journals and she won the 2009 Al Blanchard award for short fiction.

Wally Lamb, a guest faculty member for the summer with the MFA program, is the author of three New York Times bestselling novels – The Hour I First Believed, I Know This Much is True, and She’s Come Undone – of which two were Oprah’s Book Club selections. Lamb edited Couldn’t Keep It to Myself and I’ll Fly Away, two volumes of essays from students in his writing workshop at York Correctional Institution, a women’s prison in Connecticut, where he has been a volunteer facilitator for the past 10 years. His latest novel, Wishin’ and Hopin’: A Christmas Story, was published in November of 2009.

Tuesday, July 20

Al Davies, who has published two prize-winning collections of stories ( Rumors from the Lost World and Alone with the Owl ), received two Fulbright awards ( to Indonesia and Slovenia ) and a Loft-McKnight Award of Distinction in Creative Prose. He recently completed a third collection of stories and a novel.

Michael White, director of the MFA program at Fairfield University, is the author of six novels: Beautiful Assassin, just published in March by William Morrow/Harper Collins Soul Catcher, A Brother’s Blood, The Blind Side of the Heart, A Dream of Wolves, and The Garden of Martyrs. He is also the author of the story collection, Marked Men, and has published 50 stories in national and literary magazines. He was the founding editor of the American Fiction series and is the fiction editor of Dogwood.

Thursday, July 22

Elizabeth Kirschner has published five books of poetry, most recently, Surrender to Light, Cherry Grove Editions, 2009; and My Life as a Doll, brought out by Autumn House in 2008 and nominated for the Lenore Marshall Prize. She has collaborated with many classical composers who have set her poetry to music for both national and international venues and has three CDs out of her work.

Baron Wormser is the author of seven books of poetry and a poetry chapbook. He is the co-author of two books about teaching poetry and the author of a memoir and a collection of short stories. He directs the Frost Place Conference on Poetry and Teaching in Franconia, N.H. and served as poet laureate of Maine from 2000 to 2005.

Da Chen, a Columbia University School of Law graduate who worked for the Wall Street investment banking firm of Rothschilds, Inc., is the author of a memoir, Colors of the Mountain, which was compared to Angela’s Ashes and became the object of an intense bidding war among five top New York publishing houses. A New York Times bestseller, it was published in six other languages. His first adult fiction, Brothers, was awarded the Washington Post Best Book of 2006. His next fiction, due out this year, will be published by Crown.

Friday, July 23

Karen Osborn is the author of Patchwork” ( HBJ ), a New York Times Notable Book of the Year, Between Earth and Sky ( William Morrow ), and The River Road ( William Morrow/ Harper Collins ). Her poetry has been published in numerous literary journals, anthologies, and magazines.

Sarah Manguso is the author of the memoir, The Two Kinds of Decay, a story collection, Hard to Admit and Harder to Escape, and the poetry collections Siste Viator and The Captain Lands in Paradise. Her writing has appeared in McSweeney’s, the New York Times Magazine, the Paris Review, and three volumes of the Best American Poetry series.

Porochista Khakpour’s debut novel, Sons and Other Flammable Objects ( Grove/Atlantic ), a New York Times “Editor’s Choice,” Chicago Tribune “Fall’s Best,” and 2007 California Book Award winner, is out in paperback. Born in Tehran and raised in Los Angeles, her writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Daily Beast, The Village Voice, The Chicago Reader and FiveChapters.com, among others.

Saturday, July 24

Pete Duval’s short story collection, Rear View ( Houghton Mifflin ), won the Connecticut Book Award and was a finalist for a Los Angeles Times Book Prize. His work has appeared in a variety of journals including Alaska Quarterly Review, Northwest Review, Exquisite Corpse, and The Sonora Review. He recently completed a historical novel, Election Day, set along the coast of Buzzard’s Bay where he grew up.

Joan Connor is a recipient of several awards, including the Barbara Deming Award and a Pushcart Prize, for her short story collection, “History Lessons,” and the Riverteeth Award for her collection of essays, “The World Before Mirrors.” Her two earlier story collections are: “We Who Live Apart” and “Here On Old Route 7.”

Sunday, July 25

Nalini Jones’ story collection, What You Call Winter, was published in August 2007 by Knopf. She is a Stanford Calderwood Fellow of the MacDowell Colony, and has recently taught at Columbia University and the 92nd Street Y in New York. For several years she worked in music, helping produce festivals and concert series in New York, Newport, and New Orleans.

Lary Bloom is the author and co-author of several nonfiction books, including The Writer Within, Lary Bloom’s Connecticut Notebook, and the memoirs, Letters From Nuremberg ( with Senator Christopher J. Dodd ) and The Test of Our Times ( with former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge ). As one of America’s leading Sunday magazine editors for 30 years, he nurtured writers such as Edna Buchanan, Carl Hiaasen, Dave Barry, Madeleine Blais, David Hays and Susan M. Dodd. He writes a monthly column for the New York Times and Connecticut magazine.

Bill Patrick’s works have been published or produced in several genres: creative nonfiction, poetry, fiction, screenwriting, and drama. Saving Troy ( 2005 ) is a creative nonfiction chronicle of a year spent living with the professional firefighters and paramedics of the Troy, N.Y., Fire Department’s 1st Platoon, and accompanying them to emergency medical calls, rescues, and fires. His radio play, Rescue, was aired world-wide on BBC 3 in 1997. His book, We Didn’t Come Here for This ( 1999 ), is a hybrid of creative nonfiction and poetry.

For more information, visit www.fairfield.edu/mfa or contact Elizabeth Hastings at ehastings@fairfield.edu

July 11 – 28 -2010 – Writer’s Haven in Taos
Writing the Story of Your Life? Memoir Writing Opportunities Abound at the Taos Summer Writers’ Conference!

And, it’s not too late! A few spaces remain to study with acclaimed writers at this year’s 12th annual Taos Summer Writers’ Conference, taking place July 11-18. Workshops focusing on the craft of memoir, taught by Debra Monroe, Minrose Gwin, Sarah Manguso and Michelle Otero, are still open for registration. These include two weeklong workshops, one weekend workshop and one master class. Workshops are capped at twelve students and take place at the Sagebrush Inn Conference Center in Taos, New Mexico.

Weeklong Memoir Workshops:
Advanced Memoir: Challenges and Struggles (Advanced) - Minrose Gwin

For writers at least halfway through a memoir manuscript, the workshop will focus on the unique craft challenges that memoirists tackle. Minrose Gwin’s recent novel, The Queen of Palmyra, was selected by Barnes and Noble for their “Discover Great New Writers” series. She is also the author of an acclaimed memoir about her mother, Wishing for Snow.

The Search for an Orderly Story in the Disorderly Tangle of Memory: Memoir (Intermediate)- Debra Monroe

How do you translate the rich landscape of memory into a written story? This workshop will guide you through the process of discovering tension and building structure around the stories of your life. Debra Monroe’s new memoir, On the Outskirts of Normal: Forging a Family Against the Grain is receiving rave reviews: Vanity Fair listed the book in its Required Reading list, and Oprah’s Magazine, O, will feature the memoir in its August issue. Monroe is also the author of four works of fiction.

Weekend Memoir Workshop:

Writing The New “Normal”: Memoir When Life Happens (All Levels) – Michelle Otero

One challenge of writing about one’s life is that it keeps happening even as you write. So, this workshop focuses onwriting through life’s transitions. Michelle Otero is the author of the essay collection, Malinche’s Daughter, based on her time living in Oaxaca, Mexico. Otero is a former Fulbright fellow and a tenth generation New Mexican.

Master Class:
Memoir - Sarah Manugso

A workshop for writers who have completed a full-length manuscript. You’ll examine your own writing as well as two published works, and discuss the ways in which omission and repetition function in the craft of memoir. The New York Times Book Review named Sarah Manguso’s most recent memoir, The Two Kinds of Decay, an Editor’s Choice. She has also published a story collection and two books of poetry, and has been awarded a Pushcart Prize and a Rome Fellowship among many other honors.

2010 Taos Summer Writers’ Conference Schedule of Public Events

All events take place at the Sagebrush Inn Conference Center,
1508 Paseo Del Pueblo Sur, Taos, New Mexico.

All readings are free and open to the public.

SUNDAY, JULY 11, 8 PM
Cristina Garcia, Keynote Speaker.
Dreaming in Cuban, was a finalist for the National Book Award; The Lady Matador’s Hotel will be released in September.

MONDAY, JULY 12, 5:30 PM
Jon Davis. Full-length collections of poetry include Preliminary Report, Scrimmage of Appetite, and Dangerous Amusements.
John Dufresne. Novels include Louisiana Power & Light, Love Warps the Mind a Little, Deep in the Shade of Paradise, and Requiem Mass.
Priscilla Long. Author of Where the Sun Never Shines: a History of America’s Bloody Coal Industry and The Writer’s Portable Mentor.
Debra Monroe. Author of the memoir On the Outskirts of Normal: Forging a Family Against the Grain and two novels, Newfangled and Shambles.

TUESDAY, JULY 13, 5:30 PM
Jonis Agee. Author of thirteen books, including five novels – Sweet Eyes, Strange Angels, South of Resurrection, The Weight of Dreams, and her most recent, The River Wife.
Jeff Davis. Author of The Journey from the Center to the Page and City Reservoir
Minrose Gwin. Author of a novel, The Queen of Palmyra, and Wishing for Snow, a memoir.
Jesse Lee Kercheval. Author of the memoir Space, the short novel Brazil and the poetry collection Cinema Muto.

WEDNESDAY JULY 14, 5:30 PM
Dorothy Allison is the author of Bastard Out of Carolina; her novel She Who is forthcoming from Penguin
Jane Ciabattari is the author of the short story collection Stealing the Fire and the president of the National Book Critics Circle.
Sarah Manguso. Author of the memoir The Two Kinds of Decay, the story collection Hard to Admit and Harder to Escape, and the poetry collections Siste Viator and The Captain Lands in Paradise.
Rob Wilder. Author of two books of essays: Tales From The Teachers’ Lounge and Daddy Needs a Drink;

THURSDAY, JULY 15, 5:30 PM
Jill Bialosky. Author of the novels Life Room and House under Snow and poetry collections, Subterranean and Intruder, she is Executive Editor and Vice President at W. W. Norton
Pam Houston. Author of two collections of linked short stories, Cowboys Are My Weakness and Waltzing the Cat and the novel, Sighthound.
Mark Sundeen. Author of two books of creative nonfiction, Car Camping and The Making of Toro, and is a correspondent for Outside magazine.
Summer Wood. Author of the novel Arroyo, her novel Wrecker will be released in Winter 2010.

SATURDAY, JULY 17, 7 PM
Annie Dawid. Author of And Darkness Was Under His Feet: Stories of a Family, Lily in the Desert:
Stories, and York Ferry: A Novel.
Joy Harjo. Author of several poetry books including She Had Some Horses, The Woman Who Fell
From the Sky, and How We Became Human, New and Selected Poems.
Pam Houston. Author of two collections of linked short stories, Cowboys Are My Weakness and Waltzing the Cat and the novel, Sighthound.
Valerie Martínez. Author of several poetry books including Absence, Luminescent, World to World, A Flock of Scarlet Doves, And They Called it Horizon, and Each and Her.

Daniel Mueller. Author of a collection of stories, How Animals Mate.
Michelle Otero. Author of Malinche’s Daughter.
Mark Sundeen. Author of two books of creative nonfiction, Car Camping and The Making of Toro, is a correspondent for Outside magazine.

Details available online at: http://www.unm.edu/~taosconf/Workshops/special_events.htm

New Media Leaders on Tap at Online News Association Conference Oct 28-30 in Washington, D.C.
The Online News Association, the world’s largest membership organization of digital journalists, today announced the program for its 2010 Conference & Awards Banquet, the incubator for emerging ideas, media networking and newsroom technology.

ONA10 will officially open Thursday, Oct. 28, with a reception at the historic Donald W. Reynolds Center for American Art and Portraiture and end with The Online Journalism Awards Banquet on Oct. 30, celebrating the best in digital journalism.

Among the presenters so far are Bill Alison, the Sunlight Foundation; Anil Dash, Expert Labs; Jim Brady, TBD.com; Qiana Mestrich, Beliefnet; Alicia Shepard, NPR; Andrew Noyes, Facebook; Charles Lewis, Investigative Reporting Workshop at American University; Mark Briggs, Serra Media; Laura Brunow Miner, Pictory; design gurus Roger Black and Jeffrey Zeldman; Tyson Evans, New York Times; David Wright, NPR; Rachel Kaufman, MediaBistro; Marcia Parker, AOL Patch and Chris Barr, Yahoo!.

“There’s a reason why our last three conferences have sold out early,” said Jane McDonnell, ONA Executive Director. “This is where journalists and their new collaborators come to learn, grow and share excitement and pride in how their profession is evolving.”

The pre-conference will kick off at the Marriott Renaissance Downtown Hotel Thursday, Oct. 28, with hands-on digital mentoring and field trips with experts, as well as the third annual Career Summit & Job Fair, and move on to three tracks of journalism, tools and design Friday and Saturday, Oct. 29 and 30. Keynote speakers sharing their visions on media, technology and government will be announced shortly.

New this year: ONA10 J-Camp and Office Hours. Attendees will have a direct line to Google and Twitter geek squads as staff from both companies will be on hand throughout the conference to answer questions and offer tips on how to get the most out of their tools and technology.

Conference sessions will focus on everything from killer apps, mobile, the 10 hottest tech trends, tools for crisis reporting, geolocation, SEO, APIs and Document Cloud to the new investigative journalism partnerships, niche news and the new content providers, news design, data visualization and coding. The program so far is available here; more sessions will be scheduled as ONA keeps an eye on media trends.

To register, or for more information, go to http://www.conference.journalists.org/.

National Press Club to Kick Off Summer Documentary Series on July 7
The National Press Club is scheduled to kick off its second annual Summer Documentary Series on Wednesday, July 7, 2010 at 6:30 PM.

Throughout July and August, the Press Club will host a series of documentary films written and produced by journalists, media affiliates and international film fellows, with particular focus on Freedom of the Press issues.

Opening the event on July 7, the Club will screen documentary films from George Washington University’s International Emerging Filmmakers Fellowship, a six-week program that provides 20 international filmmakers the opportunity to create documentaries and cross-cultural dialogue.

A panel discussion, including select fellows and Director of GW’s Documentary Center, Nina Gilden Seavey, Emmy Award-winning filmmaker and Founding Director and Executive Producer for SILVERDOCS: The AFI/Discovery Channel Documentary Festival, will follow the July 7 film screening.

The National Press Club Summer Documentary Series is scheduled to run every Wednesday evening at 6:30 PM from July 7 to August 4, 2010. The events are free and open to the public. For more information on the Press Club, please visit http://www.press.org/.

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“The Sandbox” is a story of a decent man trying to do right under impossible circumstances. Private Toby Durrant, a self-described “broke nobody” serving in Iraq, finds himself in the middle of a far-reaching conspiracy involving insurgents massing in the nearby hills, a secretive member of military intelligence, an abandoned toy factory and a mysterious, half-feral child.

Zimmerman attended Emerson College for film studies and then went on to earn a Master of Fine Arts in creative writing at the University of Alabama. He has worked as a publicist at St. Martin’s Press and taught writing at Georgia Southern University, Dilla University College in Ethiopia, South College and the University of Wisconsin, where he was also a fiction fellow at the Wisconsin Institute of Creative Writing. His work includes a novella, “Socket.”

July 16-28 2010 – Iowa City Book Festival
The 2010 Iowa City Book Festival ( ICBF ), presented by the University of Iowa Libraries, has announced its schedule for the three-day celebration of reading, writing and books July 16-18. The Festival offers activities for the entire family: best-selling authors, hands-on book arts, kids’ activities, music and festival food.

For its second year, the ICBF has greatly expanded its schedule and has attracted some leading writers and filmmakers, including Jane Smiley, Audrey Niffenegger, Jeffrey Zaslow and Nicholas Meyer.

Pulitzer Prize winning novelist Smiley ( photo, left ) kicks off the festival with the keynote address at the Author Dinner, 6:30 p.m. Friday, July 16 in the Main Library. Tickets for the dinner must be purchased before the event, seating is limited.

On Saturday, July 17, best-selling authors Niffenegger, Zaslow, David Rhodes, and James Galvin join Smiley in the Shambaugh Auditorium Series. The Libraries Special Collections and Iowa Women’s Archives will host a series of authors: Rebecca Johns and Wendy Webb will talk about research for novelists, Hope Edelman and Carl Klaus will discuss memoirs; Ray Young Bear will read from his book, “The Rock Island Hiking Club,” and Nicholas Meyer will discuss his memoir, “The View from the Bridge.” Sessions about poetry appreciation, writing children’s books and adult computer literacy round out activities in the Main Library on Saturday. For complete author biographies, see http://www.iowacitybookfestival.org/authors.

June 29 2010 – 2010 Gerald Loeb Awards Dinner
WHAT:

The 2010 Gerald Loeb Awards for Distinguished Business and Financial Journalism will feature some of the broadcast industry’s most highly regarded journalists as presenters. Representatives from the nation’s most renowned news outlets, including CBS, CNBC, CNN, and Bloomberg, will be presenting awards to business editors and journalists who have made significant contributions to the understanding of business, finance and the economy.

WHO:
Presenters Include:

* Maria Bartiromo, CNBC – News Anchor of “Closing Bell” and Host/Managing Editor of “Wall Street Journal Report with Maria Bartiromo”

* Allan Chernoff, CNN – Senior Correspondent

* Tom Keene, Bloomberg – Editor-at-Large at Bloomberg News; Host of “Bloomberg on the Economy” and “Bloomberg Surveillance” on Bloomberg Radio

* Melissa Lee, CNBC – Host of “Fast Money” and “Options Action”

* Betty Liu, Bloomberg – News Anchor of “In the Loop with Betty Liu”

* Christine Romans, CNN – Host of “Your $$$$$” and Correspondent for “American Morning”

* Bob Simon, CBS – Correspondent for “60 Minutes”

For presenter bios, please visit http://www.anderson.ucla.edu/x32785.xml

WHEN:
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
6:00pm - Cocktail Reception
7:00pm – Dinner & Awards

WHERE:
Capitale
130 Bowery
New York, NY 10013

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