Harbor hopes that you'll one day be on a Decatur Book Festival stage, reading from your award-winning book? The Writers Conference @ DBF, presented by Poets & Writers and Agnes Scott College, can help. On Friday, attend a keynote address by Stephen Corey, editor of "The Georgia Review", then choose from one of several concurrent writing workshops. On Saturday, follow the Writers Conference track of talks about topics of particular interest to authors.
The workshops will be held at the Alston Building and Evans Hall at Agnes Scott College. Each workshop has twenty-five spots open to local writers and readers, with five spots in each reserved exclusively for Agnes Scott students. To register, send your name and the name of the workshop you would like to attend to workshops@decaturbookfestival.com.
For directions click here. Please to download the campus map click here.
You should park in the building marked #24 on the campus map. Cross the street and walk straight across campus to building #5, Letitia Pate Evans Hall (Evans). Evans ABC is on the ground floor. This is where the keynote address will be held.
After the individual workshops, there will be a reception sponsored by the Hambidge Center and the Clara Whipps Dunn Fund in Rebekah Scott Hall, #2 on the campus map, in Woltz Ballroom
Friday, August 29th:
Regie Cabico is a pioneer in the art of spoken word. Besides being the winner of numerous awards and fellowships, Cabico teaches writing and performance for Urban Word NYC and has led workshops for adolescents at Bellevue Hospital. Local teen poets will have the chance to work with Cabico and learn how to slam artfully, and the top teens from the workshop will get the chance to perform at the Saturday Teen Poetry Slam.
Doug Crandell is the author of the novel “Hairdos of the Mildly Depressed.” He will assist readers and writers as they dress as their characters and explore the writing of dialect. Props will be in abundance and all five senses will be violated.
Award-winning novelist and writing teacher David Fulmer gives up the good, bad and ugly when it comes to sex, violence and profanity between the covers. Because Fulmer’s a show-don’t-tell kind of guy, he’ll be joined by two of Atlanta’s finest acting talents to give dramatic and comic readings of the inspiring—and offending—passages. It’s an R-rated program, so no one under 18 will be admitted. A fainting couch and earplugs will be provided.
Cheryl Klein, a senior editor at Arthur A. Levine Books, will share her wit and wisdom when it comes to writing for children. Besides her editorial involvement with a number of books for children, Klein was the continuity editor for the final three Harry Potter books, so she certainly knows her stuff.
Elliot Blake is a 2008 Emmy Award-winning animation writer/producer whose credits include “Space Ghost Coast to Coast” and"Drawn Together," and "Re\Visioned: Tomb Raider." Blake will advise aspiring animation writers on how to make stories translate from the page to the drawing board.
Philip Nutman, an Atlanta-based novelist and screenwriter, has worked in TV and film for 25 years. Nutman will discuss storytelling: how to go about writing a screenplay, what makes a good screenplay, and how to adapt a novel to the screen. He will also talk about the difference between writing novels and screenplays.
The Doyenne of the Death Beat, AJC obituary writer Kay Powell will inform and entertain you as she talks about obituaries from every perspective. If you read obits, might have to write an obit one day, cut obits out and mount them in scrapbooks, always wondered how she chooses who to write about in the AJC or want to know how you can get your obit published, this workshop is for you. Kay is an international award winning obit writer who considers the family written obit an American folk art. Start collecting your euphemisms for "died" and join her at the workshop.
Saturday, August 30th:
Rhonda Wilcox, a professor of English at Gordon College, is the author of Why Buffy Matters: The Art of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and the coeditor of Fighting the Forces: What’s At Stake in Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Investigating Firefly and Serenity: Science Fiction on the Frontier. She is a scholar of the Weidon-verse and will be discussing her writing about good television shows and what’s so good about them.
You’ve been writing and writing, and now you want to know how to get your work out there. This workshop, led by Bram Hsieh of Poets & Writers, will answer all your questions about the basics of publishing, including submitting and preparing your manuscript for agents and publishers.
Joshilyn Jackson, Karen Abbott and Anna Schachner are all accomplished writers. Jackson is an award-winning (and bestselling) novelist, Abbott has recently published her first novel, and Schachner’s short fiction has appeared in numerous journals and magazines and her first novel is currently awaiting publication. They are all also members of the same critique group and will talk about how their membership in the group has helped them succeed.
Award-winning fictioneer Janna McMahan, and Sarah Reidy of Soho Press will help authors learn tips and tricks for marketing published works.
From 6 to 8 PM will be a Happy Hour at Twain’s Billiards and Tap. Not only will there be live music and a wet flannel t-shirt contest, but a there will be a kissing booth with wax lips, womaned by Hollis Gillespie.
Door prizes and cupcakes will abound, and writer mugshots and fingerprints will be taken
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