Georgia Highlands College hosts 6th annual Writers Conference
The 2023 Highlands Writers Conference returns to Georgia Highlands College on March 11 and brings published authors to share their approaches with aspiring and accomplished writers alike.
The keynote speaker at this year’s conference is Choctaw poet and film producer LeAnne Howe with a special presentation of her film “Searching for Sequoyah.”
Howe is an enrolled citizen of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma. She is the Eidson Distinguished Professor of American Literature in English at the University of Georgia and is the author of novels, plays, poetry and screenplays. She is the on-camera narrator for a 90-minute PBS documentary, Indian Country Diaries, Spiral of Fire, 2006. She is the co-producer and writer for the 56-minute Searching for Sequoyah, airing nationally last November on PBS stations for which she and producer James M. Fortier won a Telly Award. Featured speakers are:
Mayra Cuevas, a CNN award-winning journalist and the author of the young adult novels “Does My Body Offend You?” a Target YA Book Club selection, and “Salty, Bitter, Sweet.” Her short story “Resilient” was published as part of the anthology “FORESHADOW.” Mayra is also the co-founder of the Latinx Kidlit Book Festival and a loud and proud Puerto Rican.
Randi Sonenshine grew up exploring the magical world of forests, streams, and ponds in a pair of trusty tennis shoes and a red canoe. Through her books, she hopes to nurture in young readers, writers, and thinkers an appreciation and wonder of the natural world. Her debut picture book, “The Nest That Wren Built,” is a Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection and appeared on many notable lists, including the 2021 Bank Street College of Education’s Best Children’s Books of the year, the Chicago Public Library’s 2020 Best Informational Books for Younger Readers, and the National Aquarium’s favorite conservation-themed books.
Anthony Grooms writes on a variety subjects in several genres from historical fiction to science fiction, however his most notable work has been about the American Civil Rights Movement in the southern United States. He is the author of the novels “Bombingham,” and “The Vain Conversation,” the story collection “Trouble No More,” and a collection of poems, “Ice Poems.” His stories, essays, and poems have appeared in a number of anthologies and literary journals, most recently in Atlanta Noir and Alabama Noir. He is a two-time winner of the Lillian Smith Prize, a Hurston-Wright Legacy Award Finalist, a Black Caucus of the ALA Honor Fiction Award, and other honors. He has held fellowships from Yaddo and Fulbright.
Jared Yates Sexton is the author of eight books, including “The Midnight Kingdom: A History of Power, Paranoia, and the Coming Crisis” from Dutton/Penguin-Random House and “The Man They Wanted Me To Be: Toxic Masculinity and a Crisis of Our Own Making,” a runner-up for the Georgia Authors Association’s Memoir of the Year. His work has appeared in The New York Times, The New Republic, Politico, The Daily Beast, and elsewhere.
Douglas Young was a political science professor for over 33 years before becoming a full-time writer. His essays, poems, and short stories have appeared in a variety of publications in America, Canada, and Europe. His first novel, “Deep in the Forest,” was published in 2021 and “Due South,” was published in late 2022.
Jennifer Dunn is a Canton native who says she grew up between a cemetery and a trailer park and wore a homemade dress to prom, twice. She turns her family stories (the double murder, the time her great-grandpappy got drunk and took over the fire department, that winter morning she and her dad burned a house down on purpose) into hour-long TV dramas that showcase Southern-ness in all of its complexity and diversity.
Mario Chard is a poet, critic and teacher. Born in Morgan Valley, Utah, to an Argentine immigrant mother and an American father, he is the author of “Land of Fire,” winner of the Dorset Prize, a Notable Debut by Poets & Writers Magazine, and the Georgia Author of the Year Award in Poetry.
His work has appeared widely in journals and magazines, including The Nation, The New Yorker, Poetry, among others, and his honors include the “Discovery” Poetry Prize and fellowships from the Sewanee Writers’ Conference and the Civitella Ranieri Foundation. An inaugural fellow for the U.S. Ledbury Poetry Critics, he lives in Atlanta.
The Highlands Writers Conference will take place on March 11 from 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. at Georgia Highlands College, Cartersville campus located at 5441 Highway 20 in Cartersville.
The event is free to students of any institution with a valid student ID and $25 for the general public.
To register or for additional event information, visit hwc.highlands.edu.