* The AWC Annual Conference *
September 8-10, 2023
Friday: Birmingham Public Library Central Branch
Friday Night: Open Mic-Desert Island Supply Co. (5500 1st Ave. N, Birmingham, AL 35212)
Saturday: Avenue D (3008 4th Ave. So.)
Sunday: UAB Spencer Honors House (1190 10th Ave. So.)
Birmingham, Alabama
The AWC was founded in 1923. Join us as we celebrate 100 years during our in-person conference. The conference will feature a display of memorabilia from the past 100 years of AWC's rich history. It will also include Open Mic on Friday night, workshops in Poetry, Fiction, Nonfiction, Children's books, author panels, and more. Saturday's Awards Dinner will feature a ceremony for the AWC Writing Contest winners, as well as a keynote address by Poet Laureate of Alabama, Ashley Jones. Don't miss this opportunity to celebrate the past 100 years, and to look toward a bright future. The writing world is filled with endless possibilities.
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Faculty
Faculty Bios
ASHLEY M. JONES is the Poet Laureate of the State of Alabama (2022-2026). She holds an MFA in Poetry from Florida International University, and she is the author of Magic City Gospel (Hub City Press 2017), dark / / thing (Pleiades Press 2019), and REPARATIONS NOW! (Hub City Press 2021). Her poetry has earned several awards, including the Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers Award, the Silver Medal in the Independent Publishers Book Awards, the Lena-Miles Wever Todd Prize for Poetry, a Literature Fellowship from the Alabama State Council on the Arts, the Lucille Clifton Poetry Prize, and the Lucille Clifton Legacy Award. She was a finalist for the Ruth Lily Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Fellowship in 2020, and her collection, REPARATIONS NOW! was on the longlist for the 2022 PEN/Voelcker Award for Poetry. Jones has been featured on news outlets including Good Morning America, ABC News, and the BBC. Her poems and essays appear in or are forthcoming at CNN, POETRY, The Oxford American, Origins Journal, The Quarry by Split This Rock, Obsidian, and many others. She co-directs PEN Birmingham, and she is the founding director of the Magic City Poetry Festival. She teaches in the Creative Writing Department of the Alabama School of Fine Arts, and she is part of the Core Faculty of the Converse University Low Residency MFA Program. She recently served as a guest editor for Poetry Magazine. In 2022, she received a Poet Laureate Fellowship from the Academy of American Poets.
Dean Bonner’s first nonfiction humor collection I Talk Slower Than I Think opened the door to writing newspaper columns and magazine feature articles for numerous publications. He was a nonfiction winner in the 2013 Alabama Literary Competition. The Tar Nation TV pilot screenplay he co-wrote with Heidi Carroll was a quarterfinalist in the 2019 Austin Film Festival. His poetry is published in two collections called The Breaking and A Stormy Beginning, by Scars Publications. His work was featured in the February 2016 issue of Down in the Dirt literary magazine, and claims credit for two entries in Urban Dictionary. Dean is a retired Coast Guard intelligence officer and Morse telegrapher. He lives in a quaint Alabama town with his artist partner PJ and eight cats.
Tina Mozelle Braziel is the author of Known by Salt (Anhinga Press), winner of the Philip Levine Prize for Poetry, and Rooted by Thirst (Porkbelly Press). She has been awarded a fellowship from the Alabama State Council on the Arts, an artist residency at Hot Springs National Park, and an Eco Poetry fellowship from the Magic City Poetry Festival. She and her husband, novelist James Braziel, live and write in a glass cabin that they are building by hand on Hydrangea Ridge. They are currently writing a collection of poems about building their home. It will be published by Pulley Press in 2024.
Susan Cushman is the author of two novels, two memoirs, and one short story collection,
and is editor of four anthologies, including All Night, All Day: Life, Death, & Angels (June
2023). She has directed several writing conferences and workshops in Oxford, Mississippi
and in Memphis, and has led writing workshops in person and online. Susan has spoken at
numerous conferences and literary festivals, including the Decatur Book Festival, Southern
Festival of Books, Mississippi Book Festival, Louisiana Book Festival, AWP Conference
(2020), and the 2018 Alabama Writers Conclave Conference. A native of Jackson,
Mississippi, she lives in Memphis with her husband of 53 years.
Claire Datnow was born and raised in Johannesburg, South Africa, which ignited her love for the natural world and for diverse indigenous cultures around the globe. Claire taught creative writing to gifted and talented students in the Birmingham, Alabama Public Schools System. Her published works include a middle grade Eco mystery series, The Adventures of The Sizzling Six. She received numerous scholarships and awards, including, The Blanche Dean Award for Outstanding Nature Educator, the Alabama Writers Cooperative Middle Grade Award, and Monarch Mysteries (Book 6 eco mystery series) long listed for the Green Books Award. During her tenure as a teacher, Claire and her students developed a nature trail, recently named in her honor as the Alabama Audubon-Datnow Forest Preserve.
Saundra Scribner Grace is an Associate Editor at Negative Capability Press, working with Sue Brannan Walker during the past four years. Saundra, a native Mobilian, spent 44 years living and working around the world with the United Nations as a writer, editor, event producer, and head of a secretariat promoting programs for women and children. She works in five languages. A lifelong writer, Saundra recently discovered the richness of poetry when she returned to Mobile in 2018. She is primarily a Memoirist, writing both poetry and essay based on her life growing up in the South, and on her experiences with the United Nations. She has won a number of awards from the Alabama State Poetry Society, and her work is found in the Mobile Writers Guild Anthology 2023, Classic Pieces Retold, and in the upcoming Writers in Nature anthology, Florilegium. She is currently working on a Memoir to be published later this year.
Heather L. Montgomery writes nonfiction for kids who are wild about animals. An award-winning author and educator, Heather uses yuck appeal to engage young minds. Her 17 books have received recognitions from the Junior Library Guild, National Council of Teachers of English, and the American Library Association. Her picture book Bugs Don't Hug was recognized as the Alabama Book of the year. Other titles include: Something Rotten: A Fresh Look at Roadkill and What’s in Your Pocket? Collecting Nature’s Treasures, celebrates childhood passions that cultivate scientific thinking.
Charlotte Pence’s most recent book of poems, Code, received the 2020 Book of the Year award from Alabama Poetry Society. Code details not only the life cycle of birth and death, but also the means of this cycle: DNA itself. Her first book of poems, Many Small Fires (Black Lawrence Press, 2015), received an INDIEFAB Book of the Year Award from Foreword Reviews. Her poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction have recently been published in Poetry, Harvard Review, Sewanee Review, Southern Review, and featured on the podcast The Slowdown. A graduate of Emerson College (MFA) and the University of Tennessee (PhD), she is now the director of the Stokes Center for Creative Writing at University of South Alabama.
After completing her doctorate in Communication and Information Sciences , Emmy-winning producer/director Wendy Reed began to combine her passion for writing and story with her interests in science and medicine by launching science writing seminars designed to teach future researchers, scientists, and health care professionals how to translate science into readable stories. When the pandemic hit, she served as Lead for registration at the UAB Mass Vaccine Site in Hoover and began completing a Master’s in Public Health. The Alabama State Council on the Arts Writing Fellow has over 30 years of writing, producing/directing public media, publishing, and teaching experience. She currently serves as Director of Communications and Engagement and Associate Researcher in the Alabama BRAIN Lab at UAB. Her latest book project is a collaboration--Old Enough: Southern Women Artists and Writers on Creativity and Aging (forthcoming 2024, University of Georgia Press).
Lee Rozelle is the author of novel Ballad of Jasmine Wills and nonfiction books Zombiescapes & Phantom Zones and Ecosublime. He has published short stories in Cosmic Horror Monthly, Southern Humanities Review, HellBound Books' Anthology of Bizarro, Shadowy Natures by Dark Ink Books, If I Die Before I Wake Volume 3, and the Scare You to Sleep podcast.
Karim Shamsi-Basha immigrated from Damascus-Syria to the United States in 1984 at the age of 184. He attended the University of Tennessee and acquired a degree in Mechanical Engineering. After that, he pursued what he loved – Writing and photography. His children’s book, The Cat Man of Aleppo, won the 2021 Caldecott Honor, the Middle East Book Award and five starred reviews from Publisher’s Weekly among others. His Young Adult novel, Cactus Pear, is about a Muslim teenage boy in love with a Christian girl amid the Syrian civil war. Karim is a Food & Culture Columnist with nj.com and The Star Ledger in New Jersey. His work has appeared in National Geographic Traveler, Sports Illustrated, People, Time, Southern Living, The Alabama News Center, al.com, Aramco World magazine, The New York Times, and The Washington Post. Among his writings was an essay in Alabama Christmas, alongside Helen Keller and Truman Capote. His books have won national and international praise: The Beauty Box, Shelter from the Storm, and Home Sweet Home Alabama. The Huffington Post hosted his blog, Arab in Alabama. He appears on regional and national media outlets to speak about writing, photography, Arabs, and Muslims. One of his personal missions is to portray the positive aspects of his heritage. Karim is a single father to three precious human beings: Zade, Dury, and Demi. He lives by the motto, Carpe diem, seizing every moment of this beautiful life.
Jacqueline Allen Trimble lives and writes in Montgomery, Alabama. She is a National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellow (Poetry), a Cave Canem Fellow, and an Alabama State Council on the Arts Literary Fellow. Her poetry has appeared in various journals including Poetry Magazine, The Louisville Review, The Offing, and Poet Lore and has also been featured as Poetry Foundation’s Poem of the Day, Poetry Daily, The Rumpus, and Duke University’s Hart Leadership Program. Her work is included in the anthologies All Night, All Day: Life, Death and Angels (Madville Publishing), The Night’s Magician (Negative Capability Press), eighty contemporary poets write about the moon, Southern Writers on Writing (University Press of Mississippi), an anthology of essays by twenty-six contemporary Southern writers, and most recently The Beautiful: Poets Reimagine America, a collection representing each U.S. state and territory in words, pictures and a traveling art exhibit. She wrote five episodes for Die Testament, a South African soap opera that streamed on Netwerk24 in fall of 2019, and eight episodes for the second season, Die Testament 2, which aired in spring 2022. Published by NewSouth Books, American Happiness, her debut poetry collection, was named the Best Book of 2016 by the inaugural Seven Sisters Book Awards and won the 2016 Balcones Poetry Prize. The ironically titled book examines America’s refusal to grapple with hard truths, preferring instead the pretense that everyone and everything is just fine. Of the work Honorée Fanonne Jeffers wrote, “I longed for her kind of poetry, these cut-to-the-flesh poems, this verse that sings the old-time religion of difficult truths with new courage and utter sister-beauty.” Her new collection, How to Survive the Apocalypse, was selected by New York Public Library as one of the top ten poetry books for 2022. About the collection Randall Horton writes, “Not since Carolyn Rogers have we heard a voice this bold buttressed by poetic craft. It’s all here—the energy and excitement of Black idiom reimagined as contemporary art, the beautiful defiance of a balled fist disguised as love.” Trimble is Professor of English and chair of the Department of Languages and Literatures at Alabama State University.
Sue Brannan Walker is Professor Emerita at the University of South Alabama and a former Poet Laureate of Alabama. She is the Publisher of Negative Capability Press and has authored ten books of poetry, non-fiction, and criticism, as well as published hundreds of poems, essays and critical articles. She is currently teaching a creative writing class, Writers in Nature, at the Mobile Botanical Gardens.
Workshop Schedule
FRIDAY, September 8 @ Birmingham Public Library Central Branch
1-4 pm Registration/Check In
1-1:55 pm
“Writing Our Labor” with Tina Mozelle Braziel
"What do you do?" is question people often ask but we rarely get to the bottom of. In this guided writing prompt, we will explores the depths of our work in either a poem or short non-fiction piece. Taking inspiration from pieces in What Things Cost: an Anthology for the People, we'll seek to make our labor as vivid to readers as if they punched our timecard.
2-2:55 pm
”From Page to Screen: Paths to Take / Choices to Make When Adapting a Work of Fiction to the Big or Small Screen” with Heidi Carroll & Dean Bonner
There are many different choices and decisions that need to be made at the beginning of an adaptation. How faithful will I be to the original manuscript? If I vary from it, why? Should I consider adding other characters or storylines if this will help make the adaptation work better in cinematic terms? How can I be faithful to the tone and spirit of the original, through my choices in pacing, environments, locations? How important IS it to be faithful to the manuscript, anyway, and why? Before you begin working on an adaptation, you need to know the source of your adaptation well, and need to be prepared to justify your answers to the above questions. And after this - the fun begins! We will also discuss how to analyze your piece for major arcs, plot-points, and other signposts you will use as guides when you actually begin to WRITE.
3:00 pm - Bookstore Opens
3-3:55 pm
“The Perks and Pitfalls of Writing Climate Change” with Claire Datnow
Climate fiction is an important and growing branch of literature opening exciting new opportunities for writers. We will explore how to approach the climate emergency with impactful innovative writing, the many different genres and styles to choose from, and how to unlock the stories we need to tell. Cli-fi or environmental writing has never been more relevant. Join writers, novelists, playwrights, and pioneers of emerging forms who are taking up the challenge to inspire and inform readers of all ages without sugar coating the truth. This presentation will be illustrated with real world examples of success and failures.
4-4:55 pm
“The Four Pillars of the Well-Made Television Pilot Proposal, and How to Nail Them” with Heidi Carroll and Dean Bonner
When overcome with an urge only describable as “Hey! I’d like to write a completed Television Pilot Proposal” where does one begin? In fact, there are four main components to completing a pilot proposal: the proposed series’ Show Bible; a fully descriptive Character Breakdown; a summary of all Future Episodes; and - last but not least - the actual FULL SCRIPT OF THE SERIES PILOT EPISODE! You want to fully realize each component. We’ll discuss each of the four in some detail, and how best to make as solid a proposal as possible.
7 pm - Open Mic at Desert Island Supply Co. (5500 1st Ave N, Birmingham, AL 35212)
Every year, “Alabama State Council on the Arts awards multiple fellowships to individuals working in arts education, craft, dance, design, media/photography, music, literature, theatre, and visual arts. These grants recognize artistic excellence as well as professional commitment and maturity, contributing to the further development of the artist.” Congratulations to all the 23 artists, makers, and educators who were each awarded $5,000 this year—and a special congratulations to the literary art recipients: Brooke Champagne (prose), Monique Fields (prose), Kristen Iskandrian (prose), Matthew Layne (poetry), Adam Prince (prose), and Jacqueline Trimble (poetry).
This year’s literary arts recipients will share their work before the open mic begins.
Saturday, September 9 (Venue change @ Avenue D - 3008 4th Ave. S. Birmingham, AL 35233)
7 am - Registration Opens
8-8:55 am
“Nature Speaks” with Tina Mozelle Braziel
At a time when we hold great responsibility for the future of our eco-systems, what is nature telling us? Since communication experts advise us to repeat what we hear others say to us, let’s practice that, imagining what creeks, tadpoles, mockingbirds, lichen and stones are telling us, each other, the world. Nature writer Robin Wall Kimmerer says nature is lonesome for our regard. Let’s give it our best.
9-9:55 am
“The Elements of Prose” with Susan Cushman
How to use the elements of prose to critique your own work and others in a workshop setting. This will include a brief hands-on writing exercise.
10-10:55 am
“Where would Simon be without Garfunkel: Let’s Think Collaboration” with Sue Walker and Saundra Grace
In William Stafford and Marvin Bell’s Segues: A Correspondence in Poetry, Bell mentions the advantages “of addressing someone in particular in one’s writing, the more so, if you and the other are different in the details of your lives but neighborly in the ways of your minds.” The point of collaboration is to give and take from each other, creating things that are fresh and innovative. In this workshop on Collaboration, we will explore the who, what, why, and how of collaborative writing. We will provide informative handouts, a bibliography, examples, and prompts, and we will write together. In view of time constraints, we will extend an invitation to send us your class efforts for comments.
11-11:55 am
“Writing Comes Naturally When We Are Having FUN!” with Heather L. Montgomery
Whether fiction or nonfiction, when writing reaches into the real world, readers can relate. Join author Heather L. Montgomery for this hands-on session using natural artifacts for inspiration. Experience opportunities to stretch your mind, shake up your voice, and deepen your insight into your characters. We will think by analogy, play with language, and stretch our senses. Most importantly, we will PLAY!!!
12-1:00 pm - Lunch on Your Own
1:00-1:55 pm
“Getting Off Subject: Cultivating Surprise in Poetry” with Charlotte Pence
In his essay collection The Triggering Town, Richard Hugo encourages poets to venture forth from the initial subject that sparked a particular poem and follow sound, play, and musicality rather than topic. This technique allows space for a poet’s unique and complex associations with language to propel a poem. In this workshop, participants will discuss poems by Jericho Brown, Eduardo Corral, and Traci Brimhall in terms of how sound and surprising imagery drive the work forward. At the end, writing prompts will inspire poets to play with Hugo’s idea of leaping out from the initial idea.
2:00-2:55 pm
“Plunging the Pen into Horror Fiction” with Lee Rozelle
Want to see inside a horror tale? This talk will dissect one writer's gruesome method for getting a story started, letting characters lead, figuring out the next thing that happens, and gutting the plot. Hear, if you dare, tortuous tales of anthology and small magazine publishing that will leave you in terror.
3-3:55 pm
“Little People, Big Possibilities” with Heather L. Montgomery
Would you like to inspire the next generation? Have you thought about writing for children or young adults? Heather L. Montgomery has published 17 kidlit books, in both the work-for-hire and trade markets. Come discover how to break in and establish your own path in this emotionally rewarding endeavor.
4-4:55 pm
“Write Your Best-Seller Non-fiction Book” with Karim Shamsi-Basha
Non-fiction books and memoirs have been on the rise for a couple of decades, with best sellers from celebrities and well-known writers, as well as first-time authors. What does it take to write a best-selling non-fiction book? In this workshop, Karim Shamsi-Basha talks about his non-fiction journey which includes his book: Marriage Advice from a Divorced Guy! (Amazon). He will also present the three most important things to consider when starting a non-fiction book project.
5-5:55 pm
“Writing about Angels and Mystical Experiences” with Wendy Reed, Jacqueline Trimble, Susan Cushman (moderator)
ALL NIGHT, ALL DAY: LIFE, DEATH, & ANGELS is a mixed-genre collection of essays, poetry, and fiction about angels and the ways the mystical world interacts with us in daily life. Some of the pieces in this collection share the experience of personal loss when a loved one dies. There is something mystical about holding the hand of a person who is "crossing over." It can be heartbreaking, but also very holy and beautiful. Editor Susan Cushman and contributors Wendy Reed (essay) and Jacqueline Trimble (poetry) will share excerpts from the book and discuss its themes.
6-8:00 pm -Wine-down, Dinner, Awards with Jessica Temple, and Keynote with Alabama’s Poet Laureate Ashley M. Jones
“'Surely I Can Write Poems:' The Necessity of Truth-Telling, Diversity, and Authenticity in Contemporary Poetry” Keynote with Ashley M. Jones
Lucille Clifton's "surely I can write poems" alerts us to the necessity of seeing what lies beneath what is first seen. In her poem, she says the image of the tree is one that does inspire poetic images, but she can't see that tree through eyes other than her own--those of a Black woman with the ghosts of American lynching always haunting. In my life and work, I have been committed to the beauty and surprise of poetic language, but I don't think that beauty is ever at odds with my own authentic experience as a Black Southern woman who is interested in truth, uncomfortable or not. Our poems can be full of linguistic delight and they can tell the story of this place, an America which we love by holding it accountable and seeing what lies beneath the stars and stripes.
Sunday, September 10 (Venue change @ UAB Spencer Honors House 1190 10th Avenue S. Birmingham, AL 35233)
8-8:55 am
”Fiction Reading” with Lee Rozelle
Exploring principles from Saturday’s workshop, “Plunging the Pen into Horror Fiction” with examples from Rozelle’s works.
9-9:55 am
“Write a Winning Children's Book” with Karim Shamsi-Basha
Ideas for picture books are so prevalent, you wonder what it takes for one rise to the top where agents and editors are fighting over it. Throughout my Cat Man of Aleppo experience and after it won the Caldecott Honor, (I am forever humbled), I learned much about what makes an idea a winner. This workshop will give you seven things to look for when you’re evaluating a picture book concept.
10-10:55 am
“The Acrostic as Memorial” with Ashley M. Jones
The poet Faisal Mohyuddin's poem "The Faces of the Holy" is not only a powerful elegy for a mentor, but it utilizes the acrostic form to imbed the spirit of the late mentor into the very fabric of the poem. With a close study of Mohyuddin's poem and my own acrostic for my late father, attendees will craft their own modern acrostic. This isn't just a form for children--instead, it can be a transformative tool for capturing a lost loved one on the page.
11-11:55 am
AWC Annual Meeting
Lodging
Aloft Birmingham Soho Square
1903 29th Ave. S. Homewood, AL 35209
$149 King Room
$159 Double Queen
To make reservations, click here, which will allow you to take advantage of our special group rate. If you prefer making reservations over the phone, please call (877) 822-1111 to reserve. You must mention the AWC conference room block to receive the discounted price.
Rooms will be released three weeks prior to conference date. Make your reservation now and cancel, if needed. Refunds will be processed up to 48 hours beforehand.
The last day to book is August 18, 2023.