Tuesday, January 27, 2026 at 6:00 PM

Join the Alabama Writers' Cooperative and See Jane Write for a live Q&A with Lizz Schumer -- the senior books editor at People Magazine. Lizz oversees all things books on all platforms at People and previously led books coverage at Good Housekeeping Magazine, where she founded the Good Housekeeping Book Club. She has also written for Woman's Day, Prevention, the New York Times, and many other publications. She's also a writing coach at the New York Writing Room, teaches journalism courses at New York University and is the author of Biography of a Body and Buffalo Steel.

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Prospective attendees should register at the link below in order to receive a link prior to the Zoom session.

REGISTRATION FOR THE ZOOM SESSION

Image courtesy of the office of Governor Kay Ivey

Jacqueline Trimble

Dr. Jacqueline Trimble will serve from January 2026 to December 2029 as Alabama’s 14th Poet Laureate.

After the election at the 2025 AWC Annual Conference, Dr. Trimble had this to share with AWC’s voting body:

“Alabama has been blessed with a rich literary tradition. The talent that exists and has always existed here is second to none. I am honored, humbled, and deeply moved by the faith the Alabama Writers Cooperative and the writers of Alabama have placed in me to be the chief champion of poetry in this state. I walk in the footsteps of wonderful poet laureates, and I hope to continue their work of bringing well-deserved attention to this state’s literary abundance. The world needs to know our Alabama poets, and I look forward to working with organizations and individual artists to encourage emerging and established writers, create new ways of engaging readers, and support the beautiful and important work of poetry in this state.”

“Jacqueline Trimble elected Alabama’s next poet laureate” (GulfCoastMedia.com)

“Meet the new Alabama Poet Laureate, Jacqueline Allen Trimble” (AlabamaNewsCenter.com)

“Jacqueline Allen Trimble, English Professor at HBCU, to Serve as New Poet Laureate for State of Alabama” (Birmingham Times)

“Alabama Poet Laureate Commission Dr. Jacqueline Trimble” (from the office of Governor Kay Ivey)

Tuesday, October 14, 2025 at 6 PM

See Jane Write and Alabama Writers’ Cooperative present a free personal branding workshop via Zoom featuring See Jane Write founder Javacia Harris Bowser.

Register Here: https://forms.gle/rvVvC98KRBktrsGB7

You will receive an email with the Zoom link on Tuesday morning, October 14.

SJW + AWC Workshop

Brand You: Building Your Author Platform

featuring Javacia Harris Bowser of See Jane Write

In this workshop, Javacia will cover practical ways writers can build their personal brands and find community and how both can boost their writing careers.

ABOUT JAVACIA

Javacia Harris Bowser is an award-winning freelance journalist and the author of the essay collection Find Your Way Back: How to Write Your Way Through Anything. In Birmingham, she’s best known as the founder of See Jane Write, website and community for women who write that Javacia founded in 2011. Today, See Jane Write serves and brings together women from across the country and around the world. 

Because of See Jane Write, Javacia was included in Southern Living magazine’s list of Innovators Changing the South, alongside household names like Dolly Parton and Reese Witherspoon. Her personal brand has also landed her opportunities to write for major publications such as ELLE magazine, Good Housekeeping magazine, and BET.com. 

A recipient of the 2022 Alabama State Council on the Arts Fellowship, Javacia has also received multiple awards from the National Federation of Press Women, Alabama Media Association and the Alabama Press Association.

EMERALD COAST REVIEW NAMES WRITERS, ARTISTS, AND PHOTOGRAPHERS SELECTED FOR 23RD REGIONAL ANTHOLOGY

Emerald Coast Writers would like to announce the upcoming Volume XXIII of the Emerald Coast Review to be launched on October 25th!

Seventy-eight writers, artists, and photographers will be featured in the upcoming issue of Emerald Coast Review, Vol. XXIII. Since 1989, the ECR has been published every two years, emphasizing its mission to showcase high-quality fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and contemporary, emerging, and experimental works alongside outstanding art, graphic design, and photography from creators across coastal Florida and Alabama.

This year’s volume will also include scripts from the winners of the Books By the Bay 2024 Short-Film Screenwriting Contest, along with companion works from Picture Me A Story, a collaboration between Wide Angle Photo Club and Emerald Coast Writers.

The book, scheduled to launch on October 25th, features a vibrant mix of Gulf Coast creativity along with contributions from beyond the region, chosen from hundreds of submissions.

Contributors include (from Alabama) Jessica Jones, Baldwin County, AL; Amy Hadley, Bay Minette, AL; Joe Cuhaj, Fairhope, AL; Mike Turner, Fairhope, AL; Randolph Crew, Foley, AL; Justin Philips, Gulf Shores, AL; Kathleen Duthu, Mobile, AL; Janet Nodar, Mobile, AL; Karen Hydock, Mobile County, AL; (from Florida) Tonya Dalhaus, Beulah; Autry Clifton Dye, Cantonment; Leigh Anne Mabry, Cantonment; Tom Brinton, Crestview; Lauren Whitley, Emerald Coast; David Schjott, Freeport; Terri Barlotta, Fort Walton Beach; Gail Barsh, Fort Walton Beach; Jessica Temple, Fort Walton Beach; Steve Biersdorf, Gulf Breeze; Scott Finelli, Gulf Breeze; Evelyn Fredman, Gulf Breeze; Jacquelyn Roos, Gulf Breeze; Diane Skelton, Gulf Breeze; Bobby J. Touchton, Milton; Bart Daughety, Navarre; Kimberly Hutchinson, Navarre; Claire Massey, Navarre; Mikayla Satterlee, Navarre; Lee Underwood Arndt, Niceville; Benjamin Larrison, Niceville; Alice H. Murray, Niceville; Deborah R. Majors, Niceville; J. Wren Supak, Niceville; Robert Larson, Northwest FL; Stephen Wise, Northwest FL; Betty Hassler, Pace; R.A. Krueger, Pace; Pamela G. Holmes, Panama City; Vanessa Bragg, Pensacola; Lisa Mella Burridge, Pensacola; Todd Chandler Clark, JR., Pensacola; Gina Cooke, Pensacola; Patti Damm, Pensacola; Ron Dowdy, Pensacola; Vee Dowdy, Pensacola; Christy J. Draper, Pensacola; Peter Dye, Pensacola; Stephanie Whibbs Gonzalez, Pensacola; Mary Gutierrez, Pensacola; Laurie Hansen, Pensacola; Terry Henry, Pensacola; Margaret Hildreth, Pensacola; Ron Hixson, Pensacola; Toni Hixson, Pensacola; Yvonne Lashmett, Pensacola; Vera Leon, Pensacola; Jane Gate Lies, Pensacola; Cori Lojo, Pensacola; Heather Mitchell, Pensacola; Karen McAferty Morris, Pensacola; Lisa Joy Newcomb, Pensacola; Leslie E. Owen, Pensacola; Janet Reeves, Pensacola; Renate Reiner, Pensacola; Eric St. Pierre, Pensacola; Richard Smith, Pensacola; Sara Jeanine Smith, Pensacola; Debra Stogner, Pensacola; Carolyn Joyce Tokson, Pensacola; Mara Viksnins, Pensacola; Andrea Jones Walker, Pensacola; Lori Zavada, Pensacola; Emily Rose Proctor, Santa Rosa Beach; Ann Lewis, Seagrove Beach; Christina Larson, Shalimar; M.R. Street, Tallahassee; John Gibson, Vernon; Joanne Blakely, Anna, IL; Lisa Kamolnick, Blountville, TN.

For more information, please contact: Diane Skelton, emeraldcoastreview@gmail.com

Emerald Coast Writers, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, all-volunteer organization based in downtown Pensacola, Florida. Initially founded in 1986 as the West Florida Literary Federation, it now has over 100 members. ECW works to preserve the area's literary heritage and cultural scene by hosting contests and workshops, sponsoring various community happenings, youth programs, and the Books by the Bay Festival. 

AWC’s 2025 Annual Conference was a hit this year! Workshops, presentations, socializing, networking, Friday’s open mic, the Saturday Awards Banquet, the huge author bookstore—so much fun and writing crammed into an incredible weekend. Let’s keep building on the success that gathering together brings!

Please plan to attend the AWC 2026 Conference in Birmingham, Alabama, on September 11, 2026, through September 13, 2026

More details will follow on the AWC website and official social media channels, but for now, please save the date and plan to join us for another amazing year!

On September 14th at the Annual Membership Meeting following the 2025 Annual Conference in Orange Beach, the AWC Board will be voting on nominees to fill vacant board positions.

Submit your nominees for these vacant positions in the form below. (Google Form will open in a new browser tab.)

AWC Zoom Workshop on August 26th from Noon to 1 PM

Free to AWC Members

Registration Link

Join writer and editor Aimee Hardy for an interactive discussion of how to land a book contract with a small press.

Aimee Hardy is the author of Pocket Full of Teeth. She is a writer and editor dedicated to storytelling and cultivating a passion for creative storytelling in the larger community. She is married and has two children. She loves being outside and volunteering with the community. Aimee received her Bachelor’s and Master’s Degrees in English from National University. She has taught creative writing courses and is an editor for Running Wild Press. Check out her previously published work HERE.

Aimee has been writing for as long as she could hold a pen. She is inspired by the world around her, especially her upbringing in the South. She loves getting her ideas from ordinary events and bringing them to life: a twist on fairy tales told as she was getting tucked into bed, a song on her way home whose lines get stuck in her head, a smell that reminds her of a trip she once took with her grandmother. The possibilities are endless.

Aimee is a writer and editor in Birmingham, AL. She has a passion for storytelling and is the author of Pocket Full of Teeth. She has been published in Stonecoast Review, Writer’s Digest, Running Wild Press’ Short Story Anthology, Havik2020, Bluntly Lit Mag, Adelaide Literary Magazine, and Lost Pilots Lit and was nominated for the Pushcart Prize in 2020. She frequently gives workshops and panels on storytelling in the modern world. When she’s not writing or editing, she enjoys going on hikes with her husband and two kids or curling up with a good book and a hot cup of tea.

www.aimeehardy.com

AWC could really use more sponsors for our Writing Contest this year. It is very reasonably priced. $150 will send a flurry of writers fluttering into frenzies of the written word - entirely focused on whatever subject matter You choose.

What’s not to love?

Sponsorship deadline is July 12th!

Email AWC’s Contest Chair Jessica Temple at AWCcontests@gmail.com.

The Emerald Coast Review is currently accepting submissions until July 15 for the 23rd edition.

The Emerald Coast Review publishes fiction, nonfiction, poetry, contemporary, emerging, and experimental works, along with the best of art, graphic design, and photography from artists living along the Emerald Coast.

Alabama writers in Escambia, Mobile, and Baldwin counties as well as Emerald Coast Writers living elsewhere are eligible to submit for this publication.

Visit their website for more details and submission guidelines.

Join AWC for a Zoom Workshop on March 27th from 12-12:40 PM with Clinical Psychologist, Patricia Black-Gould. Free to AWC Members.

Countdown to Book Launch: What I’ve Learned About Marketing The Hard Way

If you think marketing begins after you’ve written your book, think again. Experts say marketing should start from a year to six months before you launch your book. A year might be a bit much, but there are marketing strategies you can incorporate during the writing process.

We will discuss several marketing strategies, ranging from obtaining editorial reviews to use for your book cover (Kirkus, Foreward, Indies Today), finding Advance Readers (ARCs) for prepublication reviews on Goodreads; using services such as NetGalley, and Book Funnel to increase readership; locating influencers through social media sites; entering book contests, working with virtual promotional tours (Look Book Tours, Children’s Book Review); and if you can survive and get through all this and much more—hosting a launch party! 

Workshop Registration form: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfpyPuPIN32HaXyYLBuP4M-zGYYHDI8JepOy5zBnoFe0juxVQ/viewform?usp=sharing

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BIO

Pat Black-Gould is an award-winning author, speaker, and psychologist. Her novel All the Broken Angels, co-written with Steve Hardiman, is a family saga set during the Vietnam War era. As a psychologist, Pat specialized in working with Vietnam Veterans, and the novel pays tribute to those who served and their families. Her children’s book The Crystal Beads, Lalka’s Journey, tells the story of a hidden child of the Holocaust. 

Pat’s writing explores themes of compassion, inclusion, and diversity, and she gives presentations nationally on these topics. WSRE PBS TV featured her on the program Conversations with Jeff Weeks. As a speaker, Pat also conducts workshops on marketing and the craft of writing.  In addition, Pat was a theater director and producer of a New England summer stock company and a murder mystery dinner theater.

Pat Black-Gould, PhD

Author, Clinical Psychologist

https://patblackgould.com/

Author of All the Broken Angels (First place, Digital Book Times Literary Award and Winner of a 2024 Royal Palm Literary Award from Florida Writers Association) and The Crystal Beads, Lalka’s Journey (Three-time Gold Medal winner).