2008 Faculty
Information also available from the brochure.
Melanie Almeder was raised in Georgia and Maine – landscapes that greatly shaped her work. Her poems have been widely published in Poetry, The Seneca Review, The Georgia Review, Five Points, The American Literary Review, and The Mississippi Review. She has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize three times. Her first book of poems, On Dream Street, won the Editor’s Prize from Tupelo Press. She teaches creative writing and literature at Roanoke College.
Workshop: A Four-Part Intensive Poetry Workshop - each day, Wed., Thurs., Fri., and Sat.
Sarah Bewley is an award winning playwright andcreenwriter. She has won individual artist grants inplaywriting and screenwriting, and has written features for national magazines. She also coordinates writers events, and is the assistant to the coordinator for the annual Florida ART Film Festival in Gainesville.
Workshops: Protagonist's Journey.
Bev Browning wants to tell you she's a wellknown ghostwriter, but in point of fact, a "wellknown ghostwriter" is an oxymoron. Just trust us. Those who "need-to-know," know her well. She has worked for Random House and Rodale, among other publishers of books and journals. She’s been writing and editing professionally for twenty years, with over 100 books notched in her belt. She states that every year she simply "Worked 'til she puked."
Workshop: Memoir writing Master Class; Humor Writing.
Eric Butterman has written for ESPN.com and the Sporting News. He has also lectured on sports writing both at New York University and Harvard.
Workshop: Sports Writing for Serious Money - 4 part workshop Friday and Saturday only.
Linda Evans is a science fiction and fantasy writer with 14 books in print. She has collaborated with three New York Times best-selling authors including Robert Asprin, John Ringo, and David Weber. Her fantasy novel Sleipner was her first sale in 1993. Her love of history has led her to write multiple time-travel novels, and she has written far-future fiction, much of it in the sub-genre of "military science fiction."
Workshop: Science Fiction & Fantasy World Building: How to Create Plausible Science Fiction and Fantasy Created Worlds.
Mary Anna Evans is the author of Effigies, Relics, Artifacts, and Findings, and a number of short stories and essays.. Her series character, Faye Longchamp, lives the exciting life of an archaeologist, and Mary Anna envies her a little. Her work has received honors including a Book Sense Notable Book selection, the Benjamin Franklin Award for outstanding small press mystery, and the Patrick D. Smith Florida Literature Award. She is the mother of three, a lincensed professional engineer, and an avid amateur musician. She enjoys the company of her kids, an everincreasing number of musicical instruments, and a cat. The cat is the best personal assistant a novelist ever had.
Workshops: How to Write a Synopsis that Won't Make an Agent Sneer; Six Steps to a Killer Query (with Diana Tonnessen)
M.C. Finotti has a Master’s Degree in Journalism from Columbia University. She was a broadcast journalist for 25 years and taught Broadcast Management at the University of North Florida. Her first novel The Treasure of Amelia Island was published by Pineapple Press in 2008. She is also the co-author of The Insiders Guide to Jacksonville.
Workshop: Historical Fiction for Children.
Michael Gannon is a Distinguished Service Profession Emeritus of History at the University of Florida, and the author of the dramatic WWII nonfiction book, Operation Drumbeat. His Florida: A Short History, his novel Secret Missions, and A New History of Florida are recent works. His book, Black May (1998), was a selection of both the Book-ofthe-Month Club and the History Book Club. His latest book is Michael Gannon's History of Florida in Forty Minutes.(2007)
Workshop: Writing Florida History.
J.T. Glisson was a confidante and protege of Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings. He is an artist and writer, with a rich history of travel and adventures throughout the world. He presently resides in Evinston, Florida, where he lives with his wife and continues to do workshops and speak about his art and his life.
Workshop: Sunday Morning with J.T. Glisson.
Carolyn Haines is the author of over 50 books in a number of genres, including general fiction, mystery, crime novel, suspense, romantic mystery, cozy mystery, and non-fiction. Her latest books include Fever Moon, Ham Bones, the seventh in the Delta mystery series, and Revenant, a thriller from MIRA Books. Penumbra was named one of the top five mysteries of 2006 by Library Journal. One of the Mississippi Delta mysteries Hallowed Bones, was given that honor in 2004. She regularly speaks and teaches at conferences across the nation and is currently teaching fiction writing at the University of South Alabama.
Workshop: What is Genre; That Downhome Southern Voice
Michael Knight is the author of a novel, Divining Rod, two collections of short fiction, Dogfight & Other Stories and Goodnight, Nobody. A collection of novellas, The Holiday Season was published in the Fall 2007 from Atlantic Monthly Press. His stories have appeared in places like Esquire, The New Yorker, Paris Review and Southern Review and have been anthologized in Best American Mystery Stories, Best of the South, and New Stories from the South.
Workshops: Four Part Intensive Fiction Workshop.
Murray D. Laurie has written several guide books and numerous magazine articles that combine two of her passions, historic architecture and travel. She is a contributor to internet travel sites and has landed travel assignments to some pretty interesting, off-the-beaten-track places. She also documents cemeteries, prepares National Register nominations, writes grants and website content, and actively promotes community historical preservation.
Workshop: And Away We Go! Travel Writing, Writing Regional History: Find Your Place in the Past.
Benjamin LeRoy is the publisher of Bleak House Books. The company specializes in crime and dark literary fiction. He lives in Madison, WI where he works on his own writing and is constantly enamored with the history of baseball. He graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee where he majored in both English and Philosophy.
Workshop: From Manuscript to Bestseller; Panel with Janet Reid and Katharine Sands on agents and editors.
Claire Hamner Matturro is the author of a series of legal thrillers with a sense of humor, including Skinny Dipping, Bone Valley, Wildcat Wine and Sweetheart Deal, all published by William Morrow. Skinny Dipping won the Romantic Times Best First Mystery award, was nominated for a Barry Award, won the SEAK Inc first place for legal fiction, and was a Book Sense 2004 pick. Claire practiced law in Sarasota, Florida and taught at Florida State University College of Law before developing her legal thriller series. After a recent visiting professor stint at the University of Oregon School of Law, she is back home in Georgia.
Workshops: Developing Characters that Live and Engage (2 parts).
Bill Maxwell is a columnist for the St. Petersburg Times, and currently writes a weekly column for the Tuscaloosa News, and a bimonthly column for the Gainesville Guardian. His books are Maximum Insight and Finding Yourself. He founded Role Models Foundation, Inc., a nonprofit organization which publishes Role Models Today, an online magazine for young journalists.
Workshops: How to Write Like a Journalist; How to Conduct and Edit the Q&A Interview.
Margaret McSeveney is a native of North Lanarkshire, Scotland. She writes poetry, short stories and plays. Several of her poems have appeared in anthologies and since 1998, her plays have had productions in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Canada, USA and Athens, Greece. She was a member of the Traverse Writers Group; the Traverse Women Writers Group from 1995-99 and Broadside (Women Playwrights in Scotland). Writing in both Scots and English, her work encompasses contemporary and historical themes.
Workshops: Scots Writing - before and since "Auld Lang Syne;" Theater in Motion.
Peter Meinke has published fourteen books of poetry, seven in the prestigious Pitt Poetry Series, the latest being The Contracted (World 2006). An earlier collection, Zinc Fingers, received the 2001 SEBA Award for the Southeast Booksellers Association. His poems and stories have appeared in The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Poetry, and many other journals. A new book of stories, Unheard Music, was published last year; his previous collection, The Piano Tuner, won the 1986 Flannery O’Connor Award.
Workshops: Questions and Answers; Writing Poems and Short Stories.
Jamie Pachino is a playwright and screenwriter with national and international credits. She’s won dozens of awards, including the Kennedy Center Fund for New American Plays, and the Laurie Foundation Theatre Visionary Award. She’s held writing residences, served on the faculties at Northwestern, University of California at Irvine, and been published numerous times. A proud member of the Writers Guild of America, her film work includes features for Dream Works, Disney, Walden Media, and Vanguard Films, and her teleplays Not Like Everyone Else and What If God Were the Sun? have aired on Lifetime.
Workshops: Screenwriting. (2 parts)
Janet Reid is a agent with Fine Print Literary Management. She specializes in crime fiction, loves mysteries and offbeat literary fiction. Her publishing background includes fifteen years in book publicity with clients both famous and infamous. A former board member of the NYC chapter of the Women's National Book Association, she is actively looking for projects that show mastery of craft and originality.
Workshop: Do You Actually Need a Literary Agent?; Panel with Katharine Sands and Benjamin LeRoy on agents and editors.
Katharine Sands is an associate with the Sarah Jane Frymann Literary Agency. In her experience as an agent, she has worked with a wide range of authors in a wide range of genres. Having been guest speaker on writing and publishing topics for The American Society of Journalists and Authors, and The New York State Council on the Arts, she brings great experience to the workshop. She also has written a book, "Making the Perfect Pitch: How to Catch a Literary Agent’s Eye."
Workshop: Pitchcraft; Panel with Janet Reid and Benjamin LeRoy on agents and editors.
Diana Tonnessen has 25 years of experience as a magazine editor, freelance feature writer and book author. Her feature articles on health, medicine, parenting and nutrition have appeared in Health, Glamour, McCall’s Parents, Self, and Working Mother. She is Editor in Chief of Pause and an editor of Gainesville magazine, a city magazine published in Gainesville, Florida. Ms. Tonnessen has authored or coauthored eight non-fiction books on health and medicine for general audiences. She has also taught feature writing and magazine journalism classes at the University of Florida.
Workshops: Three Essential Questions Every Nonfiction Book Proposal Must Answer; Six Steps to a Killer Query (with Mary Anna Evans); Writing with Sense(s) and Sensibility.