Chicago, August 29…Women & Children First Bookstore co-owners Linda Bubon and Ann Christophersen are proud to announce their first Women's Voices Weekend, scheduled for Saturday, Oct. 5 and Sunday, Oct.16 in Chicago. The purpose of this festival is to celebrate the voices of acclaimed women writers and to offer readers a chance to converse withand learn from them. WCF hopes to make this an annual event, one that will provide inspiration, education, and foster a community of writers who will support and encourage each other's work.
During the weekend, festival attendees will be able to enjoy workshops taught by acclaimed authors, a cocktail party, plus readings, conversations, and signings. Women & Children First, which began in 1979 and is our nation's largest feminist bookstore, is honored to present a diverse and accomplished group of writers that includes Cuban-born Chicago author Achy Obejas (Ruins), who is also a translator and Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist; Korean- born, current Chicago author and professor Nami Mun, who captured the Whiting Award and Pushcart Prize for her first novel, Miles from Nowhere; local, award-winning author of children's picture and young adult books Esther Hershenhorn (S is for Story: A Writer's Alphabet); and Jamaican National author Staceyann Chin, praised by critics for her memoir The Other Side of Paradise, and for her co-writing and performing of the Tony Award-winning Russell Simmons Def Poetry Jam on Broadway. Chin is also an award-winning LGBT and human rights activist.
The festival also welcomes esteemed reviewer and interviewer, Donna Seaman, Booklist Senior Editor, and Chicago Public Radio Book Critic, who will host Sunday night's festivities. (A complete event schedule and bios are attached.)
WOMEN'S VOICES WEEKEND EVENT SCHEDULE (Everyone welcome!)
SATURDAY, 10/15 — Workshops, Swedish American Museum, 5211 N. Clark, $40 each
($35 students/seniors). *Each class limited to 15 students
10:30-Noon Conflict in Fiction: Achy Obejas, author, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist
"We'll examine and work with ways to develop conflict in stories. We'll discuss choices and stakes, the importance of tension, and ways to resolve stories without having characters kill themselves, live happily ever after, betray the rest of the story or do anything too terribly obvious."
12:30-2:00 Finding the Tale in a Story That's Still Unfolding: Staceyann Chin, author,
spoken-word poet/performer, award-winning LGBT/human rights activist
"We'll look at how to carve the details of one's life down to the bare essentials, how to chip away at the unnecessary, to get to the heart of the story you wish to tell."
2:30-4:00 Taking Risks: Nami Mun, Whiting Award and Pushcart Prize-winning author
"We'll explore ways in which we can take more risks in our writing by identifying our comfort zones (risk-taking differs from person to person—one man's comfort is another man's abyss) and stepping out of those zones (emotionally, thematically, syntactically, etc.), so that our sentences, our stories, our characters, and their dialogue surprise even us."
2:30-4:00 Oh the Places You Can Go! Writing for Today's Children's Book World:
Esther Hershenhorn, children's book author and writing coach & Linda Bubon, Women & Children First co-owner and host of the store's popular "Storytime."
"So you want to write a children's book? Or better yet, you've written one but don't know what to do now? Esther Hershenhorn introduces newcomers to today's Children's Book World — the markets, publishing opportunities, genres, and formats, sharing Rules of the Road and a few tried-and-true shortcuts to kick-start any beginner's Children's Book Writer's Journey. Linda Bubon shares what she looks for in a children's book as a buyer and storyteller."
6:30-8:00 Cocktail Party, Women & Children First Bookstore, 5233 N. Clark, $10
Enjoy delicious appetizers, desserts, drinks and conversation with authors,
festival participants, and others from Chicago's celebrated lit community.
SUNDAY, 10/16, 4:30-6:00 pm, AUTHOR READINGS/CONVERSATIONS:
Achy Obejas, Nami Mun, Staceyann Chin
Host/interviewer: Donna Seaman, Booklist Sr. Editor, WBEZ Book Critic
Swedish American Museum, $10
*$55 package deal for 1 workshop, cocktail party, & reading. To sign-up for festival events, drop by Women & Children First, 5233 N. Clark or call us at 773-769-9299. For more info,
visit: www.womenandchildrenfirst.com or email: WCFWomensVoicesWeekend@gmail.com .
AUTHOR BIOS: (in alphabetical order)
Staceyann Chin is author of the memoir The Other Side of Paradise. She is the recipient of the 2007 Power of the Voice Award from The Human Rights Campaign, the 2008 Safe Haven Award from Immigration Equality, the 2008 Honors from the Lesbian AIDS Project, and the 2009 New York State Senate Award. She unapologetically identifies herself as Caribbean and Black, Asian and lesbian, woman, and resident of New York City. A proud Jamaican National, Staceyann's voice was featured on the Oprah Winfrey Show, where she spoke candidly about her experiences of growing up on the island and the dire consequences of her coming-out there. Widely known as co-writer and original performer in the Tony award winning, Russell Simmons Def Poetry Jam on Broadway, her poetry has seen the rousing cheers of the Nuyorican Poets' Café, one-woman shows Off-Broadway, writing workshops in Sweden, South Africa, and Australia. Chin's three one-woman shows Hands Afire, Unspeakable Things, and Border/Clash all opened to rave reviews at the Culture Project in New York City. Be it on 60 Minutes, or in the New York Times, Staceyann has a reputation for telling it exactly like it is. www.staceyannchin.com
Chicago author Esther Hershenhorn writes award-winning picture books and middle-grade fiction, teaches Writing for Children classes at the University of Chicago's Writer's Studio and Chicago's Newberry Library and coaches writers of all ages to help them tell their stories. A long-time advocate of children's books and their creators, she is an Emeritus member of the Board of Advisors of the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators, an international organization numbering over 23,000 members, as well as the Emeritus Regional Advisor of the Illinois Chapter. Her latest book is S is for Story: A Writer's Alphabet (Sleeping Bear Press).
www.estherhershenhorn.com
Nami Mun grew up in Seoul, South Korea and Bronx, New York. For her first book, Miles from Nowhere, she received a Whiting Award and a Pushcart Prize, and was short-listed for the Orange Award and the Asian American Literary Award. Miles From Nowhere became a national bestseller within its first weeks of publication and was selected as "Editors' Choice" and "Top Ten First Novels" by Booklist, "Best Fiction of 2009 So Far" by Amazon, and as an Indie Next Pick. Chicago Magazine named her "Best New Novelist of 2009." Previously, Nami has worked as an Avon Lady, a street vendor, a photojournalist, a waitress, an activities coordinator for a nursing home, and a criminal defense investigator. After earning a GED, she went on to get a BA in English from UC Berkeley, an MFA from University of Michigan, and has garnered fellowships from organizations such as Yaddo, MacDowell, Bread Loaf, and Tin House. Her stories have been published in Granta, Tin House, The Iowa Review, The Pushcart Prize Anthology, Evergreen Review, Witness, and elsewhere. She is currently an Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at Columbia College Chicago. www.namimun.com
Achy Obejas was born in Cuba and moved to the United States when she was six years old. Her most recent books are Ruins, a novel, and This is What Happened in Our Other Life, a bestselling poetry chapbook. She's the translator of Junot Diaz's The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao (from English to Spanish) and of Ena Lucia Portela's One Hundred Bottles (from Spanish to English). She was part of the Chicago Tribune Pulitzer Prize winning team in 2001, won several Peter Lisagor journalism honors, two Lambda Literary Awards, and an NEA poetry fellowship. Her articles have appeared in the Washington Post, In These Times, Village Voice, Vogue, Playboy, Los Angeles Times, MS, Nerve.com, and others. She is currently the Sor Juana Visiting Writer at DePaul University in Chicago and a blogger for Chicago Public Media, wbez.org . www.achyobjeas.com
Donna Seaman is a Senior Editor for Booklist, book critic for Chicago Public Radio (WBEZ), and a freelance reviewer. The recipient of Illinois Arts Council grants, Seaman has received the James Friend Memorial Award for Literary Criticism, the Writer Magazine Writers Who Make a Difference Award, several Pushcart Prize special mentions, the Studs Terkel Humanities Service Award, and Literacy Chicago's Literacy Hero Award, in recognition of all that she does to encourage reading. The National Book Critics Circle named Donna Seaman as a finalist for the 2010 Nona Balakian Citation for Excellence in Reviewing. Seaman is the creator of the anthology In Our Nature: Stories of Wildness, and her author interviews are collected in Writers on the Air: Conversations about Books and at www.openbooksradio.org . Seaman has taught and lectured at the University of Chicago, Columbia College Chicago, and Northwestern University.
www.donnaseaman.com
www.womenandchildrenfirst.com
