On August 3rd we were regaled with wit, had our emotions stirred, and plunged into deep thought, at the beautiful independent bookstore, Vroman’s Bookstore in Pasadena, California.
IWOSC members who read on August 3:
Mark Miller,
Maryrose Smyth,
Karen Kondazian,
Flo Selfman,
Peter Conway,
Erana Leiken,
Gagik Melikyan,
Adolphus Ward,
Janiss Garza,
Daniel Lavery,
Vickey Kall,
Gary Young,
Bo Kyung Kim,
and Jon Chandonnet.
Sunday, August 3, 2014
Admission:
Free. The public is welcome. Do join us and bring friends and family. No reservations necessary.
Panel
WRITING FICTION: The Process and The Business
Monday, July 28, 2014
Many of us have short stories or novels either inside us, in the works, or already published. The world of fiction can be confusing with all of the needed time, artistic, and mechanical decisions.
We have assembled a panel of veterans who have successfully navigated the fiction wars. They will share the ups, downs, secrets, and machinations of writing and selling fiction.
What makes good fiction? How do you create meaningful characters and situations? How do you create fiction out of nonfiction and protecting yourself from real people recognizing themselves. How do you keep track of it all?
We will discuss these topics and more, time permitting, including: how and where our panelists write; how they deal with writer’s block; research avenues and legal considerations; deadlines; editing; copyrights and protecting your work; getting published; agents; literary organizations and workshops…plus audience questions.
Panelists: Writer-author-teacher Nancy Ellen Dodd; freelance writer-author-blogger Gerald Everett Jones; literary agent Toni Lopopolo; and author-screenwriter Marvin J. Wolf. Moderator: author-teacher-editor-consultant Shelly Lowenkopf. (Panel bios below.)
Our moderator:
Shelly Lowenkopf
SHELLY LOWENKOPF has held major editorial positions with general trade, mass market paperback, literary, and scholarly book publishers in addition to executive editorial participation in special interest, literary, and genre fiction magazines for Sherbourne Press, Dell Publishing, Clio Books, Ross-Erickson, and Capra Press. He has seen over 700 book projects and hundreds of short story and essay through the publishing process.
Currently a freelance consultant and teacher. Lowenkopf taught courses in short story, novel, dramatic writing, editing, genre fiction, and revision at the graduate level at USC, where he was given a Lifetime Teaching Award.
He is a past regional president of the Mystery Writers of America; his book reviews have appeared in the Philadelphia Inquirer, The National Catholic Reporter, The Los Angeles Times, Publishers’ Weekly, and many more.
Lowenkopf has had over 35 books published, along with short fiction, pulp novels, essays and reviews. His most recent book, “The Fiction Writer’s Companion” (available on Amazon), is a guide to terms, concepts, and forms related to storytelling.
Our Panelists:
Nancy Ellen Dodd
NANCY ELLEN DODD teaches advanced screenwriting at Pepperdine University and is academic editor of an online peer-reviewed journal at Pepperdine’s Graziadio Business School. She has studied most forms of writing for more than 25 years and earned two master’s degrees from USC in professional writing and playwriting. Dodd has received numerous awards for her writing, which includes screenplays, plays, short stories, short films, and novel-length manuscripts, as well as inspirational writing. Dodd’s journalistic career includes publishing more than 130 articles in local and national publications, including interviews with celebrities and business leaders. She has served as editor of print and online publications. She is the author of “The Writer’s Compass: From Story Map to Finished Draft in 7 Stages, published by Writer’s Digest.
Gerald Everett Jones
GERALD EVERETT JONES is a freelance writer and sometime technologist. He is a member of the Writers Guild of America, the Dramatists Guild, and Film Independent (FIND), as well as a past director of the Independent Writers of Southern California (IWOSC).
Gerald is the author of the Rollo Hemphill Misadventures series of comic novels, including the recently released “Farnsworth’s Revenge,” a political satire which reviewers have compared to “Confederacy of Dunces.”
“Mr. Ballpoint,” to be released in September, is his fourth novel. Written for general audiences, it tells how an outrageous huckster brought on the “Pen Wars” of 1945.
Gerald holds a Bachelor of Arts with Honors from the College of Letters, Wesleyan University, where he studied under novelists Peter Boynton (“Stone Island”), F.D. Reeve (“The Red Machines”), and Jerzy Kozinski (“The Painted Bird,” “Being There”). Gerald blogs about male-centered comic fiction at BoychikLit.com.
Toni Lopopolo
TONI LOPOPOLO Literary Management was founded in 1991 by Toni Lopopolo, who boasts an impressive 30+ years in the book publishing business.
This former executive editor at Macmillan and then St. Martin’s Press combines her many years in publishing with unique editing skills to provide a full-service literary agency to new and seasoned authors.
Toni Lopopolo Literary Management partners with authors for the duration of their literary careers and includes development of fiction projects, creation of nonfiction book proposals, and editing when needed.
Toni has helped bring many first-time and published authors to print including Sol Stein, Lee Silber, Lillian Glass, Steve Duno, Nancy Baer, Flo Fitzgerald, Judith Smith-Levin, Howard Olgin, Jeanette Baker, Larry Seeley, Shelly Lowenkopf, Robin Winter, Ehrich Van Lowe, Manuel Ramos, and many others. Publishers include St. Martin’s Press, Simon and Schuster, Crown, Dell, HarperCollins, Kensington, and many others. Toni Lopopolo Literary Management provides a high level of service by limiting the number of clients represented but always searching for select new talent and established authors who seek a more personalized relationship with an agent.
Marvin J. Wolf
MARVIN J. WOLF has written professionally since 1965. He has authored, co-authored or ghosted 15 nonfiction books and three novels, and his reporting and photographs have appeared in periodicals around the world.
A charter member of IWOSC, Wolf served four terms as president. His most recent novel is “For Whom The Shofar Blows,” a Rabbi Ben Mystery.
In partnership with veteran screenwriter Larry Mintz, Wolf took up screenwriting in 2001 and is a member of the Writer’s Guild of America. Their script “Ladies Night,” based on a chapter in Wolf’s 1988 book “Platinum Crime,” aired in February 2005 on the USA Cable Network, as did “The Pierre Heist,” based on another Wolf book; Wolf and Mintz served as creative consultants.
Wolf’s books include “Buddha’s Child”(St. Martin’s, 2002), the wartime memoirs of former South Vietnam Prime Minister Nguyen Cao Ky’ “Where White Men Fear To Tread “(St. Martin’s, 1995), the autobiography of Native American activist and film actor Russell Means; “Beating The Odds” (Scribner’s, 1991), the life story of ABC Television founder Leonard Goldenson; and several true-crime anthologies, including “Fallen Angels: Chronicles of Los Angeles Crime and Mystery” (Ballantine, 1986), long considered a minor classic of its genre.
Seminar
Stacie Chaiken’s “What’s the Story?” Workshop
Saturday, July 12, 2014
10:30 am to 1:00 p.m.
Stacie Chaiken
Stacie Chaiken’s What’s the Story? workshop is for artists who are wrestling with personal (not necessarily autobiographical) story, for any genre.
It’s not about “what happened”; it’s about what you want to say, and why.
What’s the Story? is an exercise in empathy, an innovative group-process approach to selecting into the morass of information that is our lives.
Please bring a page of brand new writing about something that means a lot to you. If you have a project in mind or in-progress, you might bring a page of new writing about that project. What’s important is that the writing you bring be new and immediate; it does not have to be polished or good.
“Stacie has the touch of a magician in her ability to extract the very best from her students. She is unwaveringly supportive and has a keen eye and ear for ‘what works’ dramatically.” –student comment
Our Presenter:
Writer-performer STACIE CHAIKEN is the founder and artistic director of LA-based What’s The Story? — a workshop for artists wrestling with personal story for the stage and the page. Chaiken was on the faculty of the USC School of Theatre, and is a Fulbright Senior Specialist in the field of Performance and Story. She recently served as the International Creative Director for the twentieth commemoration of the genocide in Rwanda.
Chaiken is the creator of solo plays including “The Dig: death, Genesis & the double helix,” “Looking for Louie,” and “Next Year in Jerusalem.” Her printed work includes “The Poet,” “A Valley Girl Midrash,” and “A Wish Book.” As a performer, Chaiken has appeared on television and film, in plays on- and
off-Broadway, and in theatres throughout the US and abroad.
Panel
IWOSC’s Annual Marketing Panel!
Marketing Your Writing: Increasing Your Success
Monday, June 30, 2014
Your writing will not sell itself. No marketing, no nothing, nada, zilch. Regardless of the enormous competition, there are numerous, often changing marketing opportunities, if you are savvy, creative, and energetic.
You need to know how.
You need to know where.
You need to know what’s new and creative.
You need to know how to do it inexpensively and time-efficiently.
You need to keep track of the ongoing changes.
For our yearly panel, we have assembled veterans, mentors who are experienced in those matters. Learn from them and resolve to put the time and energy into improving your marketing. Yes, everyone can benefit from improved marketing.
Resolve to put the time and energy into exposing your work to a larger market. We will cover as time allows: Blogging; Social Media; Press releases; Radio; Website management; Traditional methods; Hints, tricks, shortcuts, cost-savers; and more, including your questions.
Panelists:
Carla King
CARLA KING has written seven books and produced dozens of online magazines and web-books.
A technical-turned-adventure travel writer, she self-published her first book in 1994. She was also one of the early bloggers with her “Motorcycle Misadventures” real-time reports from the road in 1995.
Carla founded the Self-Publishing Boot Camp educational program of books and workshops in 2010, runs the San Diego Self-Publishers group, writes about self-publishing for PBS MediaShift and presents on the topic at conferences and events on the West coast.
She recently launched IndieBookSchool.com to provide virtual self-publishing seminars and coaching to authors worldwide.
Dominik Rausch
DOMINIK RAUSCH As Founder/CEO of United Motion Entertainment, an entertainment production company that fuses digital with traditional media business models, Dominik has recently launched the online magazine LuminaryDaily.com, producing uplifting and meaningful news stories from all around the world to provide an alternative to over-dramatized and gossipy news media.
Rausch is an award-winning producer of Digital and Branded Entertainment, best known for his work on IKEA’s scripted Online series “Easy To Assemble” starring Illeana Douglas and Jeff Goldblum, which, with over 17 million views world-wide, is publicly acclaimed as one of the most successful digital Branded Entertainment series to date. Dominik’s producing work in feature film includes a forthcoming documentary starring Keanu Reeves, the Warner Brothers indie “April Showers” with Tom Arnold, and “Speed-Dating” with Chris Elliot.
He is a member of the Producers Guild of America, was nominated for “Variety’s Digital 25 of 2011,” and enjoys sharing his experience in digital content creation, monetization, and marketing through his LA-based consulting agency D. For Discover, which counts The Walt Becker Company (known for producing/directing “Van Wilder,” “Wild Hogs,” “Old Dogs”) as one of its clients. Project website: LuminaryDaily.com. Company website: UnitedMotionEntertainment.com.
Julia Drake
JULIA DRAKE is the founder and owner of Julia Drake Public Relations (JDPR), a Los Angeles-based boutique literary publicity company that represents authors and publishers across the globe.
JDPR specializes in tailored press campaigns, social media marketing, innovative book tours, author websites and promotional videos.
Julia has appeared as a speaker on many literary industry panels, including IWOSC, UCLA, PALA, the Women’s National Book Association, Lambda Literary Foundation, and Writers and Publishers of San Diego.
She holds a Bachelor’s Degree in film from UCLA and a Master’s Degree in Screenwriting from The American Film Institute. For more information, please visit: JuliaDrakePRcom
Moderator
Steven Sanchez
STEVEN SANCHEZ helps people build the right platforms for their businesses. For over 20 years he developed and managed integrated web marketing solutions for industry-leading companies. Steven has conducted numerous workshops on all aspects of internet marketing, from social media management to website development. He has also contributed to several best-selling books including “Homepage Usability,” “Web Design on a Shoestring,” “The Unusually Useful Web Book” and the sequel to “The Expert Success Solution.”
Currently, Steven is preparing to launch his upcoming book, “Better Book Marketing” (BetterBookMarketing.com), as well as his latest project, WordPressForWriters.com, a video training site designed to help authors develop their platforms, connect with their audience and sell more books.
You can reach him at the above websites or at Steven at BetterBookMarketing dot com or Steven at WordPressForWriters dot com.
Panel
IWOSC’s Annual Marketing Panel!
Marketing Your Writing: Increasing Your Success
Monday, June 30, 2014
Your writing will not sell itself. No marketing, no nothing, nada, zilch. Regardless of the enormous competition, there are numerous, often changing marketing opportunities, if you are savvy, creative, and energetic.
You need to know how.
You need to know where.
You need to know what’s new and creative.
You need to know how to do it inexpensively and time-efficiently.
You need to keep track of the ongoing changes.
For our yearly panel, we have assembled veterans, mentors who are experienced in those matters. Learn from them and resolve to put the time and energy into improving your marketing. Yes, everyone can benefit from improved marketing.
Resolve to put the time and energy into exposing your work to a larger market. We will cover as time allows: Blogging; Social Media; Press releases; Radio; Website management; Traditional methods; Hints, tricks, shortcuts, cost-savers; and more, including your questions.
Panelists:
Carla King
CARLA KING has written seven books and produced dozens of online magazines and web-books.
A technical-turned-adventure travel writer, she self-published her first book in 1994. She was also one of the early bloggers with her “Motorcycle Misadventures” real-time reports from the road in 1995.
Carla founded the Self-Publishing Boot Camp educational program of books and workshops in 2010, runs the San Diego Self-Publishers group, writes about self-publishing for PBS MediaShift and presents on the topic at conferences and events on the West coast.
She recently launched IndieBookSchool.com to provide virtual self-publishing seminars and coaching to authors worldwide.
Dominik Rausch
DOMINIK RAUSCH As Founder/CEO of United Motion Entertainment, an entertainment production company that fuses digital with traditional media business models, Dominik has recently launched the online magazine LuminaryDaily.com, producing uplifting and meaningful news stories from all around the world to provide an alternative to over-dramatized and gossipy news media.
Rausch is an award-winning producer of Digital and Branded Entertainment, best known for his work on IKEA’s scripted Online series “Easy To Assemble” starring Illeana Douglas and Jeff Goldblum, which, with over 17 million views world-wide, is publicly acclaimed as one of the most successful digital Branded Entertainment series to date. Dominik’s producing work in feature film includes a forthcoming documentary starring Keanu Reeves, the Warner Brothers indie “April Showers” with Tom Arnold, and “Speed-Dating” with Chris Elliot.
He is a member of the Producers Guild of America, was nominated for “Variety’s Digital 25 of 2011,” and enjoys sharing his experience in digital content creation, monetization, and marketing through his LA-based consulting agency D. For Discover, which counts The Walt Becker Company (known for producing/directing “Van Wilder,” “Wild Hogs,” “Old Dogs”) as one of its clients. Project website: LuminaryDaily.com. Company website: UnitedMotionEntertainment.com.
Julia Drake
JULIA DRAKE is the founder and owner of Julia Drake Public Relations (JDPR), a Los Angeles-based boutique literary publicity company that represents authors and publishers across the globe.
JDPR specializes in tailored press campaigns, social media marketing, innovative book tours, author websites and promotional videos.
Julia has appeared as a speaker on many literary industry panels, including IWOSC, UCLA, PALA, the Women’s National Book Association, Lambda Literary Foundation, and Writers and Publishers of San Diego.
She holds a Bachelor’s Degree in film from UCLA and a Master’s Degree in Screenwriting from The American Film Institute. For more information, please visit: JuliaDrakePRcom
Moderator
Steven Sanchez
STEVEN SANCHEZ helps people build the right platforms for their businesses. For over 20 years he developed and managed integrated web marketing solutions for industry-leading companies. Steven has conducted numerous workshops on all aspects of internet marketing, from social media management to website development. He has also contributed to several best-selling books including “Homepage Usability,” “Web Design on a Shoestring,” “The Unusually Useful Web Book” and the sequel to “The Expert Success Solution.”
Currently, Steven is preparing to launch his upcoming book, “Better Book Marketing” (BetterBookMarketing.com), as well as his latest project, WordPressForWriters.com, a video training site designed to help authors develop their platforms, connect with their audience and sell more books.
You can reach him at the above websites or at Steven at BetterBookMarketing dot com or Steven at WordPressForWriters dot com.
Panel
The Writer’s Compass: From Story Map to Finished Draft in 7 Stages
with Nancy Ellen Dodd
Saturday, June 28, 2014
How do you write the story you want to tell and capture your audience’s heart? Regardless of genre or format, to tell an effective story you must first sort through all the ideas you’ve been toying with—organize them, whip them into shape, and turn them into great writing.
In “The Writer’s Compass” Seminar you will learn how to do just that.
First, we will go over the essential elements of good storytelling using a structure chart. That chart will then become a guide to creating a story map that will tell you what you know about your story, and, more importantly, what you don’t know. Next we will explore additional tools to help you find ideas to fill in what’s missing.
The seminar is based on the book The Writer’s Compass: From Story Map to Finished Draft in 7 Stages, by Nancy Ellen Dodd, published by Writer’s Digest. (See it & check ii out here at Barnes & Noble.)
About our writing instructor:
Nancy Ellen Dodd
NANCY ELLEN DODD teaches advanced screenwriting at Pepperdine University and is academic editor of an online peer-reviewed journal at Pepperdine’s Graziadio Business School.
She has studied most forms of writing for more than 25 years and earned two master’s degrees from USC in professional writing and playwriting.
Dodd has received numerous awards for her writing, which includes screenplays, plays, short stories, short films, and novel-length manuscripts, as well as inspirational writing. She also studied writing with several successful, award-winning writers.
Dodd’s journalistic career includes publishing more than 130 articles in local and national publications, including interviews with celebrities and business leaders. She has served as editor of print and online publications.
ADDITIONAL CLASSES
An opportunity for four additional classes will be offered by Nancy Ellen Dodd for learning to develop your own storytelling compass, plus the 7-Stage process for more efficiently developing your story, and a special session for “How to Show–When to Tell.”
These stages include:
1) forming and developing ideas,
2) building strong structures,
3) creating vibrant characters,
4) structuring scenes and transitions,
5) increasing tension and adjusting pacing,
6) enriching the language and dialogue, and
7) editing and submitting.
Panel
POETRY – Creative, Illusive, Challenging – encompassing a staggeringly wide range of styles and themes
Monday, May 19, 2014
There was a poet from Los Angeles
Whose limericks never would scangeles.
When asked just why so
He replied, “I really don’t know –
“Maybe it’s because I always try to cram as many syllables into the last line as I possibly cangeles.”
Well, poets do take license.
If the above lines are too silly for you, then you might be a poet.
If you are wondering how to market your verse writing, you might be a poet.
If you are wondering why you do this, then you might be a poet.
If you are following your muse and doing what is right for you, then you might be a really interesting poet.
Yes, it’s hard, and we don’t always know how to make it both truthful and commercial. Like many
genres, if we make it true, it will find its own commerciality.
Our panel of established and credentialed poets will discuss the poetic form as they use it, their
marketing ideas, and the aesthetic and public opportunities for poets.
Impressive energy is employed as a poem is created, and a similar level of energy and creativity is required to really get the poem seen and marketed.
Our panelists have been through it all, and have won many of the battles in a field that has been described as a minefield.
We will not include poetry readings during the discussion but the evening will be quite lively and entertaining, and perhaps a bit controversial.
Join us for what should be a very spirited, amusing, and stimulating discussion.
Panelists:
CHARLES WEBB Reading the Water, Liver, Tulip Farms & Leper Colonies, Hot Popsicles, Amplified Dog, Shadow Ball: New and Selected Poems, and his most recent, What Things Are Made Of, published by the University of Pittsburgh Press in 2013. Webb’s awards in poetry include the Morse Prize, the Kate Tufts Discovery Award, the Felix Pollock Prize, and the Benjamin Saltman Prize. His poems have appeared in many distinguished journals and anthologies, including American Poetry Review, Paris Review, Iowa Review, Ploughshares, Kenyon Review, Tin House, Poets of the New Century, Best American Poetry, and The Pushcart Prize. A former professional rock musician and psychotherapist, he is the editor of Stand Up Poetry: An Expanded Anthology, and recipient of a Whiting Writer’s Award, a fellowship from the Guggenheim foundation, and the CSULB Distinguished Faculty Teaching Award. He is Professor of English at California State University, Long Beach, and teaches in the MFA Program in Creative Writing there.
LISA MARGUERITE MORA has had work published and forthcoming in the literary journals Rattle, ONTHEBUS, Common Ties, Literary Mama, California Quarterly, The Venice Beachhead, Poemimage, Public Poetry Project—Fjords Review, Cultural Weekly, REBELLE SOCIETY among others and was Second Place Prize Winner in the 2008 Biannual Blue Mountain Arts Poetry Contest.
Finding the wisdom, magic, and communicative spark in your writing, Lisa is a freelance editor for the last 12 years and conducts creative writing workshops. She is a Professional Member of PEN and IWOSC and has recently completed a novel. You can learn more about her at BarringtonEditorial.com or Facebook.com/lisa.m.mora.5
Kelly Grace Thomas
KELLY GRACE THOMAS Kelly Grace Thomas’s life has been a love affair of all things literary since the beginning. This self-proclaimed word ninja keeps busy as a poet, novelist, screenwriter, adventurer and educator.
She coaches a youth spoken word poetry team that won the Los Angeles regional championship last April. This July her team will compete in the HBO-featured international competition, Brave New Voices. Kelly also founded Poets4Progress, an organization where professional poets mentor budding youth writers.
She has been published in Aaduna, Aries, Apeiron, Black Heart, and other literary publications. She was recently nominated for a 2015 Pushcart Prize in poetry. For a sampling of her work and more information please visit KellyGraceThomas.com.
MARY-ALICE DANIEL was born in Nigeria and raised in England and Nashville, but considers Los Angeles her home. After attending Yale University, she received an MFA from the University of Michigan. In the fall of 2014, she will begin the PhD Program in Literature and Creative Writing at the University of Southern California as an Annenberg Fellow.
She is currently working on her first full-length poetry collection. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in New England Review, Mid-American Review, PANK, New Orleans Review, and other journals.
MIKE SONKSEN, also known as Mike the Poet, is a 3rd-generation LA native acclaimed for poetry performances, published articles and kinetic city tours. Poet, journalist, historian, tour guide and teacher, he graduated from the University of California Los Angeles and is currently finishing an advanced degree at California State University Los Angeles. Sonksen has lectured at and had his book — “I Am Alive in Los Angeles!” — added to the curriculum of over 60 universities and high schools
Moderator
SUZANNE LUMMIS teaches several classes through the UCLA Extension Writers’ Program, including those she designed, “The Complete Poet: Vulnerability, Sexuality, Sense of Humor,” “Writing the Persona Poem” and “Poetry Goes to the Movies: The Poem Noir.”
Her poems have appeared in the noted literary journals Ploughshares, The Antioch Review, The New Ohio Review, Hotel Amerika, and The Hudson Review, and in the Knopf “Everyman’s Poetry Library” anthologies, Poems of the American West, and Poems of Murder and Mayhem. She has work forthcoming in an important new West Coast literary magazine, Miramar. She’s the literary curator for Lummis Day: the Festival of Northeast Los Angeles, named for her grandfather. Her website is: SuzanneLummis.com
Panel
POETRY – Creative, Illusive, Challenging – encompassing a staggeringly wide range of styles and themes
Monday, May 19, 2014
There was a poet from Los Angeles
Whose limericks never would scangeles.
When asked just why so
He replied, “I really don’t know –
“Maybe it’s because I always try to cram as many syllables into the last line as I possibly cangeles.”
Well, poets do take license.
If the above lines are too silly for you, then you might be a poet.
If you are wondering how to market your verse writing, you might be a poet.
If you are wondering why you do this, then you might be a poet.
If you are following your muse and doing what is right for you, then you might be a really interesting poet.
Yes, it’s hard, and we don’t always know how to make it both truthful and commercial. Like many
genres, if we make it true, it will find its own commerciality.
Our panel of established and credentialed poets will discuss the poetic form as they use it, their
marketing ideas, and the aesthetic and public opportunities for poets.
Impressive energy is employed as a poem is created, and a similar level of energy and creativity is required to really get the poem seen and marketed.
Our panelists have been through it all, and have won many of the battles in a field that has been described as a minefield.
We will not include poetry readings during the discussion but the evening will be quite lively and entertaining, and perhaps a bit controversial.
Join us for what should be a very spirited, amusing, and stimulating discussion.
Panelists:
CHARLES WEBB Reading the Water, Liver, Tulip Farms & Leper Colonies, Hot Popsicles, Amplified Dog, Shadow Ball: New and Selected Poems, and his most recent, What Things Are Made Of, published by the University of Pittsburgh Press in 2013. Webb’s awards in poetry include the Morse Prize, the Kate Tufts Discovery Award, the Felix Pollock Prize, and the Benjamin Saltman Prize. His poems have appeared in many distinguished journals and anthologies, including American Poetry Review, Paris Review, Iowa Review, Ploughshares, Kenyon Review, Tin House, Poets of the New Century, Best American Poetry, and The Pushcart Prize. A former professional rock musician and psychotherapist, he is the editor of Stand Up Poetry: An Expanded Anthology, and recipient of a Whiting Writer’s Award, a fellowship from the Guggenheim foundation, and the CSULB Distinguished Faculty Teaching Award. He is Professor of English at California State University, Long Beach, and teaches in the MFA Program in Creative Writing there.
LISA MARGUERITE MORA has had work published and forthcoming in the literary journals Rattle, ONTHEBUS, Common Ties, Literary Mama, California Quarterly, The Venice Beachhead, Poemimage, Public Poetry Project—Fjords Review, Cultural Weekly, REBELLE SOCIETY among others and was Second Place Prize Winner in the 2008 Biannual Blue Mountain Arts Poetry Contest.
Finding the wisdom, magic, and communicative spark in your writing, Lisa is a freelance editor for the last 12 years and conducts creative writing workshops. She is a Professional Member of PEN and IWOSC and has recently completed a novel. You can learn more about her at BarringtonEditorial.com or Facebook.com/lisa.m.mora.5
Kelly Grace Thomas
KELLY GRACE THOMAS Kelly Grace Thomas’s life has been a love affair of all things literary since the beginning. This self-proclaimed word ninja keeps busy as a poet, novelist, screenwriter, adventurer and educator.
She coaches a youth spoken word poetry team that won the Los Angeles regional championship last April. This July her team will compete in the HBO-featured international competition, Brave New Voices. Kelly also founded Poets4Progress, an organization where professional poets mentor budding youth writers.
She has been published in Aaduna, Aries, Apeiron, Black Heart, and other literary publications. She was recently nominated for a 2015 Pushcart Prize in poetry. For a sampling of her work and more information please visit KellyGraceThomas.com.
MARY-ALICE DANIEL was born in Nigeria and raised in England and Nashville, but considers Los Angeles her home. After attending Yale University, she received an MFA from the University of Michigan. In the fall of 2014, she will begin the PhD Program in Literature and Creative Writing at the University of Southern California as an Annenberg Fellow.
She is currently working on her first full-length poetry collection. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in New England Review, Mid-American Review, PANK, New Orleans Review, and other journals.
MIKE SONKSEN, also known as Mike the Poet, is a 3rd-generation LA native acclaimed for poetry performances, published articles and kinetic city tours. Poet, journalist, historian, tour guide and teacher, he graduated from the University of California Los Angeles and is currently finishing an advanced degree at California State University Los Angeles. Sonksen has lectured at and had his book — “I Am Alive in Los Angeles!” — added to the curriculum of over 60 universities and high schools
Moderator
SUZANNE LUMMIS teaches several classes through the UCLA Extension Writers’ Program, including those she designed, “The Complete Poet: Vulnerability, Sexuality, Sense of Humor,” “Writing the Persona Poem” and “Poetry Goes to the Movies: The Poem Noir.”
Her poems have appeared in the noted literary journals Ploughshares, The Antioch Review, The New Ohio Review, Hotel Amerika, and The Hudson Review, and in the Knopf “Everyman’s Poetry Library” anthologies, Poems of the American West, and Poems of Murder and Mayhem. She has work forthcoming in an important new West Coast literary magazine, Miramar. She’s the literary curator for Lummis Day: the Festival of Northeast Los Angeles, named for her grandfather. Her website is: SuzanneLummis.com
Seminar
Pitching For Film and TV
with Pilar Alessandra, The ‘Script Whisperer’
Saturday, May 10, 2014
Pitch quickly and avoid producer tune-out. Returning presenter Pilar Alessandra offers written templates that help writers define the key elements of their screenplay or television series. Writers learn to pitch their ideas in a brief, concise and entertaining manner that emphasizes the hook and eliminates “writer-babble.”
Pilar Alessandra
PILAR ALESSANDRA is director of the Los Angeles writers’ studio On the Page®, host of the popular “On the Page” Podcast and author of “The Coffee Break Screenwriter.” Pilar has read and analyzed thousands of scripts for companies such as DreamWorks, ImageMovers, Radar Pictures and the Robert Evans Company. Her students and clients are working writers and producers who have written for “The Walking Dead,” “Lost,” “House of Lies,” “Nip/Tuck” and “Family Guy.” They’ve sold features and pitches to Warner Bros, DreamWorks, Disney and Sony and have won the prestigious Nicholl Fellowship and Austin Screenwriting Competition. Pilar has traveled the world teaching and has trained writers at ABC/Disney, CBS, Nickelodeon, the Los Angeles Film School and more. Pilar was named “The Script Whisperer” by Script Magazine and, in 2011 was one of LA Weekly’s top 100 people.
A statewide party 1st Annual California Bookstore Day
Saturday, May 3, 2014
Vroman’s & other bookstores
More than 90 independent bookstores across California will celebrate books, readers and indie bookselling.
There will be famous authors and books you cannot get on any other day, in any other place.
There will be reads, and prizes, and things to eat and drink.
Your neighbors will be there, your friends will be there, your kids’ friends will be there. You should definitely be there too!
IWSOC reminds you that in So Cal you’re welcome at Vroman’s. The writers of IWOSC always enjoy their visits to Vroman’s when it hosts our writers as well as when they come in on any day.
1st Annual California Bookstore Day