Saturday, November 17
Community Center
(in the center of the Marketplace)
(all free to the public)
10:00 – Mysteries, Mysteries, Mysteries
Attend this panel of mystery writer and you are in for surprises. Here these writer talk about how they dream up their plots, how they develop their characters. And always be on your guard for the unexpected.
Ted Bell, author of SPY
Mary Anna Evans, author of Effigies
James O. Born, author of Field of Fire
Moderator: David Hagberg, author of Dance with the Dragon
11:45 – Book Reviews: Insight or Axe-Grinding Opinion?
Almost 300,000 books are published in America each year, but newspapers across the country are slashing their arts coverage in general and their book sections in particular. Should we care?
Three of America’s most important book reviewers are coming to the Book Festival to spread the word: “Yes, their professional opinions do matter.”
This promises to be one of the liveliest panels at any book festival anywhere in the country. The irreverent author Larry Baker, a favorite with Vero Beach audiences, will act as moderator and Grand Inquisitor, asking the three reviewers to explain why their opinions are more valuable than the hundreds of free web bloggers who are doing the same thing, or if their professional opinions are more insightful than the amateurs who flood amazon.com with their own reviews. How does somebody become a real book reviewer?
Baker will also try to get some review secrets out of the invited trio: How do you “judge” a book? Why are some books reviewed more than others? The worst book you’ve ever reviewed? Why did you even bother? The most over-rated American writers? The least appreciated? Do you ever read just for yourself? Why is it that the same writers seem to always get nominated for the same prizes year after year? Are they the only good writers out there?
All in all, this will be a fast-paced and pyrotechnic discussion among smart people who actually get paid to have an opinion about books.
Colette Bancroft: St. Petersburg Times
Chauncey Mabe: South Florida Sun-Sentinel
David Kipen: Literature Director at the National Endowment for the Arts and author The Schreiber Theory: A Radical Rewrite of American Film History
John Freeman: President, National Book Critics Circle
Moderator: Larry Baker, author of Athens, America
1:45 – Publishing Political Books in the Era of George W. Bush
In one of the most partisan moments in American history, an intense discussion of political book-making featuring some of the leading figures from the current political publishing scene: Colin Robinson, senior editor of Scribner’s, Dennis Johnson, publisher of Melville House, recently voted the “indy publisher of the year”; Steve Wasserman, formerly head of the Los Angeles Times Book Review and now a literary agent representing, among others, Christopher Hitchens; Mike Hoyt, the editor of the Columbia Journalism Review and co-editor of the book, Reporting Iraq; and Heather Rogers, author of Gone Tomorrow: The Hidden Life of Garbage.
Colin Robinson, Senior editor of Scribners
Heather Rogers, author of Gone Tomorrow: The Hidden Life of Garbage
Mike Hoyt, Editor of the Columbia Journalism Review; Co-editor of Reporting Iraq
Dennis Johnson, Publisher Melville House; author of The Big Chill: The Great, Unreported Story of the Bush Inauguration Protest.
Moderator: Steve Wasserman, New York Literary Agent
3:30 – Writers Talk
How do writers write? More importantly, how do they publish?
A Vero Beach Book Festival original!! Put four nationally known authors together and let a writer who has just completed a first novel ask them how they became published, gleaning from them the benefit of their experiences.
“How do I become you?” is the question of the hour. You have a story, so how do you get readers? Is it skill? Connections? Dumb luck? Perseverance? Do talent and desire guarantee success?
Louhon Tucker has a manuscript. He has recently completed his first, yet to be published, novel, an action-infused travel adventure with international intrigue, and he has the opportunity to grill published writers on what to do next. Four writers with four different perspectives, including one whose first novel was turned into a movie. A wealth of experience for Tucker and everyone who ever wanted to get their own book published. He’ll start the discussion, but there will be plenty of time for audience members to ask their own questions too.
Moderator Louhon Tucker was born in Indiana graduated from Indiana State University with a degree in financial management and has enjoyed a wide-ranging and distinguished career in corporate finance on a global level. He currently is the senior financial executive with a multi-national group of companies based in Chicago.
Mary Anna Evans has degrees in physics and engineering, but her heart is in the past. Her series character, Faye Lonchamp, lives the exciting life of an archaeologist, and Mary Anna envies her a little. Her first novel, Artifacts, won the Benjamin Franklin award for best mystery published by a small press. It also won the Florida Historical Society’s Florida Literature Award, and it was named by the Voice of Young America as an “Adult Mystery with Young Adult appeal”. Her second novel, Relics, was an independent Mystery Booksellers Association bestseller.
Malcolm Macpherson is a former long time news correspondent for Time and Newsweek Magazines and covered Ambassador Paul Bremer for TIME Magazine in Iraq. His most recent book, HOCUS POTUS is rich in real-life details and thinly veiled portrayals. Other books by MacPherson include The Black Box: All-New Cockpit Voice Recorder Accounts of In-Flight Accidents, Roberts Ridge: a Story of Courage and Sacrifice on Takur Ghar Mountain, Afghanistan Book, and The Cowboy and His Elephant: The Story of a Remarkable Friendship.
Mark Hoog joins the literary world by way of the airline industry. The youngest pilot hired, and youngest Captain, at a major U.S. airline, Mark has spent his career providing command and leadership training to airline crews from around the world. Inspired by the loss of a friend flying as Captain of Flight 93 on September 11th, Mark authored the Growing Field Children’s Personal Growth and Leadership Book Series. The Series is designed as a tool to teach young children the life changing ideas and behaviors associated with personal growth, high self-esteem, self-empowerment, leadership and strong character.
Larry Baker’s 1997 Flamingo Rising, a coming-of-age tale set in Florida, won widespread acclaim and was made into a 2001 Hallmark Hall of Fame movie. In his second novel, Athens, America, he draws on his experience as an Iowa City councilman. He is currently working on a new novel based in Florida, a comedy about The Second Coming. Baker has taught creative writing at the Iowa Summer Writers Festival, and is currently teaching Twentieth Century American Literature and Culture for the University of Iowa.