West Virginia Writers Podcast

The 2011 WV Writers Summer Conference is coming up June 10, 11 and 12 at the Cedar Lakes Conference Center in Ripley, WV. While registration for the conference has been open since March 7, we've only revealed a preview of the presenters for it on our website. ConferenceCast 2011 helps fill in the blanks for the upcoming conference. Joining us to help fill the blanks is our Conference Coordinator and organizational president, Cat Pleska. The current list of workshop presenters and their workshop descriptions will soon be available at our website.

Bonus Show #13 is all about announcements, including word about the ending days of the WVW 2011 Writing Contest, the registration opening for the 2011 Summer Conference, the Writers Toolkit Event and our special upcoming poetry hotline show in which you can participate. Check our website for all the details on all of the above, but listen to the podcast to hear me say it. http://www.wvwriters.org

We're now at the half-way mark for the 2011 WV Writers Annual Writing Contest. (DEADLINE March 14, LATE DEADLINE March 31 with $2 late fee per entry.) Therefore it's time for Part 2 of ContestCast 2011. Joining us to give us an update on this year's contest will be Contest Coordinator and WVW 1st VP Teresa Newsome. And joining us to help answer your Frequenly Asked Questions about the contest will be Coordinator Emeritus Steve Goff.

Way back in June, we put out a call for our listeners to submit Dear City Letters to help drum up some publicity for National Public Radio's State of the Re:Union paying a visit to our state. With the Dear City letters, people were invited to write a letter to their city, expressing love, anger, frustration, humor and beyond, addressing the likes and dislikes or breaking misconceptions. We passed the letters we received on to NPR. This podcast is our chance to finally play them.

For a special Christmas Bonus Show, we're playing a recorded live reading of a Christmas-set short story by our own podcast host, Eric Fritzius. This story was recorded at the November 16 Brown Bag Reading he did at Carnegie Hall WV in Lewisburg. Introducing the show, unfortunately, are Eric's usual Bonus Show co-hosts, his dogs, with a Christmas story of their own.

ContestCast 2011 serves as your primer for all things related to the WV Writers 2011 Annual Writing Contest, which will began accepting entries January 2, 2011. Joining us to help explain all the whys and wherefores of the contest are WVW President Cat Pleska and WVW 1st VP Teresa Newsome.

Podcast Episode 46 is holiday-centric version of our patented Recorded Live Readings. (Q: "If they're recorded, then how can they be live?" A: "Come over here and ask me that again.") The readers for this event were Ted Webb and Diane Tarantini and it was recorded on November 5, 2010 at the Zenclay Gallery in Morgantown. Ted Webb is a cofounder of Morgantown Poets. Diane Tarantini is a member of WV Writers and won four awards in our 2010 Annual Writing Competition. Together, they put on a holiday reading full of humorous essays and poetry.

Podcast Episode 45 is a landmark recorded live reading of the Woodland Press Writing and Publishing Panel from October 23 at Taylor Books on Capitol Street in downtown Charleston. This is a panel designed to be a brief overview on publishing using a variety of methods from traditional to self-publishing as well as some of the ins and outs of the publishing business. Featured in the panel are Woodland Press authors Karin Fuller, Geoff Fuller, Eric Fritzius, Michael Knost, Jason L. Keene, Frank Lanerd and Brian J. Hatcher. The panel is led by 2010 Bram Stoker Award winner Michael Knost, co-founder of Woodland Press. Taylor Books, by the way, is a fantastic bookstore and they stock not only titles by Woodland Press but also WV Writers own anthology Seeking the Swan.

Episode 44 is another of our patented Recorded Live Readings (Q: "But if it's recorded, how can it be live?" A: "What is this, the Inqusition? Get off it already.") This one is a recording of Carnegie Hall's October Brown Bag Reading featuring poet Tim Armentrout. Tim reads from a variety of his poems and prose pieces.

Episode 43 of the WV Writers Podcast features an interview with WV Writers' own Richard A. Lewis. Richard has served the organization in the past as Parliamentarian, First Vice President and Treasurer. He recently published his first collection of short fiction entitled Naked Man's Rock. We joined him at his home in Lewisburg to talk about it.

We return with Episode 42 of the WV Writers Podcast, another of our patent-pending recorded live readings (Q: "But if it's recorded, how can it be live?" A: "Zzzzzzzzipit") This recorded live reading comes from the September 21st Brown Bag Tuesday session at Carnegie Hall WV in Lewisburg and features WV Writers' current parliamentarian, author Belinda Anderson. Belinda will be reading a selection from her three collections of short stories, The Well Ain't Dry Yet, The Bingo Cheaters and Buckle Up, Buttercup assisted by Elizabeth Spangler and Dr. Larry Davis.

We return with Episode 41 of the WV Writers Podcast, another of our patent-pending recorded live readings (Q: "But if it's recorded, how can it be live?" A: "Shhhh. Don't you worry your purty little head.") This recorded live reading comes from the September 16th Literary Tea session at the Greenbrier Valley Theatre in Lewisburg. WV Writers' featured reader is Miles Dean, honorable mention in the Humor Category of the 2010 WVW Annual Writing Contest as well as voted the 1st place winner in poetry for the Writers Wall at the 2010 Summer Conference. The Literary Tea series continues October 7 and October 14. They take place at 5:30 p.m. at the Greenbrier Valley Theatre in downtown Lewisburg. If you're a member or extended friend of WV Writers, Inc. we invite you to submit your own recorded live readings to wvwpodcast@gmail.com. DOWNLOAD (Right click and Save Link Target As) West Virginia Writers Podcast Episode 41 Links mentioned in Podcast: * Greenbrier Valley Theatre * Belinda Anderson * Tim Armentrout * Carnegie Hall WV

Episode 40 of the WV Writers Podcast is a super-sized episode with another of our patented recorded live readings (Q: "But if it's recorded, how can it be live?" A: "Mind your own Ps and Qs.") This recorded live reading comes from the September 9th session of the Greenbrier Valley Theatre's Literary Tea series. The WV Writers featured reader is Bob Clark reading a portion of his wife Brenda Clark's 2nd place win in the Children's Book category of the 2010 WVW Annual Writing Competition. The featured reader from the GVT staff is Kurtis Donnelly reading a short story by playwright Arthur Miller. The Literary Tea series continues September 16, October 7 and October 14. They take place at 5:30 p.m. at the Greenbrier Valley Theatre in downtown Lewisburg. If you're a member or extended friend of WV Writers, Inc. we invite you to submit your own recorded live readings to wvwpodcast@gmail.com.

After three weeks away, we're back with Episode 39, a recorded live reading of the Seeking the Swan author's reading we produced at Taylor Books in Charleston. This was the second of three events West Virginia Writers put together for Charleston's FestivAll 2010. Included are Geoff Fuller, Wilma Acree, Edwinna Pendarvis, Laura Treacy Bentley, and Lywellyn McKernan. Our thanks go out to Taylor Books for inviting us to put this reading together. It's a great store, located on Capitol Street in downtown Charleston. If you're in the area, please stop in and feel free to purchase a copy of Seeking the Swan from them.

Episode 38 is an interview with writer Tamara Woods, co-founder of Morgantown Poets. Tamara will be one of the leaders of a poetry workshop called Poets' Guide to Metaphor & Marketing, taking place Saturday, August 7, from 1 to 3 p.m. at the Monongalia Arts Center in Morgantown. We talk about the workshop itself, as well as Tamara's background as a writer and producer of poetry slams, Morgantown Poets history, and our shared love of writer Neil Gaiman. You can register on the day of the workshop, or you can pre-register if you send your registration form postmarked by Friday July 30. Pre-registering attendees will receive a $5 discount. Students automatically receive a $10 discount. If you would like to register, please use the Poets' Guide to Metaphor and Marketing registration form.