Pat Conroy Literary Center

An Evening with Polly Stewart, Author of The Good Ones, in Conversation with Dana Ridenour
2023-06-29 17:00 - 18:30 (America/New_York) | Beaufort Bookstore, 2127 Boundary St, Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
Thursday June 29, 2023 – 5:00-6:30 PM EDT
Price: Free
Registration: Seating is limited; please call to reserve your spot: 843-525-1066.
Venue: Beaufort Bookstore | 2127 Boundary St. #15, Beaufort
Website: Facebook Event Page
The Beaufort Bookstore, in partnership with the nonprofit Pat Conroy Literary Center, will host an evening with novelist Polly Stewart, author of The Good Ones, in conversation with retired FBI special agent turned thriller writer Dana Ridenour. This free event will be held on Thursday, June 29, at 5:00 p.m., at 2127 Boundary St., Ste 15. Books will be available for sale and signing. Call Beaufort Bookstore to reserve your seat: 843-525-1066.
“Polly Stewart’s The Good Ones is a fantastic achievement. A classic Southern Gothic tale told through the prism of modern-day sensibilities. Not to be missed.”—S. A. Cosby, New York Times bestselling author of Razorblade Tears
“Smart, dark, and suspenseful, The Good Ones skillfully navigates the sharp edges of small-town secrets that cut deep. A beautifully written mystery that’ll keep you guessing til the end.”—Laura McHugh, award-winning author of What’s Done in Darkness
ABOUT The Good Ones
The last time Nicola Bennett saw Lauren Ballard she was scraping a key along the side of a new cherry-red Chevy Silverado. That was the night before her friend mysteriously vanished from her home, leaving a bloodstained washcloth and signs of a struggle—as well as her grieving husband and young daughter—behind.
Now, nearly twenty years later, Nicola, newly unemployed and still haunted by the disappearance of her childhood friend, is returning to her Appalachian hometown. For Nicola, Tyndall County has remained frozen in time. Everywhere she turns she’s reminded of Lauren. Yet shockingly, her former friends and neighbors have all moved on. Drawn to stories of missing girls, Nicola obsessively searches the internet, hoping to discover a clue to Lauren’s ultimate fate.
Driven by a desperate need to know what happened to her friend, Nicola takes a job in her hometown, determined to uncover any bit of information, any small clue, that can help. Deep down she knows the answers are tucked in the hollows and valleys of this small Blue Ridge county. As secrets come to light and the truth begins to unravel, will Nicola finally find release and break free of the past—or lose herself completely to unanswered questions from her adolescence?
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Polly Stewart is the author of The Good Ones, forthcoming from Harper Books in June 2023. As Mary Stewart Atwell, she’s also the author of Wild Girls (Scribner 2012). Her essays have appeared in the New York Times and Poets & Writers, among other publications. She runs the Craft of Crime Fiction interview series, formerly published on Fiction Writers Review and now appearing on Instagram.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Workshop: June 2023 Writing Family Stories with Estelle Ford-Williamson
2023-06-27 17:00 - 19:00 | Pat Conroy Literary Center, 601 Bladen Street, Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
Register: patconroyliterarycenter.eventbrite.com
When: Tuesday June 27, 2023; 5:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m.
Cost: $45
Limited to 15 participants
Location: Pat Conroy Literary Center (601 Bladen St., Beaufort, SC) with a Zoom option
Did you tell yourself this is the year to publish some of your family stories? Whether your goal is a family-only writing project or maybe something a lot bigger, begin writing and sharing with other writers in this follow-up to the February class. This course will enable you to start (or continue) the process with a goal of completing a project in the fall.
Covers Beginning the Stories, Finding Structure in Your Many Tales, Publication, and What to Do after Publishing the Stories, as well as a round-robin sharing of work with feedback. Attendance at Writing Family Stories 1 is not required.
This interactive writers workshop will be held as an in-person class at the Pat Conroy Literary Center (601 Bladen St., Beaufort), with an option for remote participants to join via Zoom.
Tuesday, June 27, 5:00-7:00 p.m. Limited to 15 participants. $45/person.
Learn more and register at https://patconroyliterarycenter.eventbrite.com
Website: Facebook Event Page
About our instructor:
Estelle Ford-Williamson’s most recent book is Rising Fawn, a novel set in Atlanta and Lookout Mountain, GA. Previously she published Abbeville Farewell, a Novel of Early Atlanta and North Georgia, and co-wrote a memoir, Seed of South Sudan: Memoir of a ‘Lost Boy’ Refugee with Majok Marier. For four years, she led “Writing Your Story” workshops at a senior center in the Atlanta area; a dozen students went on to publish full memoirs.
She has received awards for her novels and short fiction, and offers writing workshops through the Pat Conroy Literary Center and the South Carolina Writers Association; she lives on nearby St. Helena Island.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Pat Conroy Book Club: The Great Santini
2023-06-22 18:30 - 20:30 | The Rhett House Inn, 1009 Craven St., Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
Thursday June 22, 2023 – 6:30 PM EDT
Price: $10
Registration: Register at Eventbrite | Limited to 20 participants
Venue: The Rhett House Inn | 1009 Craven St., Beaufort
Website: Facebook Event Page
The nonprofit Pat Conroy Literary Center and the award-winning Rhett House Inn will host a monthly book club discussion of Pat Conroy’s dozen books in order of publication, moderated by Charlene Spearen and Jonathan Haupt. Book discussions will be held on fourth Thursdays beginning at 6:30 p.m. Limited to 20 participants each month. $10/person. Advance registration required. Participants are expected to read the books and to come prepared to discuss them. Discussions will be held at The Rhett House Inn (1009 Craven St., Beaufort)
SCHEDULE

April 27: The Boo (1970)
May 25 The Water Is Wide (1972)
June 22: The Great Santini (1976)
July 27: The Lords of Discipline (1980)

Future discussion dates will be announced this summer, once the book club is underway.
Register at Eventbrite
ABOUT OUR DISCUSSION LEADERS
Dr. Charlene Monahan Spearen received her MFA degree in Creative Writing and a Ph.D. in Composition and Rhetoric from the University of South Carolina. She is currently serving as the Public Relations and Special Projects Coordinator for Penn Center after a successful career in academia at Allen University. She served as the Program Coordinator for the University of South Carolina’s Arts Institute and was the Assistant Director for the South Carolina Poetry Initiative. In addition to her work throughout the Carolinas, Spearen has been a featured reader and Creative Writing instructor and scholar in County Monaghan and County Mayo, Ireland. She has published a full-length collection of poems titled A Book of Exquisite Disasters. Her poems have appeared in journals and publications throughout the United States.
Jonathan Haupt is the executive director of the nonprofit Conroy Center and the former director of the University of South Carolina Press, where he created the Story River Books fiction imprint with Pat Conroy, named by Garden & Gun magazine as one of “the top ten things to love about the South.” Haupt’s book reviews and author interviews have appeared in the Charleston Post and Courier, Lowcountry Weekly, Beaufort Lifestyle, Savannah Morning News’ Beacon magazine, Southern Review of Books, and Southern Writers Magazine’s Suite T blog. He is co-editor of the anthology Our Prince of Scribes: Writers Remember Pat Conroy, the recipient of seventeen book awards. He serves on the boards of the Friends of South Carolina Libraries and the South Carolina Academy of Authors. In 2020, Haupt was recognized with the Doug Marlette Literacy Leadership Award presented by the Pulpwood Queens, the largest book club in the U.S.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Camp Conroy: Summer Camp for Young Writers & Artists 2023
2023-06-12 09:00 - 2023-06-23 16:00 | Beaufort Middle School, 2501 Mossy Oaks Rd., Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
REGISTRATION: Eventbrite
Camp Conroy is a two-week day camp build-a-book experience for young writers and artists, ages 8 to 14. Participants will create independently and collaboratively as they research, write, illustrate, edit, design, and ultimately publish a book together.
The nonprofit Pat Conroy Literary Center’s 6th annual Camp Conroy will be held June 12 to 23, Monday to Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. (Drop-off and pick-up hours are between 8:00-9:00 a.m. and 3:30-4:00 p.m.), with a closing reading to be held on Friday afternoon, June 23. Presented in partnership with Beaufort Middle School, the camp will creatively explore this year’s theme, “When we find ourselves on a voyage exploring the unknown, we discover extraordinary adventures leading to the most bountiful treasures.”
During the first week of the camp, we invite our campers to immerse themselves in creative exploration as they respond to our theme. In the second week, campers refine their stories, essays, poems, artwork, and photography as they build their anthology together. Participants also constructively critique one another’s work, forming thematic connections as they combine their selected works into a cohesive, collaborative publication.
Camp Conroy invites diversity and inclusivity among our campers with respect to race, religion, ability, and all other aspects of identity.
Camp Conroy 2023 Theme: When we find ourselves on a voyage exploring the unknown, we discover extraordinary adventures leading to the most bountiful treasures.
The $300 registration fee for Camp Conroy includes two weeks of instruction, camp activities, and healthy daily snacks. Students must bring their own lunches and drinks each day. (This is a day camp; overnight lodging and meals are not included.) After the camp, participants will each receive a copy of their published anthology. Registration closes on May 15.
In the 2004 Pat Conroy Cookbook, Pat describes his “Bill Dufford Summer” spent between his junior and senior years on the campus of Beaufort High School (what is now Beaufort Middle School, the site of last year’s Camp Conroy). It was a transformative summer for Pat and for his principal, mentor, and surrogate father figure, Bill Dufford. As Pat writes at the end of his recollection, “I had everything—the best summer of my life.” That has been and remains the goal of our Camp Conroy, to give our campers the best summers of their lives. We hope you will join us this year.
Applying for a Scholarship: A limited number of full and partial scholarships are available, including a scholarship established in memory of Maura Connelly, an instructor in our original Camp Conroy. To apply, interested students should submit a sample of their work (story, essay, poem, artwork, or photography) with a brief letter about their interest in the Camp Conroy experience by May 15, to the Pat Conroy Literary Center, Attention: Camp Conroy, 601 Bladen Street, Beaufort, SC 29902. Scholarship recipients will be contacted in early June.
Sponsoring a Scholarship: Tax-deductible donations to the nonprofit Pat Conroy Literary Center are most welcome to sponsor student scholarships or a visiting instructor for Camp Conroy. See the camp registration link for details.
Questions: Email us at campconroysc@gmail.com.
MEET OUR INSTRUCTORS
Lisa Anne Cullen is an author, illustrator, and artist. Her most recent books are the Carolina folktales Little Orange Honey Hood, Three Wild Pigs (University of South Carolina Press/Young Palmetto Books) and Haskell & Greta (Quantum 8 Press). She is a member of the National Association of Women Artists, Seacoast Artists Guild, Seacoast Artist’s Guild & Gallery Writer’s Group, and teaches art and illustration. She holds an MFA in writing for children.

Twice nominated for the Pushcart Prize (2019 & 2023), Miho Kinnas is a Japanese poet and translator. Two collections of poetry, Today, Fish Only (2014) and Move Over, Bird (2019) were published by Math Paper Press. We Eclipse Into the Other Side, co-written with E. Ethelbert Miller, will be released from Pinyong Publishing in summer, 2023. Elaine Equi chose her poem, “Three Shrimp Boats Over the Horizon” (Wet Cement Press Magazine) for The Best American Poetry 2023.

Maddy Roth is a third grade teacher at Lady’s Island Elementary School. She earned her bachelor’s degree in Elementary and Early Childhood Education with a minor in Special Education from Pennsylvania State University in the spring of 2021. She also runs a competitive gymnastics program at The Foundry in Beaufort and coaches JV Cheerleading at Beaufort High School.

Jonathan Haupt is the executive director of the Pat Conroy Literary Center, the former director of the University of South Carolina Press, and co-editor of Our Prince of Scribes: Writers Remember Pat Conroy, winner of 17 book awards. In 2020, he was awarded the Doug Marlette Literacy Leadership Award by the Pulpwood Queens, the largest book club in the U.S.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

June 2023 Open Mic Night
2023-06-08 18:00 - 19:30 | Sandies, 711 Bladen St., Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
In partnership with the South Carolina Writers Association and the Beaufort County Black Chamber of Commerce, the Conroy Center’s monthly Open Mic Night will be held at Sandies (711 Bladen St.) on Thursday, June 8, from 6:00 to 7:30 p.m. Our featured writer is poet Helen P. Bradley, author of the novel Breach of Trust, forthcoming in May 2023.
When: Thursday, June 8, 2023 at 6 PM – 7:30 PM EDT
Price: Free · Duration: 1 hr 30 min
Where: Sandies (711 Bladen St.)
Interested in reading as part of Open Mic? Let us know at contact@patconroyliterarycenter.org
We want to build our community of writers and an appreciation for the art and talent of new, emerging, and long-time writers. Thank you for supporting this partnership!
Event Facebook Page
About our featured writer:
Helen P. Bradley’s debut novel Breach of Trust draws from her experiences during twenty-seven years heading a nationally-recognized crime victim advocacy program. A former newspaper journalist, Helen has written curricula, essays, and articles for the National Organization for Victim Assistance, the National Center for Victims of Crime, and the Georgia Victim Assistance Academy. Her writing has been published in The Savannah Anthology, Savannah Magazine, The Savannah Morning News, and Law Enforcement Magazine. She volunteered for 10 years with Deep Center, a Savannah youth literacy program that won a 2015 National Endowment for the Arts award.
In August 2022, Helen won first place in a national essay contest out of a field of 55 entries. NextTribe, the “voice of women aging boldly,” sponsored the contest in which Helen’s essay, “From High Heels to Hot Wheels,” reveals how she unexpectedly became a first-time mom at the age of 52, when her husband’s two-year-old grandson came to live with them. Learn more at www.helenpbradley.com.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Workshop: Two-Sentence Elevator Pitch with Ann Garvin
2023-06-01 18:00 - 20:00 | Online – ZOOM
UPDATE: This workshop has been rescheduled to Thursday June 1, 2023 6:00-8:00 p.m. EDT
Register: patconroyliterarycenter.eventbrite.com
Cost: $45
Limited to 15 participants (A minimum of ten participants is needed for this workshop.)
Online: Zoom
When an agent or editor asks, “What’s your book about?” will your brief description (your logline) capture their interest? Will they ask for more? Will they see you as a skilled professional or an eager newbie who isn’t quite sure what they are doing?
Even the most skilled authors find distilling their book down to a compelling pitch difficult to do, not because they don’t know what their book is about, but because they do. In fact, they know it so well that they don’t want to leave anything out. This results in more of a summary than juicy marketing copy designed to hook and interest an agent or a publisher.
In this virtual workshop led by USA Today bestselling novelist and Tall Poppy Writers founder Ann Garvin, you will learn how to get to the very heart of your project and make certain that the story you’re working on is compelling and clear. Even the most complicated or quiet of tales can be pitched in such a way that people will sit up and take notice.
Tuesday, May 9, 6:00-8:00 p.m. on Zoom. Limited to 15 participants. $45/person.
Learn more and register at https://patconroyliterarycenter.eventbrite.com
This workshop will be held as an online video conference call through Zoom. Details for joining the video call will be provided to all participating writers after registering.
Website: Facebook Event Page
About our instructor:
Ann Garvin, PhD, is the USA Today bestselling author of five funny and sad novels about people who do too much, in a world that asks too much from them. Her forthcoming novel, There’s No Coming Back From This, will be published this August. Ann teaches in the low-residency master of fine arts program at Drexel University and lives in Wisconsin with her anxious and overly protective dog, Peanut. She is the founder of the Tall Poppy Writers and is dedicated to helping authors find readers and vice versa. For more information visit www.anngarvin.net.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

An Evening with Novelist Kristen Ness
2023-05-26 17:30 - 18:30 | Pat Conroy Literary Center, 601 Bladen Street, Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
Friday May 26, 2023 – 5:30-6:30 PM EDT
Price: Free
Registration: Seating is limited; please call to reserve your spot: 843-379-7025.
Venue: Pat Conroy Literary Center | 601 Bladen St., Beaufort
Website: Facebook Event Page
The nonprofit Pat Conroy Literary Center will host Kristen Ness, author of the debut novel At Loggerheads, on Friday, May 26, at 5:30 p.m. Free and open to the public, this special author event will be held at the Conroy Center, 601 Bladen Street, Beaufort. Books will be available for sale and signing. Seating is limited; please call 843-379-7025 to reserve in advance.
“Kristen Ness’s At Loggerheads is a thrilling debut novel intertwined with mystery, nature, romance, and betrayal. Set on a lush barrier island, Ness offers the reader a rich sense of place in a whodunit that reflects on the meaning of home.”—New York Times bestselling author Mary Alice Monroe
About At Loggerheads
Brooke Edens, a scientist who studies loggerhead sea turtles, has longed for a sense of home and belonging ever since her return to Anders Isle. But something is amiss on the Lowcountry island where she grew up. For years, loggerheads have been disappearing from the beach and development has been encroaching on the island’s natural beauty and maritime forest.
When a dead body is found on the same day as a mutilated loggerhead, Brooke uses clues from her knowledge of sea turtles to help Detective Drew Young, her closest friend and potential love interest, investigate the many big crimes beginning to surface on their small island. Brooke’s life is further complicated by her ex-fiancé, Charlotte-based attorney Caldwell Madden, who appears on the island for a work trip and to support the presidential campaign of his father, a US Senator.
More than just a whodunit, this murder mystery includes romance, nature, politics, real estate, and science. With a captivating sense of place, the story unfolds as a love letter to the barrier islands and coastal towns of the South Carolina Lowcountry, where the often-opposing forces of mother nature and human nature influence what people will do for money, for power, and for love. Amid the many revelations, betrayals, and twists that threaten to pull Brooke and Drew apart, will they be able to untangle the web of crimes, catch the murderer and, ultimately, find a way back to each other?
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Kristen Ness grew up mostly in South Carolina, spending countless days with nature and falling in love with the ocean and its creatures on Isle of Palms, where she walks the beach at sunrise each summer in search of sea turtle nests as a volunteer for the Island Turtle Team.
While practicing immigration law for the past twenty years, Kristen has been moonlighting in pursuit of her lifelong passion for writing and her obsession with marine biology. Writing, real estate, politics, and even publishing run in her blood as the daughter of an English teacher and a land developer, and the great-granddaughter of the 14th Governor of North Dakota whose family owned and published The Bismarck Tribune. She has a BA in English from Duke University, a JD from the University of South Carolina School of Law, and serves as an appointed member of the South Atlantic Fishery Management Council’s Coral Advisory Panel.
Kristen lives in Charleston, SC, with her husband, their two children, two guinea pigs, and a cat. At Loggerheads is her first novel. https://kristenness.com

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Pat Conroy Book Club: The Water is Wide
2023-05-25 18:30 - 20:30 | The Rhett House Inn, 1009 Craven St., Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
Thursday May 25, 2023 – 6:30 PM EDT
Price: $10
Registration: Register at Eventbrite | Limited to 20 participants
Venue: The Rhett House Inn | 1009 Craven St., Beaufort
Website: Facebook Event Page
The nonprofit Pat Conroy Literary Center and the award-winning Rhett House Inn will host a monthly book club discussion of Pat Conroy’s dozen books in order of publication, moderated by Charlene Spearen and Jonathan Haupt. Book discussions will be held on fourth Thursdays beginning at 6:30 p.m. Limited to 20 participants each month. $10/person. Advance registration required. Participants are expected to read the books and to come prepared to discuss them. Discussions will be held at The Rhett House Inn (1009 Craven St., Beaufort)
SCHEDULE

April 27: The Boo (1970)
May 25 The Water Is Wide (1972)
June 22: The Great Santini (1976)
July 27: The Lords of Discipline (1980)

Future discussion dates will be announced this summer, once the book club is underway.
Register at Eventbrite
ABOUT OUR DISCUSSION LEADERS
Dr. Charlene Monahan Spearen received her MFA degree in Creative Writing and a Ph.D. in Composition and Rhetoric from the University of South Carolina. She is currently serving as the Public Relations and Special Projects Coordinator for Penn Center after a successful career in academia at Allen University. She served as the Program Coordinator for the University of South Carolina’s Arts Institute and was the Assistant Director for the South Carolina Poetry Initiative. In addition to her work throughout the Carolinas, Spearen has been a featured reader and Creative Writing instructor and scholar in County Monaghan and County Mayo, Ireland. She has published a full-length collection of poems titled A Book of Exquisite Disasters. Her poems have appeared in journals and publications throughout the United States.
Jonathan Haupt is the executive director of the nonprofit Conroy Center and the former director of the University of South Carolina Press, where he created the Story River Books fiction imprint with Pat Conroy, named by Garden & Gun magazine as one of “the top ten things to love about the South.” Haupt’s book reviews and author interviews have appeared in the Charleston Post and Courier, Lowcountry Weekly, Beaufort Lifestyle, Savannah Morning News’ Beacon magazine, Southern Review of Books, and Southern Writers Magazine’s Suite T blog. He is co-editor of the anthology Our Prince of Scribes: Writers Remember Pat Conroy, the recipient of seventeen book awards. He serves on the boards of the Friends of South Carolina Libraries and the South Carolina Academy of Authors. In 2020, Haupt was recognized with the Doug Marlette Literacy Leadership Award presented by the Pulpwood Queens, the largest book club in the U.S.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Book Launch: Rainbow Warrior with Jacquelyn Markham
2023-05-18 17:30 - 19:30 | Pat Conroy Literary Center, 601 Bladen Street, Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
Thursday May 18, 2023 – 5:30-7:30 PM EDT
Price: Free public drop-in event
Registration: No advance registration needed
Venue: Pat Conroy Literary Center | 601 Bladen St., Beaufort
Website: Facebook Event Page
The nonprofit Pat Conroy Literary Center is honored to host a public launch event for Jacquelyn Markham’s new collection of poetry, Rainbow Warrior, on Thursday, May 18, from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. at 601 Bladen St., in downtown Beaufort. No advance registration required. Books will be available for sale and signing. Refreshments will be provided. The author will give a reading from her new book at 6:30 p.m.
About Rainbow Warrior
The powerful poems in Rainbow Warrior make connections between the lives of the islanders of the South Pacific impacted by nuclear testing on Bikini and nearby islands and the Deep Water Horizon oil spill that devastated land and sea off the coast of Louisiana. The poems in this collection—some narrative, some epic, some lyrical—delve into ecopoetics to reveal the human toll of environmental disasters.
Images of the lone Ivory Billed Woodpecker, now extinct, juxtaposed with a child listening to the “Mother of the Sea” chant from a spiral shell, or fledglings the “size of pennies/…copper in the sun” make everyday moments of healing and beauty in nature even more poignant. These poems that follow the moon and the tides strike awe in our hearts and move us toward a deeper social consciousness.
“Jacquelyn Markham’s dedication of Rainbow Warrior to Rachel Carson prepares us for the power of this collection. Each of the ten poems gives us not only an insightful appreciation of nature but an awareness of its fragility in the lives of humans who too often view themselves as ‘gods’ in relation to it, enjoying what they will without understanding they are destroying it. Drawing from indigenous lore, and imagining the voices of the people directly affected, Markham—as though herself listening to the spirit of the sea in a spiral shell, as though heartfully calling on sky power—expresses outrage and terror in the dark necessary reminder that warfare’s bombs and greed’s oil drilling have poisoned our Earth. ‘I plunge into the water trying/yet I wonder will we survive?’ epitomizes the spirit of this strong sequence compelling in silent reading and superbly ready to be performed aloud by many voices.”–Katharyn Howd Machan, author of Dark Side of the Spoon and other collections
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Dr. Jacquelyn Markham has loved poetry since wandering through the meadow along a mint-lined brook as a child in rural Michigan. She has written poetry for nearly as long, so as a freshman in college, she decided to make a career of it. After earning her bachelor’s degree in English, she earned a master’s and a doctorate in English and Creative Writing from Florida State University.
Author of two chapbooks and a personal mythology, Peering Into the Iris: An Ancestral Journey, she has published nationally and internationally in literary journals, magazines, and anthologies, including Archive: South Carolina Poetry Since 2005, Adrienne Rich: A Tribute Anthology, Anthology of Appalachian Writers, Lullwater Review, Hawaii Pacific Review, The High Window, and Woman and Earth, among others.
Dr. Markham enjoyed a rich academic career from which she retired as a full professor. During her academic career, her love of poetry extended to scholarship as she “rescued” 19th century women poets who had fallen into obscurity, focusing on collecting the far-flung poems published by Charlotte Perkins Gilman during her lifetime. The result is the award-winning reference The Complete Poetry of Charlotte Perkins Gilman, 1884-1935, Together with Commentary and Notes (Mellen Press, 2014), recipient of the Adele Mellen Prize “for its distinguished contribution to scholarship.” She currently mentors poets and writers, making her home near the coast of South Carolina.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

May 2023 Open Mic Night
2023-05-11 18:00 - 19:30 | Online – Facebook Live
Our monthly virtual Open Mic Night is presented in partnership between the Pat Conroy Literary Center and the South Carolina Writers Association. Our featured writer for May is Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle, author of the debut novel Even As We Breathe, winner of the Thomas Wolfe Memorial Literary Award. Join us live on the Conroy Center’s Facebook page for readings by a pantheon of participating writers from in and beyond our South Carolina lowcountry.
When: Thursday, May 11, 2023 at 6 PM – 7:30 PM EDT
Price: Free · Duration: 1 hr 30 min
Where: Facebook Live
Interested in reading as part of Open Mic? Let us know at contact@patconroyliterarycenter.org
We want to build our community of writers and an appreciation for the art and talent of new, emerging, and long-time writers. Thank you for supporting this partnership!
Event Facebook Page
About our featured writer:
Annette Saunooke Clapsaddle, a citizen of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians, resides in Qualla, NC. She holds degrees from Yale University and the College of William and Mary.
Her debut novel, Even As We Breathe (UPK 2020), was a finalist for the Weatherford Award, named one of NPR’s Best Books of 2020, and received the Thomas Wolfe Memorial Literary Award (2021). It also is the first novel published by a citizen of the Eastern Band of Cherokee. Clapsaddle’s work appears in Yes! Magazine, Lit Hub, Our State Magazine, and The Atlantic. She is a former secondary English and Cherokee Studies educator. Currently, Clapsaddle is an editor for the Appalachian Futures Series (UPK), serves on the Board of Directors for the Museum of the Cherokee Indian, and is the President of the Board of Trustees for the North Carolina Writers Network. www.asaunookeclapsaddle.com

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Workshop: Therapeutic Journaling with Sandra E. Johnson
2023-05-06 13:00 - 15:00 | Pat Conroy Literary Center, 601 Bladen Street, Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
Register: patconroyliterarycenter.eventbrite.com
When: Saturday May 6, 2023; 1:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m.
Cost: $45
Limited to 15 participants
Location: Pat Conroy Literary Center (601 Bladen St., Beaufort, SC)
This interactive writing workshop will highlight how to use therapeutic journaling to become more resilient by transforming traumatic events into opportunities for growth, reframing failures into successes, and changing unhelpful habits into ones that strengthen wellbeing.
Instructor Sandra E. Johnson, LMSW, is the author of The Resilience Journal: 365 Days to Balance and Peace of Mind, and a copy of the journal is included in the registration fee (a $19 value).
This is an in-person writers workshop, held at the Pat Conroy Literary Center (601 Bladen St, Beaufort). Limited to 15 participants; $45/person.
Learn more and register at https://patconroyliterarycenter.eventbrite.com
Website: Facebook Event Page
About our instructor:
Therapeutic journaling expert Sandra E. Johnson, LMSW, is the author of The Resilience Journal: 365 Days to Balance and Peace of Mind (Clarkson Potter), a 365-day journal designed to strengthen skills to not just survive adversity but thrive from it.
Praised by bestselling authors Sharon Salzberg and Karen Casey, PhD, as well as mindfulness leaders Richard Miller, PhD, Shivani Hawkins, and Stacey Milner-Collins, The Resilience Journal offers inspirational quotes by great thinkers followed by interactive writing prompts to serve as guides towards greater wellness and resiliency. It is preceded by The Mind-Body Peace Journal: 366 Mindful Prompts for Serenity & Peace (Sterling Publishing), which has sold widely around the world and been highlighted in Psychology Today.
Johnson is also a novelist. Her novel Flowers for the Living (Texas Review Press) garnered nominations for a PEN/Faulkner Award and Paterson Prize for Fiction. Her narrative nonfiction book, Standing on Holy Ground: A Triumph over Hate in the Deep South (St. Martin’s Press) received glowing reviews from O: The Oprah Magazine, USA Today, Southern Living, and other publications. Since earning a Master of Social Work from the University of South Carolina in 1988, Johnson has been a clinical social worker with a number of health care organizations, including those specializing in psychiatric services.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Pat Conroy Book Club: The Boo
2023-04-27 18:30 - 20:30 | The Rhett House Inn, 1009 Craven St., Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
Thursday April 27, 2023 – 6:30 PM EDT
Price: $10
Registration: Register at Eventbrite | Limited to 20 participants
Venue: The Rhett House Inn | 1009 Craven St., Beaufort
Website: Facebook Event Page
The nonprofit Pat Conroy Literary Center and the award-winning Rhett House Inn will host a monthly book club discussion of Pat Conroy’s dozen books in order of publication, moderated by Charlene Spearen and Jonathan Haupt. Book discussions will be held on fourth Thursdays beginning at 6:30 p.m. Limited to 20 participants each month. $10/person. Advance registration required. Participants are expected to read the books and to come prepared to discuss them. Discussions will be held at The Rhett House Inn (1009 Craven St., Beaufort)
SCHEDULE

April 27: The Boo (1970)
May 25 The Water Is Wide (1972)
June 22: The Great Santini (1976)
July 27: The Lords of Discipline (1980)

Future discussion dates will be announced this summer, once the book club is underway.
Register at Eventbrite
ABOUT OUR DISCUSSION LEADERS
Dr. Charlene Monahan Spearen received her MFA degree in Creative Writing and a Ph.D. in Composition and Rhetoric from the University of South Carolina. She is currently serving as the Public Relations and Special Projects Coordinator for Penn Center after a successful career in academia at Allen University. She served as the Program Coordinator for the University of South Carolina’s Arts Institute and was the Assistant Director for the South Carolina Poetry Initiative. In addition to her work throughout the Carolinas, Spearen has been a featured reader and Creative Writing instructor and scholar in County Monaghan and County Mayo, Ireland. She has published a full-length collection of poems titled A Book of Exquisite Disasters. Her poems have appeared in journals and publications throughout the United States.
Jonathan Haupt is the executive director of the nonprofit Conroy Center and the former director of the University of South Carolina Press, where he created the Story River Books fiction imprint with Pat Conroy, named by Garden & Gun magazine as one of “the top ten things to love about the South.” Haupt’s book reviews and author interviews have appeared in the Charleston Post and Courier, Lowcountry Weekly, Beaufort Lifestyle, Savannah Morning News’ Beacon magazine, Southern Review of Books, and Southern Writers Magazine’s Suite T blog. He is co-editor of the anthology Our Prince of Scribes: Writers Remember Pat Conroy, the recipient of seventeen book awards. He serves on the boards of the Friends of South Carolina Libraries and the South Carolina Academy of Authors. In 2020, Haupt was recognized with the Doug Marlette Literacy Leadership Award presented by the Pulpwood Queens, the largest book club in the U.S.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Beaufort Human Library, Third Edition
2023-04-23 13:00 - 16:00 | Technical College of the Lowcountry – Building 12 Auditorium, 104 Reynolds Street, Bldg 12, Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
Sunday, April 23, 2023 – 1:00-4:00 PM EDT
Price: Free · Duration: 3 hrs
Location: Technical College of the Lowcountry’s MacLean Hall (104 Reynolds St, bldg 12, Beaufort, SC)
Check Out the Third Edition of the Beaufort Human Library, April 23
“Where oral history meets speed dating.” The Beaufort Human Library project seeks to foster empathy and understanding across communities by offering the public opportunities to “check out” more than a dozen Human Books who will be sharing their personal stories of facing challenges and striving for acceptance. These engaging conversations will cover topics including occupations, education, healthcare, gender, race, faith, immigration, addiction, abuse, and law enforcement, among others. Ultimately the dialogues will focus on building bridges of understanding, person to person, through storytelling.
The third edition of the Beaufort Human Library will be held on opening day of National Library Week: Sunday, April 23, from 1:00 to 4:00 p.m. in MacLean Hall, building 12 of the Technical College of the Lowcountry (TCL), at 104 Reynolds Street in Beaufort. Free and open to the public, the event is hosted by TCL; the nonprofit Pat Conroy Literary Center; the DAYLO (Diversity Awareness Youth Literacy Organization) chapters of Beaufort Academy, Beaufort High School, and Battery Creek High School; and volunteer community organizers. The program is funded in part with a grant from South Carolina Humanities, a nonprofit organization inspiring, engaging, and enriching South Carolinians with programs on literature, history, culture, and heritage.
Participating Human Books include Major General Harold L. “Mitch” Mitchell (ret.), Rev. Lori Hlaban, Rev. Rebecca Albright, Lola Campbell, Aki Kato, Gwenn McClune, Rodney Adams, Dana Ridenour, Ryan Copeland, Isabella Troy Brazoban, Kevin Holman, Eric Hayes, two Joseph Taylors, and others.
Beginning the event in the TCL auditorium from 1:00 to 1:30, historical re-enactor and educator Donald Sweeper will appear as celebrated Beaufortonian Robert Smalls with a brief performance followed by in-character audience Q&A. Born into slavery and later becoming the first Black hero of the Civil War and later a U.S. Congressman, Smalls is synonymous with Beaufort and Reconstruction. Sweeper has been performing the role for nearly a decade; his appearance at the Beaufort Human Library is made possible by the South Carolina Humanities Speakers Bureau. Please plan to arrive early as this presentation will begin promptly at 1:00.
Following the Robert Smalls presentation in the auditorium, all of the volunteer Human Books will be available throughout MacLean Hall to be checked out for 30-minute small group conversations from 1:30 to 4:00. No advance registration is needed. Volunteer Librarians and student Bookmarks from Beaufort Academy, Beaufort High School, and Battery Creek High School will be on hand to help guests navigate their experience.
Website: Facebook Event Page

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Evening with USA Today Bestselling Novelist Colleen Oakley
2023-04-15 17:00 - 19:00 | The Rhett House Inn, 1009 Craven St., Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
Saturday April 15, 2023 – 5-7:00 PM EDT
Price: $36 (includes a signed copy of her latest novel)
Registration: Register at Eventbrite
Venue: The Rhett House Inn | 1009 Craven St., Beaufort
Website: Facebook Event Page
The Pat Conroy Literary Center, NeverMore Books, and The Rhett House Inn will host an evening with USA Today bestselling novelist Colleen Oakley, author of the newly released The Mostly True Story of Tanner & Louise–named a Most Anticipated New Release of 2023 by Southern Living and Today. The $36 registration fee includes a signed copy of the novel, the author’s book talk, and refreshments, and music by the Alibis. Additional copies of the author’s books will be available for sale and signing through NeverMore Books. This special event will be held at The Rhett House Inn (1009 Craven St., Beaufort) on Saturday, April 15, at 5:00-7:00 p.m.
Register at Eventbrite
About The Mostly True Story of Tanner & Louise
“Ambitionless 21-year-old Tanner needs a place to live, but gets a lot more than she bargained for when she agrees to work as live-in caregiver for Louise, a vodka-swilling, sharp-as-a-tack elderly woman. The little old lady might not be as innocent as she seems, though, especially when she tells Tanner they need to make a quick getaway. Is Louise the culprit behind a legendary jewel heist? With a wild road trip, a classic car and a love interest reminiscent of a young Brad Pitt, The Mostly True Story of Tanner & Louise is tailor-made for fans of Thelma and Louise.”—Reader’s Digest
“You’ll never be able to see what’s coming in this wildly surprising, entertaining ride of a novel—which is a coming-of-age story, a contending-with-age story, and a surprising exploration of how womanhood is a matter of surprising others…and oneself.”—Jodi Picoult, New York Times bestselling author of Wish You Were Here
“Oakley draws on Thelma and Louise for this delightful story of an elderly woman and her caregiver who go on the run…The antics of this unlikely duo makes for an entertaining buddy drama.”—Publishers Weekly
Twenty-one-year-old Tanner Quimby needs a place to live. Preferably one where she can continue sitting around in sweatpants and playing video games nineteen hours a day. Since she has no credit or money to speak of, her options are limited, so when an opportunity to work as a live-in caregiver for an elderly woman falls into her lap, she takes it.
One slip on the rug. That’s all it took for Louise Wilt’s daughter to demand that Louise have a full-time nanny living with her. Never mind that she can still walk fine, finish her daily crossword puzzle, and pour the two fingers of vodka she drinks every afternoon.Bottom line: Louise wants a caretaker even less than Tanner wants to be one.
The two start off their living arrangement happily ignoring each other until Tanner starts to notice things—weird things. Like, why does Louise keep her garden shed locked up tighter than a prison? And why is the local news fixated on the suspect of one of the biggest jewelry heists in American history who looks eerily like Louise? And why does Louise suddenly appear in her room, with a packed bag at 1 a.m. insisting that they leave town immediately? Thus begins the story of a not-to-be-underestimated elderly woman and an aimless young woman who—if they can outrun the mistakes of their past—might just have the greatest adventure of their lives.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Colleen Oakley is the USA Today bestselling author of The Invisible Husband of Frick Island, You Were There Too, Close Enough to Touch, and Before I Go. Her books have been named best books by People, Us Weekly, Library Journal, and Real Simple, and have been long-listed for the Southern Book Prize. She lives in Atlanta, Georgia, with her husband, four kids, and the world’s biggest lapdog.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Book Launch: Jury of One with John Warley
2023-04-14 17:30 - 20:00 | Pat Conroy Literary Center, 601 Bladen Street, Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
Friday April 14, 2023 – 5:30-8:00 PM EDT
Price: Free public drop-in event
Registration: No advance registration needed
Venue: Pat Conroy Literary Center | 601 Bladen St., Beaufort
Website: Facebook Event Page
Our nonprofit Conroy Center is honored to host the book launch for Jury of One, the new Beaufort-based legal thriller from novelist John Warley. This free public drop-in event will be held at the Conroy Center (601 Bladen St., Beaufort) on Friday, April 14, from 4:30 to 7:00 pm. Refreshments will be served. Books will be available for sale and signing. No advance registration needed.
As a special feature of this event, there will also be a jewelry give-away with a donation to the Conroy Center.
About Jury of One
In this legal thriller, South Carolina Circuit Court judge Dan Borders appears poised for selection to the state Supreme Court thanks to his controversial proposal for dealing with death penalty cases. But a divorce he entered years earlier for Alana Morgan, a bright, ambitious school teacher, leads to a relationship that puts both of their futures in jeopardy. On the night Alana’s ex, Toby, is killed, Dan finds himself in the wrong place at the wrong time. He and Alana strike a deal that may save them both.
Can Dan trust Alana to keep her vow of silence? Can she rely on him to protect her when an aggressive young Indian prosecutor realizes her account of the confrontation raises suspicions? Alana and Dan depend on each other to avoid the cliff that awaits both if the pact is broken as Jury of One pushes the limits of human trust and moral reckoning to an unforgettable climax.
“John Warley’s Jury of One is a penetrating tale that entertains while at the same time requiring us to reflect on our lives and the oft-stated maxim ‘There but for the grace of God . . .’ The story is built around a trial judge’s idea for transforming the death penalty in an intriguing way that creates for him a potential path to South Carolina’s highest court. But that path is clouded by one night’s dalliance with an attractive woman that changes their lives forever. As the plot unfolds, you can see the inexorable finale coming in the judge’s courtroom, but you have no idea how that fateful moment will arrive. Warley is a master of his craft, as you will readily agree while turning the pages of this compelling story of people captured by their choices.”–Wyatt Durrette, Virginia trial attorney
“A promise made over a dead body conjoins two disparate lives in a compelling novel that’s equal parts taut legal thriller and thought-provoking moral quandary. Jury of One keeps readers on their toes to the very end. A welcome addition to masterful storyteller John Warley’s oeuvre.”–Jonathan Haupt, coeditor, Our Prince of Scribes: Writers Remember Pat Conroy
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
As a Citadel classmate and lifelong friend of Pat Conroy’s, award-winning novelist John Warley began his career as a lawyer but was encouraged by Pat to follow his passion for writing. Warley’s bestselling novel, A Southern Girl, was praised by Conroy as “stylish as a novel by John Irving and as tightly written as one by John Grisham.”
His history of his undergraduate alma mater, Stand Forever, Yielding Never: The Citadel in the 21st Century, led to his selection to write both the inscription for the college’s war memorial and “The Citadel at War,” a narrative history of the wars and conflicts in which Citadel alumni have made the ultimate sacrifice. NPR selected his essay “Lingering at the Doors” for publication in This I Believe on Fatherhood.
Warley’s other books include the novels The Home Guard, The Moralist, and The Moralist II. A graduate of the University of Virginia School of Law, he drew on decades of experience practicing law in writing Jury of One.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

April 2023 Open Mic Night
2023-04-13 18:00 - 19:30 | Sandies, 711 Bladen St., Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
In partnership with the South Carolina Writers Association and the Beaufort County Black Chamber of Commerce, the Conroy Center’s monthly Open Mic Night will be held at Sandies (711 Bladen St.) on Thursday, April 13, from 6:00 to 7:30 p.m. Our featured writer for April is Jacquelyn Markham, author of two chapbooks and a personal mythology.
When: Thursday, April 13, 2023 at 6 PM – 7:30 PM EDT
Price: Free · Duration: 1 hr 30 min
Where: Sandies (711 Bladen St.)
Interested in reading as part of Open Mic? Let us know at contact@patconroyliterarycenter.org
We want to build our community of writers and an appreciation for the art and talent of new, emerging, and long-time writers. Thank you for supporting this partnership!
Event Facebook Page
About our featured writer:
Jacquelyn Markham, author of two chapbooks and a personal mythology, has published nationally and internationally, including Archive: South Carolina Poetry, Adrienne Rich: A Tribute Anthology, Anthology of Appalachian Writers, Lullwater Review, Hawaii Pacific Review, and The High Window. Her chapbook, Rainbow Warrior, is forthcoming from Finishing Line Press (2023).
Markham’s awards include three Georgia Council for the Arts grants, a Kentucky Women’s Foundation Award, and a South Carolina Arts Grant. Awarded the Adele Mellen Prize for distinguished contribution to scholarship for The Complete Poetry of Charlotte Perkins Gilman, she holds an M.A. and a Ph.D. in Creative Writing from Florida State University. She lives and writes on the coast of South Carolina.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Kick-Start National Poetry Month Reading 2023
2023-04-06 16:30 - 18:30 | Hilton Head Island Branch Library, 11 Beach City Rd, Hilton Head Island, SC, 29926, United States
Thursday, April 6, 2023 | 4:30 PM EST – 6:30 PM EST
Price: Free · Duration: 2 hrs
Location: Hilton Head Island Branch Library (11 Beach City Rd.)
The annual Kick-Start Poetry Month Reading honors the start of National Poetry Month each April and is hosted in partnership between the Hilton Head Island Writers’ Network, the Hilton Head Island Office of Cultural Affairs, and the Pat Conroy Literary Center. Free and open to the public, the reading will be held at the Hilton Head Island Branch Library (11 Beach City Road) on Thursday, April 6, from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. Refreshments will be provided.
This year’s featured poets are Janet Kozachek, Len Lawson, Jacquelyn Markham, Yvette R. Murray, Arthur Turfa, and Elizabeth Robin–all published by Finishing Line Press. Books will be available for sale and signing.
Event Page: PCLC Facebook Page

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Evening with Post and Courier Journalist Adam Parker
2023-04-04 17:00 - 18:00 | Sandies, 711 Bladen St., Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
Tuesday April 4, 2023 – 5-6:00 PM EDT
Price: Free
Registration: Open to the public
Venue: Sandies at the BCBCC (711 Bladen Street)
Website: Facebook Event Page
On Tuesday, April 4, at 5:00 p.m., the nonprofit Pat Conroy Literary Center and the Beaufort County Black Chamber of Commerce are honored to host veteran journalist for the Charleston Post and Courier, Adam Parker, to discuss his newest book, Us. Free and open to the public, this special event will be held at Sandies at the BCBCC (711 Bladen Street). Books will be available for sale and signing.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Adam Parker has covered just about everything for the Post and Courier, though he has spent most of his time writing about race, religion and the arts. His reported articles are not of the standard kind. The stories delve deep, investigating much of what informs life in the American Southeast. They are issue-focused and convey the experiences and perceptions of all kinds of people, from civil rights leaders to Cistercian monks.
Us: A Journalist’s Look at the Culture, Conflict and Creativity of the South is a collection of in-depth articles published by The Post and Courier over the course of nearly 20 years, and it reveals the breadth and scope of Parker’s uncanny ability to pull back the scrim and take a hard look at ourselves and our community.
Adam Parker earned two degrees in music, then spent a decade in the business world before going back to school for a graduate degree in journalism from Columbia University. At The Post and Courier, he has worked on several beats over the years, including religion, the arts and, most recently, race and history. A long-time student of the civil rights movement and race in America, he has written extensively about the African-American experience. He is the author of the biography Outside Agitator: The Civil Rights Struggle of Cleveland Sellers Jr., published by Hub City Press in 2018, and Us: A Journalist’s Look at the Culture, Conflict, and Creativity of the South, published by Evening Post Books in 2022.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

March 2023 Open Mic Night
2023-03-30 18:00 - 19:30 | Online – Facebook Live
Our monthly virtual Open Mic Night is presented in partnership between the Pat Conroy Literary Center and the South Carolina Writers Association. Our featured writer for March is Ciera Horton McElroy, author of the debut novel Atomic Family. Join us live on the Conroy Center’s Facebook page for readings by a pantheon of participating writers from in and beyond our South Carolina lowcountry.
Online with Facebook Live
Thursday, March 30, 2023 at 6 PM – 7:30 PM EDT
Price: Free · Duration: 1 hr 30 min
Interested in reading as part of Open Mic? Let us know at contact@patconroyliterarycenter.org
We want to build our community of writers and an appreciation for the art and talent of new, emerging, and long-time writers. Thank you for supporting this partnership!
About our featured writer:
Ciera Horton McElroy is a novelist and business owner originally from Orlando, Florida. She holds a BA from Wheaton College and an MFA from the University of Central Florida. Her work has appeared in AGNI, Bridge Eight, Iron Horse Literary Review, The Crab Orchard Review, and Saw Palm, among others. She currently lives in St. Louis with her husband and son. Atomic Family is her first novel.
Ciera is also the owner of Clover and Bee Communications, named after an Emily Dickinson poem. She works as a communications strategist on film campaigns and has worked with Sony Pictures, Lionsgate and Kingdom Story Company, and Pure Flix to name a few. www.cieramcelroy.com

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Haunted Evening with Author & Storyteller Kim Poovey
2023-03-21 18:00 - 19:30 | The Rhett House Inn, 1009 Craven St., Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
Tuesday March 21, 2023 – 6-7:30 PM EDT
Price: $15
Registration: Register at Eventbrite
Venue: The Rhett House Inn | 1009 Craven St., Beaufort
Website: Facebook Event Page
Join local author and storyteller Kim Poovey for an evening of spine-tingling tales and haunted history. Refreshments will be served. Cash bar available. Kim will also be signing copies of her latest hauntedly historical novels: The Haunting of Monroe Manse, The Haunting of Edgefield Manor, and Shadows of the Moss. Hosted by the nonprofit Pat Conroy Literary Center and the historic Rhett House Inn, this spectral event is not to be missed! This special event will be held at The Rhett House Inn (1009 Craven St., Beaufort) on Tuesday, March 21, at 6:00-7:30 p.m.
Register at Eventbrite
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Kim Poovey is an author, storyteller, and living historian. She has written several books to include Truer Words, Through Button Eyes: Memoirs of an Edwardian Teddy Bear, Dickens’ Mice: The Tails Behind the Tale, The Haunting of Monroe Manse, The Haunting of Edgefield Manor, and Shadows of the Moss.
Kim resides in a haunted 1890s Victorian cottage in the South Carolina Lowcountry with her husband, Darryl, and their furry children. www.kimpoovey.com

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Book Launch: Slack Tide with Nancy Ritter
2023-03-18 17:30 - 19:30 | Pat Conroy Literary Center, 601 Bladen Street, Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
Saturday March 18, 2023 – 5:30-7:30 PM EDT
Price: Free public drop-in event
Registration: No advance registration needed
Venue: Pat Conroy Literary Center | 601 Bladen St., Beaufort
Website: Facebook Event Page
Our nonprofit Conroy Center is honored to host the book launch for Slack Tide, the Beaufort-based debut novel from Nancy Ritter. This free public drop-in event will be held at the Conroy Center (601 Bladen St., Beaufort) on Saturday March 18, from 5:30 to 7:30 pm. Refreshments will be served. Books will be available for sale and signing, with proceeds benefiting the Conroy Center. No advance registration needed.
About Slack Tide
Coping with the death of her mother, loss of her job, and ending of a long-term relationship, Cecilia Gilbert decides to start over in Beaufort, South Carolina. On her first day in town, her beloved dog disappears. As she searches for Wink, Cecilia meets and befriends a quirky cast of characters who help her grapple with Wink’s unknown fate. The Lowcountry of South Carolina comes alive in this deeply contemplative and empathetic exploration of community, grace, and forgiveness.
“Part My Dog Skip and part Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, this novel is a beautifully crafted literary mystery of anyone who has loved and lost and found the healing power of hope along the way.”–Cassandra King, author of Tell Me a Story: My Life with Pat Conroy
“Slack Tide is a heartfelt love letter to the essential connections we can, and must, forge to one another when we are set adrift by loss. This novel brims with memorable characters in a Lowcountry backdrop which proves to be as precarious as it is wondrous.”–Jonathan Haupt, coeditor of Our Prince of Scribes: Writers Remember Pat Conroy
“Ritter’s prose pulls us into the extraordinary mind and expansive heart of a woman who is unafraid to love, to seek, to connect, and ultimately to forgive and live. Her journey connects the mystical Lowcountry with transformative relationships, a brilliant mind, and a hear that beats with great love.”–Rebecca Bruff, author of Trouble the Water
“This literary mystery intertwines lush descriptions of the South Carolina Lowcountry with a feisty narrator’s exploration of wounded souls. Its love stories are as satisfying as its defiant, decisive conclusion.”–Valerie Sayers, author of The Powers and Brain Fever
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Nancy Ritter has been writing her entire life, including long letters to her English professor grandfather and notes passed surreptitiously to her best friend in junior high. In her professional career, she worked as a paralegal, a reporter, and an editor. She has received numerous awards for her writing, culminating in a Service to America Medal for her work at the U.S. Department of Justice on the nation’s missing persons crisis, where she first learned about “ambiguous loss,” an issue she explores in Slack Tide.
Born in New Mexico, Nancy grew up in Minnesota, receiving her B.S. in English Education from the University of Minnesota. When she realized she didn’t possess the temperament to survive classroom teaching or Minnesota winters, she moved to Seattle, where she worked as a paralegal. Other jobs took her across the country to New Jersey, then down to Washington, D.C., before she followed the siren call of the South and landed in Beaufort, South Carolina.
A vocal advocate of community service, Nancy has tutored and mentored kids, worked with elderly folks in nursing homes, and, most recently, served on a citizen task force investigating issues of racial equity and civic rights justice. She volunteers with the Pat Conroy Literary Center, a nonprofit organization that nurtures a diverse community of readers and writers. An avid reader and lapsed musician, Nancy spends as much time as possible exploring Hunting Island and other South Carolina treasures with her [fifth] rescue dog, Otis.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

An Evening with Memoirist Donna Keel Armer
2023-03-16 17:00 - 18:00 | Pat Conroy Literary Center, 601 Bladen Street, Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
Thursday March 16, 2023 – 5-6:00 PM EDT
Price: Free · Duration: 1 hr
Registration: Seating is limited; please call to reserve your spot: 843-379-7025.
Venue: Pat Conroy Literary Center | 601 Bladen St., Beaufort
Website: Facebook Event Page
The nonprofit Pat Conroy Literary Center will host Donna Keel Armer author of the travel memoir Solo in Solento, on Thursday, March 16, at 5:00 p.m. Donna’s talk, “One Story, Two Books,” will explore her globetrotting experiences as her book was translated into Italian as Un’americana in Salento and she was invited on a recent book tour of Southern Italy and Sicily.
Free and open to the public, this special author event will be held at the Conroy Center, 601 Bladen Street, Beaufort. Books will be available for sale and signing. Seating is limited; please call 843-379-7025 to reserve in advance.
About Solo in Salento
“A sassy and sacred memoir for those sorting out what’s most valuable in life.”—Cassandra King
Desperate to break out of a life haunted by a wretched past, a loss of faith, toxic relationships, a stressful management career, and a slow sink into domestication, Donna Keel Armer craves time away from everything and everyone, including her loving husband. So she tells everyone she is traveling alone to research a novel she intends to write.
While in Otranto, Donna masters the complex recycling system of a country where she doesn’t speak the language. By applying these same trash rules to her own life, she discovers that she can sort, recycle, and discard the personal garbage that has plagued her over a lifetime. The book’s universal themes of personal growth and travel invite you to come along on this transformational journey filled with mysterious sacred places, culinary delights, and the possibility of being kidnapped. Readers seeking personal realization, along with active travelers, courageous wannabe travelers, and armchair travelers, will be drawn into the magic.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Donna Keel Armer’s first trip to Italy in 1995 compelled her to return over and over. She fell in love with the place: the mystery, the magic, the music, the martyrs, and the marvelous food. She hoped one day she’d share these treasures with the rest of the world.
Donna graduated cum laude with a double major in psychology and social sciences with graduate studies in theology. Donna has published numerous articles, along with her photography, on travel, food, human interest, and home and garden in South Carolina magazines, and teamed up with the Order of the Sons of Italy in Columbia, SC, to produce Bella Cucina Italiana, a cookbook featuring her photography.
She was president of a hospitality business she and her husband created in Southwest Georgia. They now live in Beaufort, where she volunteers at the Pat Conroy Literary Center and Hunting Island State Park. Learn more about Donna Keel Armer at https://donnaarmer.com.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

7th Annual March Forth
2023-03-04 - 2023-03-05 | Penn Center, 16 Penn Center Circle West, St. Helena Island, SC, 29920, United States
Our Conroy Center’s seventh annual March Forth will be held on Saturday, March 4, and Sunday, March 5, with a special preview event the evening of Friday, March 3. March Forth commemorates the anniversary of Pat Conroy’s passing on March 4, 2016, with programs on major themes of his writing and teaching life, including social justice, inclusivity, conservation, education, and storytelling.
For events on Saturday and Sunday, March 4, and 5, at Penn Center, please register in advance by February 24 at Eventbrite
Our 2023 March Forth will include appearances by MacArthur Fellowship honoree, environmentalist, memoirist, and poet J. Drew Lanham; South Carolina Academy of Authors honoree, environmentalist, memoirist, poet, and novelist John Lane; New York Times bestselling novelists De’Shawn Charles Winslow and Megan Miranda; and former Charleston City Poet Laureate Marcus Amaker.
March Forth is presented in collaboration between the nonprofit Pat Conroy Literary Center and Penn Center, NeverMore Books, the Storybook Shoppe, the Port Royal Farmers Market, Catering by Debbi Covington, and the DAYLO (Diversity Awareness Youth Literacy Organization) chapters of Beaufort High School and Beaufort Academy, and sponsored in part by a grant from South Carolina Humanities, a nonprofit organization inspiring, engaging and enriching South Carolinians with programs on literature, history, culture and heritage.
FREE P﻿REVIEW EVENT at NEVERMORE BOOKS on FRIDAY, MARCH 3
5﻿:00-6:00 p.m. New York Times bestselling novelist De’Shawn Charles Winslow, author of newly released Decent People, in conversation with Jonathan Haupt. Free and open to the public, this book discussion and signing will be held at NeverMore Books (910 Port Republic St, Beaufort) on Friday, March 3, at 5:00 p.m. Seating is limited; please call 843-812-9460 to reserve in advance.
FREE TEDDY BEAR PICNIC READ-ALOUD at the PORT ROYAL FARMERS MARKET on SATURDAY, MARCH 4
9﻿:00-Noon. High school students from the DAYLO (Diversity Awareness Youth Literacy Organization) and National Honor Society chapters of Beaufort High School and Beaufort Academy will be reading children’s picture books to young readers and their families, with light snacks provided, in partnership with the Bluffton-based children’s bookstore, the Storybook Shoppe. This free event will be held near the gazebo at the Port Royal Farmers Market (1615 Ribaut Rd, Port Royal). No registration needed.
YORK W. BAILEY MUSEUM at PENN CENTER on SATURDAY, MARCH 4
1﻿0:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. Museum admission: $7.00/adult, $5.00/child. Learn more at www.penncenter.com
D﻿ARRAH HALL (part of the RECONSTRUCTION ERA NATIONAL HISTORIC PARK) at PENN CENTER on SATURDAY, MARCH 4
9﻿:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Free admission. Learn more at https://www.nps.gov/reer/planyourvisit/penn-center.htm
TICKETED MARCH FORTH EVENTS at PENN CENTER on SATURDAY, MARCH 4
(﻿Register in advance by February 24.)
1﻿1:00-11:30 a.m. Attendee check-in.
11:30 to Noon. Catered lunch by Debbi Covington.
Noon to 1:00 p.m. A conversation with South Carolina Academy of Authors honoree, environmentalist, memoirist, poet, and novelist John Lane, author of Still Upright and Headed Downstream and Coming into Animal Presence.
1﻿:00 to 1:20 p.m. Book signing break with NeverMore Books.
1﻿:20 to 2:20 p.m. A conversation with New York Times bestselling nature-themed mystery novelist Megan Miranda, author of The Last to Vanish and (forthcoming) The Only Survivors.
2﻿:20-2:40 p.m. Book signing break with NeverMore Books.
2﻿:40-3:40 p.m. A poetry reading and discussion with former Charleston City Poet Laureate Marcus Amaker, editor of Colors Wash Over Me: Poems by Lowcountry Students and author of The Birth of All Things and (forthcoming) Hold What Makes You Whole. (Amaker will be assisted by student readers.)
3﻿:40 to 4:00 p.m. Final book signing break with NeverMore Books.
TICKETED MARCH FORTH EVENT at PENN CENTER on SUNDAY, MARCH 5
(﻿Register in advance by February 24.)
1﻿0:30-11:00 a.m. Attendee check-in.
1﻿1:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.: Nature walk of Penn Center led by environmentalist J. Drew Lanham (a MacArthur Fellowship “genius grant” honoree and author of Sparrow Envy) and John Lane (a SC Academy of Authors honoree and author of Still Upright and Headed Downstream)
1﻿2:30 p.m. to 1:00 p.m. Book signing.

An Evening with NYT Bestselling Novelist De'Shawn Charles Winslow
2023-03-03 17:00 - 18:00 | NeverMore Books, 910 Port Republic St, Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
A March Forth special event
Friday March 3, 2023 – 5-6:00 PM EDT
Price: Free · Duration: 1 hr
Location: NeverMore Books (910 Port Republic Street) | please call NeverMore to reserve your seat: 843-812-9460
As a free event of the Pat Conroy Literary Center’s seventh annual March Forth, the Conroy Center and NeverMore Books will host an evening with New York Times bestselling novelist De’Shawn Charles Winslow, author of the newly published Decent People, in conversation with Jonathan Haupt.
Winslow’s debut novel, In West Mills, was awarded the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize and the Willie Morris Award for Southern Fiction. Decent People returns to West Mills with a social justice-themed murder mystery, which has already been recognized on the recommended reading lists of USA Today, Good Housekeeping, the American Booksellers Association’s Indie Next, and Apple Books.
Free and open to the public, this book discussion and signing will be held at NeverMore Books (910 Port Republic St, Beaufort) on Friday, March 3, at 5:00 p.m. Seating is limited; please call 843-812-9460 to reserve in advance.
Website: Facebook Event Page
ABOUT DECENT PEOPLE
In the still-segregated town of West Mills, North Carolina, in 1976, Marian, Marva, and Lazarus Harmon–three enigmatic siblings–are found shot to death in their home. The people of West Mills are in a frenzy of finger-pointing, gossip, and wonder. The crime is the first reported murder in the area in decades, but the white authorities don’t seem to have any interest in solving the case.
Fortunately, one person is determined to do more than talk. Miss Josephine Wright has just moved back to West Mills from New York City to retire and marry a childhood sweetheart, Olympus “Lymp” Seymore. When she discovers that the murder victims are Lymp’s half-siblings, and that Lymp is one of West Mills’s leading suspects, she sets out to prove his innocence. But as Jo investigates those who might know the most about the Harmons’ deaths, she starts to discover more secrets than she’d ever imagined, and a host of cover-ups–ranging from medical misuse to illicit affairs–that could upend the reputations of many. For readers of American Spy and Bluebird, Bluebird, Decent People is a powerful new novel about shame, race, money, and the reckoning required to heal a fractured community.
“De’Shawn Charles Winslow invites readers on a satisfying ride that, through his keen observations of human nature, leads to deeper considerations of the glacial progress of racial equality.”―BookPage, starred review
“Winslow chronicles the aftermath of a triple homicide that rocks a segregated Southern community in his dynamic latest . . . There are a trove of surprises along the way to the well-earned resolution, and Winslow entrances readers with strong characters, impeccable prose, and brisk pacing. As a character-driven mystery, it delivers the goods.”―Publishers Weekly
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
De’Shawn Charles Winslow is the author of In West Mills, a Center for Fiction First Novel Prize winner, an American Book Award recipient, a Willie Morris Award for Southern Fiction winner, and a Los Angeles Times Book Award, Lambda Literary Award, and Publishing Triangle Award finalist. His second novel, Decent People, was published in January 2023. He was born and raised in Elizabeth City, North Carolina, and graduated from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop.

ABOUT OUR INTERVIEWER
Interviewer Jonathan Haupt is executive director of the Pat Conroy Literary Center, a judge for the Willie Morris Award for Southern Fiction, and a guest book reviewer for the Pulitzer Prize-winning Charleston Post and Courier.
MARCH FORTH continues on Saturday, 3/4, with a free young readers read-aloud event at the Port Royal Farmers Market and a ticketed day of special events at Penn Center featuring appearances by J. Drew Lanham, John Lane, Megan Miranda, and Marcus Amaker. Learn more and register in advance at Eventbrite
March Forth is presented in collaboration between the nonprofit Pat Conroy Literary Center and Penn Center, NeverMore Books, the Storybook Shoppe, the Port Royal Farmers Market, Catering by Debbi Covington, and the DAYLO (Diversity Awareness Youth Literacy Organization) chapters of Beaufort High School and Beaufort Academy, and sponsored in part by a grant from South Carolina Humanities, a not-for-profit organization inspiring, engaging and enriching South Carolinians with programs on literature, history, culture and heritage.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Workshop: Writing Family Stories with Estelle Ford-Williamson
2023-02-28 17:00 - 19:00 | Pat Conroy Literary Center, 601 Bladen Street, Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
This workshop is now sold out. Our thanks to everyone who registered in advance.
Register: patconroyliterarycenter.eventbrite.com
When: Tuesday February 28, 2023; 5:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m.
Cost: $45
Limited to 15 participants
Location: Pat Conroy Literary Center (601 Bladen St., Beaufort, SC) with a Zoom option
If, according to Pat Conroy, the most powerful words in the English language are “Tell Me a Story,” then the most regretful ones are: “I never got Mama’s (or Daddy’s) stories.” This workshop helps you avoid that regret! We’ll cover:

Beginning the Stories
Finding Structure in Your Many Tales
Publication
What to Do After Publishing the Stories?

Led by an award-winning memoirist and novelist, this workshop is for those who want to put in writing their cache of family legends or happenings, and for those who want to assist their parents or relatives or friends in doing just that. A great holiday gift for a loved one!
This interactive writers workshop will be held as an in-person class at the Pat Conroy Literary Center (601 Bladen St., Beaufort), with an option for remote participants to join via Zoom.
Tuesday, February 28, 5:00-7:00 p.m. Limited to 15 participants. $45/person.
Learn more and register at https://patconroyliterarycenter.eventbrite.com
Website: Facebook Event Page
About our instructor:
Estelle Ford-Williamson’s most recent book is Rising Fawn, a novel set in Atlanta and Lookout Mountain, GA. Previously she published Abbeville Farewell, a Novel of Early Atlanta and North Georgia, and co-wrote a memoir, Seed of South Sudan: Memoir of a ‘Lost Boy’ Refugee with Majok Marier.
For four years, she led “Writing Your Story” workshops at a senior center in the Atlanta area; a dozen students went on to publish full memoirs. She has received awards for her novels and short fiction, and offers writing workshops through the Pat Conroy Literary Center and the South Carolina Writers Association; she lives on nearby St. Helena Island.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Workshop: Writing as Spiritual Practice with Valerie Sayers
2023-02-25 10:00 - 12:00 | Pat Conroy Literary Center, 601 Bladen Street, Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
Register: patconroyliterarycenter.eventbrite.com
When: Saturday February 25, 2023; 10:00 a.m. – 12:00 noon
Cost: $45
Limited to 15 participants
Location: Pat Conroy Literary Center (601 Bladen St., Beaufort, SC)
Writers of all genres struggle with, and delight in, questions of meaning and purpose. This workshop will explore a broad range of writers, from Thicht Nhat Hahn to San Juan de la Cruz to Toni Morrison, whose writing has been anchored by their belief in (or search for) the Divine. We’ll suggest practical ways to make our writing an exploration of spirituality, and we’ll write three in-class exercises to help sharpen our attention to observation, meditation, and invention. Writers of all genres, all levels of experience, and all (or no) faith traditions are most welcome.
This is an in-person writers workshop, held at the Pat Conroy Literary Center (601 Bladen St, Beaufort). Limited to 15 participants; $45/person.
Learn more and register at https://patconroyliterarycenter.eventbrite.com
Website: Facebook Event Page
About our instructor:
Valerie Sayers is the author of a collection of stories, The Age of Infidelity, and six novels, including her most recent, The Powers. Who Do You Love and Brain Fever were both named New York Times “Notable Books of the Year, and a film, “Due East,” was based on her novels Due East and How I Got Him Back Sayers’s stories, essays, and reviews have appeared widely, in such publications as the New York Times, Washington Post, Commonweal, Zoetrope, and Ploughshares, and have been cited in Best American Short Stories and Best American Essays. Her literary prizes include a National Endowment for the Arts literature fellowship and two Pushcart Prizes for fiction. She is honored to be a member of the South Carolina Academy of Writers.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Workshop: Stop Making Sense! with Luis H. Francia
2023-02-18 10:00 - 12:00 | Pat Conroy Literary Center, 601 Bladen Street, Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
Register: patconroyliterarycenter.eventbrite.com
When: Saturday February 18, 2023; 10:00 a.m. – 12:00 noon
Cost: $45
Limited to 12 participants
Location: Pat Conroy Literary Center (601 Bladen St., Beaufort, SC)
You do not need to write about something in order to write a lyrical poem. Poems are written with words, not ideas.
Taking its title from a Talking Heads song, this two-hour workshop uses verbal play, emphasizing lyricism and non-narrative technique. As in jazz, a lyrical poem riffs on the verbal energy of its initial lines to evolve towards a whole greater than the sum of its parts.
We will explore word-sounds and what these suggest, without regard to meaning. Meaning will be arrived at rather than be predetermined. We will create non-sense that actually makes sense! Participants need to have paper so they can do in-class exercises based on material handed out. These will enable each participant to craft a short poem. The workshop will be fun and instructive!
This in-person workshop is limited to 12 participants and will be held at the Pat Conroy Literary Center (601 Bladen St., Beaufort) on February 18, 2023; 10:00 a.m. – 12:00 noon
Learn more and register at https://patconroyliterarycenter.eventbrite.com
Website: Facebook Event Page
About our instructor:
Luis H. Francia is a poet, playwright, nonfiction writer, and occasional filmmaker. He is an adjunct professor at New York University, where he teaches Filipino Language and Culture.
His latest poetry collection is Thorn Grass (University of the Philippines Press, 2021). Previous collections include Tattered Boat, The Beauty of Ghosts, Museum of Absences, and The Arctic Archipelago and Other Poems. Included in many anthologies, he has been a first-prize winner in the Philippines’ most prestigious literary competition, the Palanca Literary Awards, and honored by the Union of Philippine Writers in 2014. His works have been translated into Filipino, Chinese, Spanish, French, and German. He has read at numerous literary festivals in Australia, Canada, China, the Philippines, and Nicaragua, and in various US cities, such as New York, Washington DC, San Francisco, and Chicago.
His nonfiction works include the memoir Eye of the Fish: A Personal Archipelago, winner of both the 2002 PEN Open Book Award and the 2002 Asian American Writers award, and Memories of Overdevelopment: Reviews and Essays of Two Decades. His A History of the Philippines: From Indios Bravos to Filipinos was published in 2010, with a revised edition in 2014. He is in the Library of America’s Becoming Americans: Four Centuries of Immigrant Writing. His latest collection of nonfiction, RE: Reflections, Reviews, and Recollections, was released in 2015.
His first full-length play The Strange Case of Citizen de la Cruz, was given its world premiere by Bindlestiff Studio in San Francisco in 2012, and restaged in 2022 by New York’s Atlantic Pacific Theater . Another play, Black Henry, on Magellan’s 1521 landfall in the Philippines, was virtually staged by New York University ’s King Juan Carlos Center and Sulo: Philippine Studies Initiative, in late April of 2021, the quincentennial of that historic voyage.
He has taught poetry, nonfiction writing, and playwriting at, among other places, Yale, the Iowa Writers Program, the City University of Hong Kong, Sun Yat Sen University in Guangzhou, China, and St. Benilde College and Ateneo de Manila University in Manila. He and his wife, the art historian Midori Yamamura, live in Jackson Heights, Queens.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

An Evening of Art and Poetry with Midori Yamamura and Luis H. Francia
2023-02-17 17:00 - 19:30 | Beaufort Arts Council – Beaufort, SC, 921 Ribaut Road, Bldg. 1, Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
When: Friday February 17, 2023; 5:00 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.
Cost: Free | Seating is limited. Call 843-379-7025 to reserve in advance
Location: Beaufort Arts Council, (921 Ribaut Road, Beaufort)
The nonprofit Pat Conroy Literary Center and Beaufort Arts Council will host art historian Midori Yamamura, speaking on Yoko Ono’s Painting to Hammer a Nail (1966) and poet Luis H. Francia, reading from his newest collection Thorn Grass (2021).
Free and open to the public, this partnership program will be held on Friday, February 17, from 5:00 to 7:30 p.m. at the Beaufort Arts Council, 921 Ribaut Road, Beaufort. Seating is limited; please call the Conroy Center in advance at 843-379-7025 to reserve your spot.
Books will be available for sale and signing. There will be a brief intermission between the two presentations.
Painting to Hammer a Nail is one of Yoko Ono’s most celebrated pieces, exhibited at Indica Gallery in London in 1966. The participatory art marked her encounter with the British pop culture icon and her future husband, John Lennon. Before this piece, Painting to Hammer a Nail existed in four forms of texts (1961-62), and later, it became a sculpture (1967). This talk examines the transformations of Ono’s Painting to Hammer a Nail In (1961-62/66/67) in relation to her gender in Tokyo, New York, and London. It discusses how Ono envisioned forming society using art.
Website: Facebook Event Page
About our presenters:
Midori Yamamura, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Art History at the CUNY Kingsborough Community College and the 2022-23 Alcaly/Bodian Distinguished Scholar at The Advanced Research Collaborative, the CUNY Graduate Center, specializes in global contemporary art history focusing on Asia and its diaspora.
The author of Yayoi Kusama: Inventing the Singular (MIT Press: 2015) and a co-editor of Visual Representation and the Cold War: Art and Postcolonial Struggles in East and Southeast Asia (Routledge, 2021), as a feminist art historian of color, her interest is in exploring the ideas that emerge in marginal space in society. In Spring 2022, Yamamura co-organized a community-based pedagogical exhibition, UnHomeless NYC (March-April, 2022), with a multi-disciplinary group of scholars and housing activists. Her new book, Japanese Contemporary Art Since 1989: Emergence of the Local in the Age of Globalization, examines the impact of technocracy on art in neoliberal society and the new ideas that emerged in the spaces devastated by the globally homogenous value system.
Luis H. Francia is a poet, playwright, nonfiction writer, and occasional filmmaker. He is an adjunct professor at New York University, where he teaches Filipino Language and Culture.
His latest poetry collection is Thorn Grass (University of the Philippines Press, 2021). Previous collections include Tattered Boat, The Beauty of Ghosts, Museum of Absences, and The Arctic Archipelago and Other Poems. Included in many anthologies, he has been a first-prize winner in the Philippines’ most prestigious literary competition, the Palanca Literary Awards, and honored by the Union of Philippine Writers in 2014. His works have been translated into Filipino, Chinese, Spanish, French, and German. He has read at numerous literary festivals in Australia, Canada, China, the Philippines, and Nicaragua, and in various US cities, such as New York, Washington DC, San Francisco, and Chicago.
His nonfiction works include the memoir Eye of the Fish: A Personal Archipelago, winner of both the 2002 PEN Open Book Award and the 2002 Asian American Writers award, and Memories of Overdevelopment: Reviews and Essays of Two Decades. His A History of the Philippines: From Indios Bravos to Filipinos was published in 2010, with a revised edition in 2014. He is in the Library of America’s Becoming Americans: Four Centuries of Immigrant Writing. His latest collection of nonfiction, RE: Reflections, Reviews, and Recollections, was released in 2015.
His first full-length play The Strange Case of Citizen de la Cruz, was given its world premiere by Bindlestiff Studio in San Francisco in 2012, and restaged in 2022 by New York’s Atlantic Pacific Theater . Another play, Black Henry, on Magellan’s 1521 landfall in the Philippines, was virtually staged by New York University ’s King Juan Carlos Center and Sulo: Philippine Studies Initiative, in late April of 2021, the quincentennial of that historic voyage.
He has taught poetry, nonfiction writing, and playwriting at, among other places, Yale, the Iowa Writers Program, the City University of Hong Kong, Sun Yat Sen University in Guangzhou, China, and St. Benilde College and Ateneo de Manila University in Manila.
Husband and wife, Francia and Yamamura live in Jackson Heights, Queens.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Workshop: More Than Just a Backdrop with Anthony Grooms
2023-02-16 18:00 - 20:00 | Online – ZOOM
RESCHEDULED
Register: patconroyliterarycenter.eventbrite.com
When: Thursday, February 16, 2023; 6:00-8:00 p.m. EDT on Zoom.
Cost: $45
Limited to 15 participants
Online: Zoom
In this seminar and workshop, participants will discuss setting in prose fiction, including its importance in establishing “place,” its integration into scene, and its support of characterization and theme. References will be made to Willia Cather’s short story “Paul’s Case,” and other short fiction. Students are welcomed to submit up to 750 words of original manuscript to be discussed in the workshop. (Submissions by registered participants must be received as PDFs by one week prior to the workshop.)
Learn more and register at https://patconroyliterarycenter.eventbrite.com
This workshop will be held as an online video conference call through Zoom. Details for joining the video call will be provided to all participating writers after registering.
Website: Facebook Event Page
About our instructor:
Anthony Grooms writes on a variety subjects in several genres from historical fiction to science fiction, however his most notable work has been about the American Civil Rights Movement in the southern United States. He is the author of the novels Bombingham, and The Vain Conversation, the story collection Trouble No More, a collection of poems, Ice Poems.
His stories, essays, and poems have appeared in a number of anthologies and literary journals, most recently in Atlanta Noir and Alabama Noir. He is a two-time winner of the Lillian Smith Prize, a Hurston-Wright Legacy Award Finalist, a Black Caucus of the ALA Honor Fiction Award, and other honors. He has held fellowships from Yaddo and Fulbright. For more information, please go to www.AnthonyGrooms.com.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.

Book Launch for Lynn Seldon's Novel Carolina's Ring
2023-02-15 17:00 - 19:00 | Pat Conroy Literary Center, 601 Bladen Street, Beaufort, SC, 29902, United States
When: Wednesday February 15, 2023; 5:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m. ET
Cost: Free
Location: Pat Conroy Literary Center (601 Bladen St., Beaufort, SC)
The late Pat Conroy praised Lynn Seldon’s debut novel Virginia’s Ring as “a triumph and a tour de force”. He joins the distinguished ranks of our military academy graduates who have written about the life changing, fire tested tribe.
The nonprofit Pat Conroy Literary Center is honored to host a public drop-in launch event for Seldon’s new novel, Carolina’s Ring, on Wednesday, February 15, from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m., at 601 Bladen St., in downtown Beaufort. Copies will be available for sale and signing. Light refreshments will be served.
Website: Facebook Event Page
About Carolina’s Ring
Carolina’s Ring is a modern coming-of-age story between Carolina Stone and childhood friends, twin brothers Ben and Alf Marshall. With unexpected life-or-death events shaping their futures, the novel follows these three friends from the foothills of South Carolina to the campuses of the Virginia Military Institute and The Citadel, and ultimately to the Global War on Terrorism in Iraq and beyond.
“Lynn Seldon’s new novel is an insightful and deeply moving account of ways that duty, honor, and love merge in the lives of two brothers and the woman they have both sought. An additional (and fitting) bonus is a cameo by Pat Conroy, who, like Lynn Seldon, understood the bond of those who wear the ring. Bravo!”—Ron Rash, bestselling author of Serena and Above the Waterfall
“Carolina’s Ring is an unforgettable story of love, loss, and redemption that will stay with you long after the final page is turned. As he did in his debut novel, Virginia’s Ring, Lynn Seldon offers an authentic, behind-the-scenes look at the unbreakable bonds of friendship and loyalty forged within the military college system.”—Cassandra King, bestselling author of Tell Me a Story: My Life with Pat Conroy
About the author
Graduate of Virginia Military Institute and U.S. Army veteran Lynn Seldon is a longtime writer with more than 500 magazine and newspaper credits, including USA Today, The Atlanta Journal- Constitution, TrailBlazer, airline inflights, several AAA publications, and dozens more. He is the author or coauthor of six nonfiction books, and the novels Virginia’s Ring and Carolina’s Ring. Lynn lives in Beaufort, South Carolina, with fellow writer and wife Cele Seldon.

This program and others like this would not be possible without your financial help for which, as always, Pat Conroy Literary Center gratefully thanks you.
