The South Carolina Academy of Authors will induct four new writers into the Palmetto State’s literary hall of fame in a weekend featuring an awards dinner, free public conversations, exhibitions, and tours in Beaufort, April 27–29. The SCAA’s 32nd annual induction weekend will honor the literary contributions of James Beard Award-winning cookbook author Nathalie Dupree, New York Times best-selling novelist Mary Alice Monroe, Pushcart Prize-winning fiction writer Valerie Sayers, and dramatist and first director of the SC […]

“A genuine dialogue has to happen across cultural boundaries—not just preaching to the choir—and it has to be done quietly where each gets to speak and everyone listens…. [W]e must seek out each other for quiet, likely uncomfortable, but hopefully genuine dialogue.”

Anthony Grooms is a celebrated poet, short story […]

“My fiction illuminates the everyday conditions of characters who, at first glance, may live lives very different than my readers, but with whom, ultimately, my readers will empathize. I look for the connectedness among human beings.”

It’s a good sign when book reviewers favorably compare your debut novel to the work of John Steinbeck. Lowcountry native Michel Stone was on the receiving end of such high praise for her 2012 novel The Iguana Tree. In it, Stone introduced readers […]

“My reputation is the kind you can’t ruin.”—Marshall Chapman

Marshall Chapman grew up in Spartanburg, South Carolina. As a debutante and the daughter of a textile mill owner she started life “firmly part of proper society” but was determined to make a very different life doing something else – somewhere else.

At the tender age of 7, Chapman saw Elvis perform and knew immediately what that something else was. Her memoir Goodbye, Little Rock & Roller details much of […]

“Reading helps me know what to do in my life and in the world. It also increases my capacity for empathy, which is a muscle that needs constant exercise or it atrophies. Reading widely is the best way I know to become more empathetic—when you walk miles in someone else’s shoes you can walk farther and with more purpose in your own.”—Will Schwalbe

Author of the New York Times best sellers The End of Your Life Book Club and Books […]

“Growing up in a small southern town, you get to know who the storytellers are…. It took me a long time to come to the conclusion that, yes, I wanted to be a writer. But I was always a story chaser.”

Novelist J.C. Sasser, author of Gradle Bird, made a return appearance on Porch Talk–following her earlier print interview with Conroy Center executive director Jonathan Haupt–in this Porch Talk Live appearance at the Beaufort County Library’s main branch […]