AWM Author Talks

This week, we’re proud to present a conversation about the slippery slope of censorship and what you can do to preserve your community’s freedom to read. Young Adult and Children’s book author Jarrett Dapier appears in conversation with Deborah Caldwell-Stone, Director of the ALA Office for Intellectual Freedom and Kristin Pekoll, Assistant Director of the ALA Office for Intellectual Freedom.

Learn more about and get involved with Unite Against Book Bans, a national initiative from the ALA to empower readers everywhere to stand together in the fight against censorship. Open access for all people to books and stories of all kinds is critical to democracy, and we all need to work to ensure everyone has the freedom to read.

This conversation originally took place May 15, 2022 and was recorded live at the American Writers Festival.

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More about the panelists:

Jarrett Dapier is the author of the picture books Mr. Watson’s Chickens (Chronicle Books), Jazz For Lunch! (Simon & Schuster), and The Most Haunted House in America (Abrams Kids). Also a librarian, he is the recipient of the 2016 John Phillip Immroth Award given by the American Library Association for his research which uncovered previously suppressed information about the 2013 censorship of the graphic novel Persepolis in Chicago Public Schools. His first graphic novel – Wake Now in the Fire – is based on this research and will be released by Chronicle Books in 2023.

Deborah Caldwell-Stone is director of the American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom and Executive Director of the Freedom to Read Foundation. For nearly two decades she has supported and advised libraries, librarians, and trustees addressing book censorship and privacy issues in their libraries. She is a former appellate litigator.

Kristin Pekoll is the Assistant Director at the ALA Office for Intellectual Freedom. She is a former youth librarian from Wisconsin and a lifelong Green Bay Packers fan who happens to live in Chicago Bears country. She is the author of Beyond Banned Books: Defending Intellectual Freedom throughout Your Library published by ALA Editions in 2019.

Students from the National Student Poets Program discuss their work and the importance of poetry in the lives of young people today. The National Student Poets Program is the nation’s highest honor for young poets (grades 10–11) creating original work. Annually, five students are selected for one year of service, each representing a different geographic region of the country. The Program believes in the power of youth voices to create and sustain meaningful change, and supports them in being heard. Four of the five 2021 National Student Poets joined us for this program: Aanika Eragam, Kevin Gu, Kechi Mbah, and Sarah Fathima Mohammed.

The following conversation originally took place May 15th, 2022 and was recorded live at the American Writers Festival.

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About the 2021 National Student Poets:

Aanika Eragam is a senior at Milton High School in Milton, Georgia who serves as the 2021 National Student Poet for the Southeast. Through her mother’s bedtime tales of South Indian mythology, Aanika was first exposed to the power of storytelling in connecting her to her cultural heritage, unlocking foreign perspectives, and exploring history. Since then, she’s written poetry and creative nonfiction about culture, family, girlhood, and body image. Aanika serves as the 2021 Atlanta Youth Poet Laureate and the Editor-in-Chief of her high school literary magazine The Globe.

Kevin Gu is a Chinese American from Boston and the 2021 National Student Poet of the Northeast. His work has been included in Rattle, The National Poetry Quarterly, Ember Journal, and The Eunoia Review among others. On his off days, he enjoys hunting for underrated boba shops and eating cold watermelon.

Kechi Mbah is a senior at Carnegie Vanguard High School and a Houston native. She first found a love for poetry when she stumbled upon a YouTube video of a Brave New Voices slam competition in the fall of 2019 and has been performing and writing poetry ever since. Her poetry explores many avenues from making the known strange to chronicling her experiences as a Nigerian-American and the histories of her people. She currently serves as the 2021 National Student Poet of the Southwest and her work can be found in Blue Marble Review, The Incandescent Review, elementia, and elsewhere.

Sarah Fathima Mohammed, daughter of Indian Muslim immigrants, is the 2021-22 National Student Poet representing the West Region, the nation’s highest honor for youth poets. She writes poetry sourced in grief, faith, and longing because, for her people, these emotions are inherited. When she travels back to her hometown in Kumbakonam, India, Sarah sits in circles with girls at the mosque, reading Safia Elhillo and Fatimah Asghar’s anthology of Muslim voices, Halal If You Hear Me. When she is not writing, Sarah loves long morning walks with her family and listening to music by Yuna.

This week, poets Angela Jackson, Johanny Vázquez Paz, Faisal Mohyuddin, and Carlos Cumpián read from and discuss their contributions to the recent collection Wherever I’m At: An Anthology of Chicago Poetry.

The following conversation originally took place May 15, 2022 and was recorded live at the American Writers Festival.

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About Wherever I'm At:

The Chicago Literary Hall of Fame has partnered with Chicago publishers After Hours Press and Third World Press to produce a definitive collection of poetry by living Chicago poets. "Wherever I'm At: An Anthology of Chicago Poetry" features the work of a widely diverse list of over 160 poets and artists all with strong ties to Chicagoland. With a Foreword by noted scholar Carlo Rotello, the new anthology is edited by Donald G. Evans (executive director of the Chicago Literary Hall of Fame) who completed the project begun by the late poet-editor-teacher Robin Metz formerly of Knox College.

A dazzling array of voices representing many generations of Chicagoans grace the pages of "Wherever I'm At" including essential poets such as Li-Young Lee, Elizabeth Alexander, Stuart Dybek, Angela Jackson, Tyehimba Jess, Sandra Cisneros, Campbell McGrath, Ana Castillo, Maxine Chernoff, Patricia Smith, Edward Hirsch, Kathleen Rooney, Luis Alberto Urrea, Emily Jungmin Yoon, Luis J. Rodriguez, Elise Paschen, Sterling Plumpp, Marianne Boruch, Haki Madhubuti, Rachel DeWoskin, Ed Roberson, Tara Betts, and Reginald Gibbons, to name a few. The list is exhaustive in its diversity and according to editor Don Evans, deliberately so. This anthology also showcases the incredible visuals of an equally talented group of Chicago artists whose work amplifies the poetic musings throughout.

This week, bestselling mystery novelist Amanda Flower discusses her latest multi award nominated novel Because I Could Not Stop for Death: An Emily Dickinson Mystery. In this first book in an all new series, Emily Dickinson and her housemaid, Willa Noble, realize there is nothing poetic about murder…

Flower is joined by author and scholar Peter Coviello to discuss her book and Dickinson’s literary legacy.

The following conversation originally took place March 26, 2023 and was recorded live at the American Writers Museum.

This week, Caits Meissner and Nicole Shawan Junior discuss their contributions to The Sentences That Create Us: Crafting A Writer’s Life in Prison. They are joined by Alicia Brown.

The following conversation originally took place May 15, 2022 and was recorded live at the American Writers Festival.

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More about The Sentences That Create Us:

The Sentences That Create Us provides a road map for incarcerated people and their allies to have a thriving writing life behind bars—and shared beyond the walls—that draws on the unique insights of more than fifty contributors, most themselves justice-involved, to offer advice, inspiration and resources.

The Sentences That Create Us draws from the unique insights of over fifty justice-involved contributors and their allies to offer inspiration and resources for creating a literary life in prison. Centering in the philosophy that writers in prison can be as vibrant and capable as writers on the outside, and have much to offer readers everywhere, The Sentences That Create Us aims to propel writers in prison to launch their work into the world beyond the walls, while also embracing and supporting the creative community within the walls.

The Sentences That Create Us is a comprehensive resource writers can grow with, beginning with the foundations of creative writing. A roster of impressive contributors including Reginald Dwayne Betts (Felon: Poems), Mitchell S. Jackson (Survival Math), Wilbert Rideau (In the Place of Justice) and Piper Kerman (Orange is the New Black), among many others, address working within and around the severe institutional, emotional, psychological and physical limitations of writing prison through compelling first-person narratives. The book's authors offer pragmatic advice on editing techniques, pathways to publication, writing routines, launching incarcerated-run prison publications and writing groups, lesson plans from prison educators and next-step resources.

Threaded throughout the book is the running theme of addressing lived trauma in writing, and writing's capacity to support an authentic healing journey centered in accountability and restoration. While written towards people in the justice system, this book can serve anyone seeking hard won lessons and inspiration for their own creative—and human—journey.

The Sentences That Create Us includes contributions from Alexa Alemanni; Raquel Almazan; Ellen Bass; Reginald Dwayne Betts; Keri Blakinger; Jennifer Bowen; Zeke Caligiuri; Sterling Cunio; Chris Daley; Curtis Dawkins; Emile DeWeaver; Casey Donahue; Ryan Gattis; Eli Hager; Ashley Hamilton, PhD; Kenneth Hartman; Elizabeth Hawes; Randall Horton; Spoon Jackson; Mitchell S. Jackson; Nicole Shawan Junior; Yukari Iwatani Kane, Shaheen Pasha, and Kate McQueen of The Prison Journalism Project; Piper Kerman; Lauren Kessler; Johnny Kovatch; Doran Larson; Victoria Law; Jaeah Lee; John J. Lennon; Arthur Longworth; T Kira Mahealani Madden; J. D. Mathes; Justin Rovillos Monson; Lateef Mtima, JD; Vivian D. Nixon; Patrick O'Neil; Liza Jessie Peterson; Wilbert Rideau; Alejo Rodriguez; Luis J. Rodriguez; Susan Rosenberg; Geraldine Sealey; Sarah Shourd; Sarah Shourd; Anderson Smith, PhD; Derek R. Trumbo Sr.;

This week, Reverend Wheeler Parker, Jr.—Emmett Till's cousin, best friend, and the last surviving witness of the night Till was lynched—discusses his book A Few Days Full of Trouble with co-author Christopher Benson.

The following conversation originally took place March 16th, 2023 and was recorded live at the American Writers Museum.

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More about A Few Days Full of Trouble:

The last surviving witness to the lynching of Emmett Till tells his story, with poignant recollections of Emmett as a boy, critical insights into the recent investigation, and powerful lessons for racial reckoning, both then and now.

In 1955, Emmett Till was lynched when he was fourteen years old. That remains an undisputed fact of the case that ignited a flame within the Civil Rights Movement that has yet to be extinguished. Yet the rest of the details surrounding the event remain distorted by time and too many tellings. What does justice mean in the resolution of a cold case spanning nearly seven decades? In A Few Days Full of Trouble, this question drives a new perspective on the story of Emmett Till, relayed by his cousin and best friend—the Reverend Wheeler Parker Jr., a survivor of the night of terror when young Emmett was taken from his family's rural Mississippi Delta home in the dead of night.

In a hypnotic interplay between uncovered facts and vivid recall, Rev. Parker offers an emotional and suspenseful page-turner, set against a backdrop of reporting errors and manipulations, racial reckoning, and political pushback—and he does so accompanied by never-before-seen findings in the investigation, the soft resurrection of memory, and the battle-tested courage of faith. A Few Days Full of Trouble is a powerful work of truth-telling, a gift to readers looking to reconcile the weight of the past with a hope for the future.

This week, historian and author Deborah Cohen discusses her book Last Call at the Hotel Imperial: The Reporters Who Took on a World at War. Cohen is joined in conversation by Daniel Greene, President and Librarian at the Newberry Library.

The following conversation originally took place at the American Writers Festival on May 15, 2022 and was recorded live.

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More about Last Call at the Hotel Imperial:

A prize-winning historian's "effervescent" (The New Yorker) account of a close-knit band of wildly famous American reporters who, in the run-up to World War II, took on dictators and rewrote the rules of modern journalism.

They were an astonishing group: glamorous, gutsy, and irreverent to the bone. As cub reporters in the 1920s, they roamed across a war-ravaged world, sometimes perched atop mules on wooden saddles, sometimes gliding through countries in the splendor of a first-class sleeper car. While empires collapsed and fledgling democracies faltered, they chased deposed empresses, international financiers, and Balkan gun-runners, and then knocked back doubles late into the night.

Last Call at the Hotel Imperial is the extraordinary story of John Gunther, H. R. Knickerbocker, Vincent Sheean, and Dorothy Thompson. In those tumultuous years, they landed exclusive interviews with Hitler and Mussolini, Nehru and Gandhi, and helped shape what Americans knew about the world. Alongside these backstage glimpses into the halls of power, they left another equally incredible set of records. Living in the heady afterglow of Freud, they subjected themselves to frank, critical scrutiny and argued about love, war, sex, death, and everything in between.

Plunged into successive global crises, Gunther, Knickerbocker, Sheean, and Thompson could no longer separate themselves from the turmoil that surrounded them. To tell that story, they broke long-standing taboos. From their circle came not just the first modern account of illness in Gunther's Death Be Not Proud—a memoir about his son's death from cancer—but the first no-holds-barred chronicle of a marriage: Sheean's Dorothy and Red, about Thompson's fractious relationship with Sinclair Lewis.

Told with the immediacy of a conversation overheard, this revelatory book captures how the global upheavals of the twentieth century felt up close.

This week, Natalie Y. Moore discusses her play The Billboard with J. Nicole Brooks. As a play and a book, The Billboard is a cultural force that treats abortion as more than pro-life or pro-choice.

The following conversation originally took place at the American Writers Festival on May 15, 2022 and was recorded live.

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More about The Billboard:

The Billboard is about a fictional Black women's clinic in Chicago's Englewood neighborhood on the South Side and its fight with a local gadfly running for City Council who puts up a provocative billboard: "Abortion is genocide. The most dangerous place for a Black child is his mother's womb," spurring on the clinic to fight back with their own provocative sign: "Black women take care of their families by taking care of themselves. Abortion is self-care. #Trust Black Women." The book also has a foreword and afterword and Q&A with a founder of reproductive justice. As a play and book, The Billboard is a cultural force that treats abortion as more than pro-life or pro-choice.

This week, political scientist Dr. Clarence Lusane discusses his book Twenty Dollars and Change: Harriet Tubman and the Ongoing Fight for Racial Justice and Democracy. He is interviewed by journalist Arionne Nettles.

The following conversation originally took place February 23, 2023 and was recorded live via Zoom.

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More about Twenty Dollars and Change:

Twenty Dollars and Change places Harriet Tubman's life and legacy in a long tradition of resistance, illuminating the ongoing struggle to realize a democracy in which her emancipatory vision prevails.

America is in the throes of a historic reckoning with racism, with the battle for control over official narratives at ground zero. Across the country, politicians, city councils, and school boards are engaged in a highly polarized debate about whose accomplishments should be recognized, and whose point of view should be included in the telling of America's history.

In Twenty Dollars and Change, political scientist Clarence Lusane, author of the acclaimed The Black History of the White House, writes from a basic premise: Racist historical narratives and pervasive social inequities are inextricably linked--changing one can transform the other. Taking up the debate over the future of the twenty-dollar bill, Lusane uses the question of Harriet Tubman vs. Andrew Jackson as a lens through which to view the current state of our nation's ongoing reckoning with the legacies of slavery and foundational white supremacy. He places the struggle to confront unjust social conditions in direct connection with the push to transform our public symbols, making it plain that any choice of whose life deserves to be remembered and honored is a direct reflection of whose basic rights are deemed worthy of protection, and whose are not.

This week, activist and author Will Jawando discusses his book My Seven Black Fathers: A Young Activist’s Memoir of Race, Family and the Mentors Who Made Him Whole. He is joined by Ambassador Carolyn Curiel.

The following conversation originally took place May 15th, 2022 at the American Writers Festival and was recorded live.

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More about My Seven Black Fathers:

Will Jawando tells a deeply affirmative story of hope and respect for men of color at a time when Black men are routinely stigmatized. As a boy growing up outside DC, Will, who went by his Nigerian name, Yemi, was shunted from school to school, never quite fitting in. He was a Black kid with a divorced white mother, a frayed relationship with his biological father, and teachers who scolded him for being disruptive in class and on the playground. Eventually, he became close to Kalfani, a kid he looked up to on the basketball court. Years after he got the call telling him that Kalfani was dead, another sickening casualty of gun violence, Will looks back on the relationships with an extraordinary series of mentors that enabled him to thrive.

Among them were Mr. Williams, the rare Black male grade school teacher, who found a way to bolster Will's self-esteem when he discovered he was being bullied; Jay Fletcher, the openly gay colleague of his mother who got him off junk food and took him to his first play; Mr. Holmes, the high school coach and chorus director who saw him through a crushing disappointment; Deen Sanwoola, the businessman who helped him bridge the gap between his American upbringing and his Nigerian heritage, eventually leading to a dramatic reconciliation with his biological father; and President Barack Obama, who made Will his associate director of public engagement at the White House--and who invited him to play basketball on more than one occasion. Without the influence of these men, Will knows he would not be who he is today: a civil rights and education policy attorney, a civic leader, a husband, and a father.

Drawing on Will's inspiring personal story and involvement in My Brother's Keeper, President Obama's national initiative to address persistent opportunity gaps facing boys and young men of color, My Seven Black Fathers offers a transformative way for Black men to shape the next generation.