Children’s book author/illustrator team featured speakers at conference

Published 9:57 pm Monday, January 20, 2014

CONTRIBUTED A CREATIVE PAIR: Children’s book author/illustrator team Suzanne Tate and James Melvin will be the featured speakers at the Pamlico Writers Conference on March 8. Tate will talk about her award-winning work while Melvin will illustrate her speech.

CONTRIBUTED
A CREATIVE PAIR: Children’s book author/illustrator team Suzanne Tate and James Melvin will be the featured speakers at the Pamlico Writers Conference on March 8. Tate will talk about her award-winning work while Melvin will illustrate her speech.

 

From the Pamlico Writers Conference

 

The children’s book author/illustrator team Suzanne Tate and James Melvin will highlight the second annual Pamlico Writers Conference to be held March 8 in the Washington Civic Center. The scheduled keynote speech at 1:30 p.m. will feature author Suzanne Tate talking about writing children’s books, while her illustrator, James Melvin, draws to illustrate her speech.

Teachers, marine educators and parents use Tate’s nature and history books that have sold over two million copies. She has received many awards in her career, with two titles awarded “Children’s Choice” in a joint project by the International Reading Association and Children’s Book Council. Children across the country each year choose the books they like best for the award.

Special tickets for the keynote speech are $10, while a box lunch is $10 (if available). The box lunches will be sold at the door.

The Art and Craft of Writing is the theme for the 2014 writers conference. A 9 a.m. welcome by Beaufort County Arts Council’s Executive Director Joey Toler will be followed by a panel discussion on The Craft of Writing, AKA The Labor After the Inspiration, which will include discussions on refining, editing, book design and publishing. Morning and afternoon workshop sessions will be lead by recognized authors of fiction, creative non-fiction, poetry and young adult fiction.

Three morning workshop sessions will be followed by lunch and the keynote speakers.  Three afternoon sessions will conclude with the competition awards ceremony and a social time with light hors d’oeuvres. Literary vendors will be present throughout the day.

Conference registration will conclude on March 5, with a limited number of registrations available at the door. The conference registration fee is $49, including a box lunch.

The 2014 blind-juried writing competition will have five categories: Fiction, Creative Nonfiction, Young Adult, Poetry and a special High School contest. The first four categories require a $10 reading fee (for the poetry category the fee is $10 for three poems) and will feature first-place awards of $100 and second-place awards of $50. The high-school category will not require a reading fee in keeping with our desire to promote creative writing in high school. The single high-school winner will receive a $500 cash scholarship. Winning entries may be featured in the spring issue of The Washington Magazine. The competition will conclude on Feb. 23.

Registration and competition entries can be made online at www.pamlicowritersconference.org. Participants will be required to create a free account in order to register for the conference or submit a competition entry. All registration and reading fees can be paid through PayPal using a credit card of choice. Competition entries can be made by uploading work in Microsoft Word (in a .doc or .docx format) or Adobe Acrobat (.pdf) format.

Registration and competition entries may be made in person at the Beaufort County Arts Council office at the Turnage Theater in downtown Washington. Competition entries must be submitted in digital format via a CD or thumb drive.