2023
WNBA Nashville members enjoyed dinner with authors Aime Card, Julia Franks, and Robert Mugge (filmmaker and picture taker) and his wife Diana at the Authors in the Round event, kickoff to the Southern Festival of Books.
by Jennifer Sellers, CWA assistant chair
LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION! Our annual CWA event was hosted in a new location this year, The Tennessee State Library & Archives. This change gave attendees a beautiful place to mingle with coffee, tea, and light treats before hearing from our impressive panel of authors. Afterward, we were able to dismiss right into the heart of the festival. A CWA first!
This year we welcomed Patti Callahan Henry (The Secret Book of Flora Lea), Sharon Cameron (Artifice), David Arnold (I Loved You in Another Life), and Jennifer Lynn Alvarez (friends like these). Our moderator, Nashville’s very own Ami McConnell, WNBA Nashville member and founder of WriterFest Nashville, kicked us off with each author telling us a little about themselves and their books. By the end, we were learning about secret writing trips disguised as yoga trips, that some “no’s” in the business are worth throwing a party for. . . especially if Stephen Spielberg is involved, and how you don’t have to be published to still be a writer. It was humorous, honest, and above all else, a delight to be a part of.
After the panel discussion concluded, we ended, as all good book events should, by passing out an assortment of complimentary books sponsored by Ingram Content Group and Hachette Nashville.
A BIG thank you to our authors, moderator, book sponsors, Starbucks on Indian Lake for the coffee, and all of our amazing WNBA volunteers who helped put together another amazing event.
A note from Genetta Adair, CWA chair
As a testament to the wonderful WNBA-Nashville Chapter, when I had a family emergency and could not attend our chapter’s signature Coffee with Authors event or the prior day of preparation work, many members stepped up to take my place and make this event a smashing success! I am especially grateful to my assistant, Jennifer Sellers, who attended to every single detail with a smile while encouraging me to not worry. The members of our WNBA Nashville Chapter are wonderful!
LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION! Our annual CWA event was hosted in a new location this year, The Tennessee State Library & Archives. This change gave attendees a beautiful place to mingle with coffee, tea, and light treats before hearing from our impressive panel of authors. Afterward, we were able to dismiss right into the heart of the festival. A CWA first!
This year we welcomed Patti Callahan Henry (The Secret Book of Flora Lea), Sharon Cameron (Artifice), David Arnold (I Loved You in Another Life), and Jennifer Lynn Alvarez (friends like these). Our moderator, Nashville’s very own Ami McConnell, WNBA Nashville member and founder of WriterFest Nashville, kicked us off with each author telling us a little about themselves and their books. By the end, we were learning about secret writing trips disguised as yoga trips, that some “no’s” in the business are worth throwing a party for. . . especially if Stephen Spielberg is involved, and how you don’t have to be published to still be a writer. It was humorous, honest, and above all else, a delight to be a part of.
After the panel discussion concluded, we ended, as all good book events should, by passing out an assortment of complimentary books sponsored by Ingram Content Group and Hachette Nashville.
A BIG thank you to our authors, moderator, book sponsors, Starbucks on Indian Lake for the coffee, and all of our amazing WNBA volunteers who helped put together another amazing event.
A note from Genetta Adair, CWA chair
As a testament to the wonderful WNBA-Nashville Chapter, when I had a family emergency and could not attend our chapter’s signature Coffee with Authors event or the prior day of preparation work, many members stepped up to take my place and make this event a smashing success! I am especially grateful to my assistant, Jennifer Sellers, who attended to every single detail with a smile while encouraging me to not worry. The members of our WNBA Nashville Chapter are wonderful!
Author David Arnold from our Coffee with Authors and Kayla Stierwalt, WNBA Nashville member, were repping Kentucky at the Southern Festival of Books. David is a musician and an author, and, at CWA, he was also a comedian! So funny and personable!
WNBA Nashville member and poet Elizabeth Katie signs her poetry collection for a fan at the WNBA Nashville vendor booth.
Boston WNBA member and author Aime Card and Nashville WNBA membership chair Catherine Hooper share a laugh while volunteering at the WNBA vendor booth.
WNBA member Barbie Chadwick interviews author Mark Greaney in the Cumberland Tent on Saturday.
WNBA member Barbie Chadwick interviews author Mark Greaney in the Cumberland Tent on Saturday.
WNBA Nashville was a proud vendor at SFB again this year. Some of our members volunteered to staff the booth for the two-day event. We love telling people about WNBA!
WNBA Network Member Sandy Barker from Des Moines, Iowa, and Nashville member Nancy Dickinson enjoyed getting together at Coffee with Authors. Sandy and Nancy met in the WNBA National Book Club which is held on Zoom.
WNBA Nashville member Dr. Yasmine Ali was a speaker at the festival. We asked her to share her experience with us. You can find more information about Dr. Ali's book at www.yasminealimd.com
It was yet another dream come true, the culmination of a year of dreams come true. First came the release, in February 2023, of my first published book, Walk through Fire: The Train Disaster that Changed America, a book on which I had been working for nearly 12 years, about the Waverly Train Disaster of 1978, which occurred in my own hometown of Waverly, Tennessee, and led to the creation of FEMA. Then came month upon month of sold-out and standing-room-only book signings and author events. And then, finally, an invitation to appear on an author panel at the Southern Festival of Books in Nashville, Tennessee, on October 22, 2023.
I am a native Tennessean and have been attending the Southern Festival of Books since I was a teenager, and I’ve been a published and award-winning poet and essayist for even longer than that, but it was only a distant hope that one day I would actually be one of the Festival’s featured authors. So, I was beyond delighted to appear with fellow authors Emily Strasser and Rachel Louise Martin on a panel exploring how the little-known events in Tennessee history that are the subjects of our books shaped national and world history, and continue to do so to the present day.
The room was packed—another event with standing-room only—and recorded by C-SPAN for Book TV! Yet another dream come true! It could not have gone better.
And, after the panel and subsequent book signing, I stopped by the exhibit tent for the Nashville chapter of the WNBA—the chapter I had proudly joined one year earlier at this very festival—and was greeted by the friendly faces of my fellow WNBA members, all eager to share my excitement. Many of these members had shown their support of me and my book throughout the year, and to have them there at the Festival was the icing on the cake. I am humbled by my blessings, and so fortunate to be a part of the WNBA.
--Yasmine S. Ali, MD
www.yasminealimd.com
