I Went to a Garden Party....All current WNBA Nashville members are invited to our annual Garden Party at the home of Barbie Chadwick on Thursday, May 16, at 5:30 pm.
This is our way of winding up our membership year with fun, food, and fellowship. It's a great way to get to know one another and to celebrate another successful year. All you have to do is show up and help celebrate. We especially hope our new members will attend so we can get to know you! If you need the address, contact us. Announcing the 2024-26 BoardMany thanks to our WNBA Nashville members who are stepping up to lead our organization for the next two years. Please let them know your suggestions and ideas for helping to grow and improve our association.
PRESIDENT: Ami McConnell VICE PRESIDENT: Lluvia Augustin SECRETARY: Melissa Collings TREASURER: Allison Stewart PROGRAMS: Linda Harris COFFEE WITH AUTHORS: Jennifer Sellers SOUTHERN FESTIVAL OF BOOKS: Libby Simons HOSPITALITY: Caitlin Cristman MEMBERSHIP: Catherine Hooper SOCIAL MEDIA/BOOK CLUB/LITERARY SOCIETY: Kayla Stierwalt WEBMASTER: Nancy Dickinson PAST PRESIDENT: Kathleen Dietz The BannedThe April meeting at Dalts focused on The Banned, a Q&A with two of Nashville's leading authorities on book banning and freedom of speech. The meeting was well attended with four guests and members totaling over 30 people. It was wonderful to welcome long time members Roger and Martha Bishop, Joanne Slaughter and Etta Wilson.
The room buzzed with conversation, and our speakers, Dr. John Viles and Lindsey Kimery, ensured that everyone was comfortable when asking questions about the challenging topic of banned books. Dr. Viles, author, constitutional scholar and Dean of the University Honors College at Middle Tennessee State University, shared a brief history of challenges this country has experienced through the years, such as the Sedition Act which made it a crime to criticize the president or Woodrow Wilson’s support for a return to segregation. He went on to say that we go through times that are more ideologic and hopes that some of the issues faced today will be overcome. Lindsey Kimery, coordinator of Library Services for Metro Nashville Public Schools and 2023 "Movers and Shakers" award winner from Library Journal, emphasized the importance of Nancy Dickinson getting her involved with TASL (Tenn Assn of School Librarians) and thanked WNBA for its donation to the organization. When she started monitoring the activities of the state legislature regarding books, she knew little about how to track a bill that had been proposed or what was meant when a bill was sent to summer study. Lindsey shared that a bill proposed in 2020 to criminalize librarians was sent to summer study where bills go to die. Changes have been made that includes the position of state coordinator in the Department of Education. There had not been one for many years previously. The Education Trust-Tennessee is led by a former Metro Nashville school board member. Information is invaluable and knowing sources to check for accurate data will benefit everyone. March MeetingLinda Harris, Program Chair, kicked off her first WNBA program on Thursday, March 7, at Dalts. It was a delightful evening with a book swap and conversation. We also heard from three of our most recent board members, Linda Harris, Program chair, Libby Simons, Southern Festival booth chair, and Catherine Hooper, Membership chair, about their experiences as WNBA Nashville board members.
Linda was generous sharing information about her experience with Hachette. Her friends at Hachette and Little Brown provided books for the book swap. Libby Simons is the new chair for the Southern Festival booth and shared experiences from her career and as a long time WNBA member. Catherine Hooper has been the Membership Chair for a year, and it was interesting to hear her thoughts about handling membership and her career as an event planner with Vanderbilt. It was a very casual evening and we encouraged WNBA members who have recently published to share information about their books. Several members participated: Lauren Thoman (I’ll Stop the World), Melissa Hogan (Afraid of the Doctor) and Melissa Collings (False Flat). Meredith Lyons was a guest at the March meeting and shared information about her recently published book Ghost Tamer. The book swap was opened up to the staff at Dalts. Books not chosen, and there were very few, were given to the Dalts manager whose apartment complex has a library. Join us for some conversation!Would you like to have a chance to socialize with your fellow members of WNBA without leaving home or having to fight Nashville traffic? At 7:00 pm on the third Thursday of February, April, June, August, October, and December, you can do just that! That is when we have our Literary Society meetings where we share books that we've been reading. But we also talk about life and get to know each other a little bit better. Join us for some online fellowship! You should receive an email with the Zoom link early in the week, but if you don't, let us know through the contact form on this site and we will send it to you. Our next Literary Society meeting is June 20 at 7:00 p.m. "I look forward to hearing everyone talk enthusiastically about the books they're reading, and what they most enjoyed. It's always a nice variety. My "books to read" list has grown every time we chat over Zoom." -- Tori Ross Southern Festival of Books 2024Humanities Tennessee has announced that the 2024 Southern Festival of Books will be held October 26-27 at the Tennessee State Library and Archive, Tennessee State Museum, and Bicentennial Capitol Mall State Park! Authors in the Round, the annual fundraising special event featuring 40+ Festival authors, will be held Friday, October 25th at the Country Music Hall of Fame. Mark your calendar now!
There’s a new author and publisher’s event coming to Nashville…. It’s called the Books, Authors & Publishers Fair (www.BAPFair.com). The organizer (who is also an author) has planned the event to be for authors, publishers, book sellers and anyone connected with the wonderful, inspiring world of books. Initial plans include:
The organizers are hoping to attract local booksellers, and those providing publishing & author services such as: Printers, designers, editors, distributors, book marketing experts etc. Plus libraries, associations, book clubs anything book or literary. There will be a used book drop off -- all sale proceeds to charity. Visit the website to sign up for more information, or go to the FaceBook event page. Contact details: Paul Rowney, PHR Media. Email: expo@phrmedia.com. www.bapfair.com Tel: 615 457 2816 Member News Don't forget to check out our Member News page regularly. Our members are doing great things and have great tips for you! If you have anything you would like to add, complete our contact form. Member news can be about anything that you want to share, your retirement, a promotion at work, your latest publication, your appearances, or a work in progress. News of current members only will be published. Our members are awesome! Did you realize there are more pages on our website than this one? Click above the website header on the three lines or the plus sign to find the links to our other pages. You'll find lots more content and information! |
This panel is a collaboration between multiple chapters of the Women's National Book Association (WNBA) and perspectives include author, librarian, educator, legal, publishing, and bookseller.
Ami McConnell (WNBA Nashville member) will be the moderator. The panelists will be: Jessica Nettles -- author and K-12 educator Megan Atkinson -- university educator and librarian Cheryl Davis -- legal Patricia Glass Schuman -- librarian Linda Harris -- publishing (WNBA Nashville member) Angela Redden -- bookseller (WNBA Nashville member) Date: May 15th Time: 7pm Eastern (spearheaded by the Atlanta chapter) Location: Live through Zoom RSVP / Ticketing: CLICK HERE A Little Boost...Some of our members launched books during the Pandemic when people just weren't getting out to bookstores very much. So we would like to give their books a little boost and feature them here on the website. Let us know if you also had a pandemic book!
Melissa Hogan's first book, "Afraid of the Doctor: Every Parent’s Guide to Preventing and Managing Medical Trauma,” released in July 2021 during COVID, so I would love for it to be shared in whatever way possible! After living with my son’s experiences of medical trauma (think of PTSD from medical conditions and experiences) for many years and researching and writing about how we had learned to address it, I approached one of the leading specialists in medical trauma, Dr. Meghan Marsac, a pediatric psychologist at the University of Kentucky, to write this book together to help parents, families, and healthcare providers.
Afraid of the Doctor educates readers about what is (and isn’t) medical trauma, discusses the important role that caregivers can play within their loved one’s medical team, and shares specific strategies for preventing and managing medical trauma. It illustrates how to adjust those strategies for special populations such as very young children or individuals who are nonverbal or have cognitive impairment, and also addresses potential medical trauma in caregivers themselves. The book has been endorsed by leaders in the medical field such as the Child Neurology Foundation, the chair of pediatrics at Vanderbilt Children’s Hospital, the Director of the Center for Pediatric Traumatic Stress at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, and the heads of various rare disease organizations. Readers can find more information at afraidofthedoctor.com and the hardback book can be purchased on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and other venues. The paperback edition is expected to release on July 2, 2024! Janet Lee is the illustrator for the Trot & Cap'n Bill Adventure series by Amy Chu.
Sea Sirens 9780451480170 https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/573447/sea-sirens-by-amy-chu-illustrated-by-janet-k-lee/ Sky Island 9780451480248 https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/573450/sky-island-by-amy-chu-illustrated-by-janet-k-lee/ She is currently writing (as well as illustrating) a graphic novel for Roaring Brook, so more on that presently! Margaret Thomson is the author of The World Looks Different Now: A Memoir of Suicide, Faith, and Family. Margaret received the IBPA (Independent Book Publishers Association) Benjamin Franklin Award. The back copy for Margaret and the book reads: The World Looks Different Now takes readers behind the statistics and into the private world of a family whose lives are forever changed following the suicide of the family’s older son less than three months before he was due to deploy to Afghanistan. A journalist as well as a grieving mother, author Margaret Thomson instinctively turned to writing during the weeks, months, and even years following her son’s death in an effort to make sense out of a seemingly senseless act that she never dreamed could happen. In The World Looks Different Now, Thomson chronicles the difficult journey that she and her husband, along with their surviving son, are forced to embark upon as they move toward eventual – if only partial – healing.
The Book ReviewWe would like to post book reviews here on the website, written by our members. So, if you know of a great book that you would like to share with us, please send your original review to wnbanashwebsite@gmail.com. It can even be a review of your own book! Here's the first in what we hope will be our series.
by Sandy Stahl In The Jackson River Bridge: A Memoir by Noah Waters author Elliot Light takes the reader on a poignant exploration of memory and development. From the internal perspective of the main character, the reader can feel and see the daily struggles of someone who is trying to cope with a family and society that has little empathy for his position as a neuro-diverse child. Jeff Cutter tries to cope, to fit in, and simply to survive despite his unexpected and disconcerting responses to normal social cues. While society often demonstrates little tolerance for those who don’t meet normal expectations, Jeff Cutter doggedly pushes forward to learn strategies to fit in as well as to discover who he is. This book pushed all my buttons. I was angry about the abuse he received from family and strangers. I felt triumphant at his successes and disturbed by his confusion and despair. I laughed with him on the rare occasions when he experienced happiness. No child should have to struggle as he did to reach adulthood and discover his goodness or his soul. For all of his difficulty in relating to people due to his autism, Jeff Cutter eventually discovered ways of connecting with people. He found his identity and a new name. The idea that Jeff wasn’t finished and that strangers committed to helping him find himself is powerful. That sort of kindness and investment of people in the well-being of others is special and so is The Jackson River Bridge: A Memoir by Noah Waters. You will not be disappointed in this memoir. Available in paperback, hardback, and on Kindle through Amazon.
May 18, 2024 10:00 am Book Discussion From #1 New York Times bestselling author Brandon Sanderson comes a rollicking, riveting tale set in the Cosmere universe—a standalone adventure perfect for fans of The Princess Bride.
The only life Tress has known on her island home in an emerald-green ocean has been a simple one, with the simple pleasures of collecting cups brought by sailors from faraway lands and listening to stories told by her friend Charlie. But when his father takes him on a voyage to find a bride and disaster strikes, Tress must stow away on a ship and seek the Sorceress of the deadly Midnight Sea. Amid the spore oceans where pirates abound, can Tress leave her simple life behind and make her own place sailing a sea where a single drop of water can mean instant death? All book discussions are currently being held on Zoom.
Contact wnbanashwebsite@gmail.com for the link. Click here to see our Upcoming Book Discussions May 18 July 20 September 21 November 16 Next Literary Society: April 18 , 2024 WNBA Loves Books!
We write them, we publish them, we sell them, we teach children and adults to read and appreciate them, we loan them, we borrow them, we give them, we read them, we listen to them, and we share them with friends. --Lee Fairbend |
Questions?
All events, with the exception of the annual Christmas dinner and the Garden Party, are free and open to the public. For more information, or to request a Zoom code, contact wnbanashwebsite@gmail.com
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