Member News & Announcements
Looking for a good read to shake off the doldrums?
Check out these titles by some of our SWA members.
Jayne Jaudon Ferrer
Jayne Jaudon Ferrer’s novel, Hayley and the Hot Flashes, has been chosen as an August 2023 Bonus Book Selection by the International Pulpwood Queens and Timber Guys Book Club. In addition to special August blogs and videos, Jayne will be a featured author at the club’s annual convention next January.
Marlene Ratledge Buchanan
Marlene Ratledge Buchanan’s latest book, Tips, Tricks, & Techniques: A Self-Directed Guide to Easier Learning (Ratledge Press), was released May 1, 2023.
Each person learns in his or her own way. This book provides tips that can make learning and memory stronger and easier.
Buchanan’s book is available at Amazon.com, Scribblersweb.com, MsRatWrites.com or through MsRatWrites@gmail.com.
Down a Dark Road transports readers to the shadowy forests of WWII Austria, where a weary and battle-worn Army platoon is about to discover the war’s darkest secret. As the conflict in Europe draws to a close, young Army lieutenant Jim Thayer finds himself and his platoon on the point of the American advance. Jim and his men are no strangers to the horrors of war, but what they find hidden in the woodlands of western
Sheila Hudson
Sheila S. Hudson won first place and $250 for her essay entry “Flower Power” in the ThinkingFunny.com Humor-Writing Contest. She said she originally entered the essay several years ago in a Southeastern Writers Association writing contest.
www.ThinkingFunny.com is a humor and comedy-writing community. In addition to their conferences, workshops, and retreats, they offer venues for writers to meet and collaborate.
H.W. "Buzz" Bernard
H.W. “Buzz” Bernard’s ninth novel, Down a Dark Road (Severn River Publishing), will be released May 9, 2023.
Down a Dark Road transports readers to the shadowy forests of WWII Austria, where a weary and battle-worn Army platoon is about to discover the war’s darkest secret. As the conflict in Europe draws to a close, young Army lieutenant Jim Thayer finds himself and his platoon on the point of the American advance. Jim and his men are no strangers to the horrors of war, but what they find hidden in the woodlands of western
Austria is beyond anything they have yet experienced.
Battling remnants of the legendary Waffen SS, Germany’s elite fighting force, Jim and his men come face to face with the true heart of darkness--the cruel brutality of the Nazi regime. They bear witness to the fields of death left in its wake.
Determined to hunt down the architect of this atrocity, Jim dispatches an unofficial pursuit team of unlikely allies—an American bomber pilot, a German Luftwaffe fighter pilot, and a young Austrian woman.
The war may be ending, but for these strange comrades in arms, the final battle is only just beginning.
Book may be purchased initially only on Amazon. But other outlets—Barnes & Noble, IndieBound, Books-A-Million, Waterstones, Fish Pond, Google Play—will come on-line on the publication date. https://www.buzzbernard.com/
Dawn Major
Southeastern Writers Association member Dawn Major, author of newly released
novel The Bystanders, has two upcoming author events in April.
On April 18, Major will be in conversation with local fiction author Ann Hite at Vintage Pizzaria, 5510 Chamblee Dunwoody Road, Dunwoody GA, 7-9 p.m. The two authors will discuss Hite’s latest haunted collection, The Haints on Black Mountain. Q&A and book signing will follow.
On April 29, Major will be at FoxTale Book Shoppe in Old Woodstock GA at 1 p.m.
to talk about her debut novel The Bystanders. The in-person event will be followed by Q&A and book signing. www.foxtalebookshoppe.com
Karen Jones
Karen Jones’s new novel The Summer of Grace (Brother Mockingbird) was released November 2, 2022. On March 7, 2023, the Virginia Beach Public Library released a YouTube video “Meet the Author” that features Jones giving insights into publishing and what it takes to write a book: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2gxXKp9K6Y
Set in the summer of 1951, The Summer of Grace is a coming-of-age story about 10-year-old Gracie, who becomes too much for her mother to handle and is sent along with her dog Brown Hound to spend the summer with Great Granny on the family farm in North Carolina. (www.kjwriter.com)
John Macllroy
John MacIlroy's book Whatever Happens, Probably Will (Short Story America), which was released May 15, 2022, had a formal launch event in October at the historic Lewis Reeve Sams home in Beaufort, SC. Named a 2022 finalist in the International Book Awards (Short Fiction), the book is a collection of eighteen short stories, including "Duke's," recognized as a Best of 2019; "The Man Inside," named a finalist in the 2021 Coker Fiction Fellowship and the Excellence in Southern Lowcountry Writing competition; and "Three Buses," winner of the 2021 Amy Munnell Prize.
In December, MacIlroy had a book signing at Main Street Reads in Summerville SC, and the book was recently selected as a January 2023 "Hot List" Pick by Local Life Magazine, which MacIlroy said "deftly leads the reader to the very moment when everything changes for the characters, then powers on to endings that reveal the fullness of the human condition."
In the spring, MacIlroy will be the featured author on the Los Angeles-based podcast "Writers Drinking Whiskey," where host and guest share a favorite "adult beverage" recipe, and a free-wheeling conversation about writing.
T.M. Brown's Shiloh Mystery Series is celebrating its fifth anniversary with updated book covers for Sanctuary, Testament, and Purgatory. He will host a Fifth Anniversary party on April 28, 6-8 p.m. at the Corner Arts Gallery, Newnan GA, where his storytelling first began.
In other news, Brown reports he has a new historical novel, The Last Laird of Sapelo, scheduled for release in July by Koehler Books. A cover reveal is coming soon.
In March, Brown will appear at the Atlanta Writers Club monthly meeting, where he will offer a preview of his upcoming historical novel and discuss his Shiloh Mystery Series novels. Also, March 24-25, Brown will be a presenting guest author at the Carrollton BookFest, Carrollton GA.
T.M. Brown
Dana Wildsmith
Dana Wildsmith has a new collection of poems scheduled for release from Madville Publishing in March 2023.
In the same spirit as the iconic The New Whole Earth Catalogue: access to tools, Wildsmith's book With Access to Tools offers a means for navigating a new time of change. Opening with a series of odes to traditional tools, each tool is shown inextricably bound to the hand and heart of the worker. The book then shifts, as has our world, to cyber tools which work at a physical remove that echoes the pandemic’s societal disruption. The book concludes with persona poems offering a note of hope through the strength of individual cerebral tools. www.danawildsmith.com/blog.html
Sheila Hudson
As "Author of the Month," Sheila Hudson is featured on the cover of the February 2023 edition of Opal Magazine for Writers. Also, Hudson's new book, Casket Chaos (Winged Publications), was released in December 2022. It is the fourth book in her Crimes from the Crypt cozy mystery series about Nadia, who returns to her hometown of Alto GA to assist her brother in running the family business, Carlton Manor -- the only funeral home in town. Nadia and Detective Colsen work together to solve crime and murder in their town. www.sheilashudson.website
Katherine Nichols
Katherine Nichols’ new book Trust Issues (Black Rose Writing) is scheduled to be released December 15, 2022.
The book is about Claire Kincaid, a rising star in a prominent Atlanta public relations firm and a self-proclaimed fixer. From high-profile clients embroiled in scandal to shady political campaigns, Claire can handle it.
Her personal life? Not so much.
Her fiancé, Rob Evans, shows more interest in her job than in her. Her mother, Janis, and grandmother, Jams, are feuding because Jams refuses to reveal the identity of Janis’s biological father. When her sleazy client, Judge Harrision, orders her to gather dirt on his opponent, Claire uncovers more than she bargained for, but it’s on her judge.
Those complications are nothing compared to her connection to the murder of a focus group member and the grieving daughter she leaves behind.
Claire must determine who she can trust and unravel the mess her life has become, or she could be the next on the killer’s list. www.kathy-nichols.com
C. Hope Clark
Clark's new book, Badge of Edisto (Bell Bridge Books), Book 9 in The Edisto Island Mysteries, was released on October 28, 2022.
When a shocking murder leaves more questions than answers, retired police chief Callie Jean Morgan feels guilty about abandoning her citizens and officers. She must decide whether to stay safely retired, or save Edisto from an unforeseen criminal element by reclaiming her true purpose -- solving big crimes in a small town.
Clark’s book may be purchased on Amazon, B&N, Google, Kobo, Apple, and from her web- site: www.chopeclark.com
Randy Mazie
Mazie had two books of poetry published in 2022-- Itches Inside My Head, Vol. 1, released in April; Itches Inside My Head, Vol 2, released in August, published by A Year of Encouragements Press LLC.
The books contain a series of classically inspired and fun family-focused children’s poetry, written for everyone ages 5 to 105, with or without children.
Illustrators include Luke Valentine, Garrett Madlock, Rachel Fichtel and student illustrators.
Many pieces explore family issues, growing pains, relationships, questioning the world around us, and encouraging children to write poetry.
Lynne Hesse
Lynne Hesse’s new crime novel A Matter of Respect (Scribblers
Press) was released November 22, 2022. It is Book 2 in her Murder in Mobile Series and the sequel to the Well of Rage.
In Book 2, Officer Carly Redmond witnesses a robbery in progress and makes an off-duty arrest of a mentally ill man that leads to the death of a fellow officer by the suspect, Joshua Randall, in the jail’s intake sally port.
During interrogation by her department’s Internal Affairs and the Alabama Bureau of Investigation, Carly learns the jail’s video of Joshua murdering the officer with a switchblade is missing, and the radio printout is altered. She is sure she patted down Joshua and bagged the knife, but “the powers that be” accuse her of negligence.
A Matter of Respect can be purchased on Amazon.com or Scribblersweb.com
Melinda Farris
Farris received an Honorable Mention from the Writer’s Digest 91st Annual Writing Competition for her short story “The Secret of Harper Lee.” An excerpt from her unpublished novel, The Fourth Degree, won an award and was selected for publication in The Seven Hills Literary Review, available from Amazon in March.
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