Authors
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Ellen
Booraem is a Massachusetts native whose love of writing began
during a childhood filled with books and reading. She has worked as a writer
and editor for college publications and for weekly newspapers in New England,
most recently as a contributing writer to the Ellsworth American. A
fiction-writing workshop in 2003 with Maine author Cynthia Thayer convinced
Ellen to rework a draft of a children’s book that became her new novel,
The Unnameables, “A Fantasy for Ages 10 and older,” published
in October, 2008 by Harcourt Children’s Books. Booraem is a member of
The Class of 2k8 (www.classof2k8.com),
a group of debut authors of middle-school and young adult novels. She lives
in Brooklin, Maine with her partner, artist Robert Shillady.
Kate
Braestrup's New York Times bestselling memoir, Here If You
Need Me (Little, Brown, 2007), is the powerful story of a personal tragedy
that inspired the author to move her life in an entirely new
direction. When her husband Drew, a Maine state trooper, was killed in
an automobile accident, Braestrup found herself a single parent of four.
After a period of grieving and coming to terms with her situation, she decided
to pursue and fulfill her husband's dream of becoming a Unitarian Universalist
minister and enrolled at the Bangor Theological Seminary. After ordination,
she became the first chaplain of the Maine Warden Service, which conducts
the state's search-and-rescue operations. Here If You Need Me is
part police procedural, part spiritual journey, often funny, always moving
and honest. Kate Braestrup is the author of a novel, Onion
(Viking, 1990), and has written for Mademoiselle, Ms., City Paper, Hope
and Law and Order. She lives in Lincolnville, Maine with her husband,
Simon van der Ven, and their six children.
Lyn
Mikel Brown, Ed.D. is a mom, professor, author, and community
activist. Her research on girls’ social and psychological development
has garnered her notice in magazines like People, Teen Voices, and Bitch,
as well as reviews in newspapers such as The New York Times and Boston Globe.
She is the author of four books, including Meeting at the Crossroads: Women’s
Psychology and Girls’ Development (co-authored with Carol Gilligan),
a 1992 New York Times Notable Book of the Year, and, most recently, Packaging
Girlhood: Rescuing Our Daughters From Marketers’ Schemes (co-authored
with Sharon Lamb), a 2006 Books for a Better Life Award winner.
Lyn grew up in Vanceboro and Calais. She attended the University of Maine, graduated
from Ottawa University in Ottawa, Kansas, and received her doctorate from Harvard
University in Human Development and Psychology. She is Professor of Education
and Human Development at Colby College, where she teaches courses in adolescent
development and girls’development. She is creator of the Waterville-based
nonprofit Hardy Girls Healthy Women, where she works with communities across
the state and nationally to support girls’ healthy development.
W.
Hodding Carter dreamed of being an Olympian as a kid. He
just missed qualifying for the Olympic trials in swimming as a college senior,
and although he didn't qualify for the 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, or
2004 Olympics, he never stopped believing he could make it. He swam
three to four miles each day, six days a week. He pumped iron, trained with
former Olympians, and consulted with swimming gurus and medical researchers
who taught him that the body doesn't have to age. He swam with sharks (inadvertently)
in the Virgin Islands, suffered hypothermia in a relay around Manhattan, and
put on fifteen pounds of muscle. Amazingly, he discovered that his heartbeat
could keep pace with that of the best of the younger swimmers. And each day
he felt stronger, swam faster, and became more convinced that he wasn't crazy.
Carter's new memoir, Off the Deep End (Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill,
2008), is the exhilarating story of a man who rebels against middle age the
only way he can—by chasing a dream. His article in Outside magazine,
on which this book is based, was the winner of a Lowell Thomas award from the
Society of American Travel Writers Foundation. He lives in midcoast Maine.
Carrie
Jones moved to Maine from her native New
Hampshire to study political science at Bates College and later graduated from
Vermont College’s MFA writing program. She has edited newspapers and poetry
journals and in May won the Independent Publishers Book Award for Best Young
Adult-Juvenile novel at Book Expo America for her first book, Tips on Having
a Gay (ex)Boyfriend (Flux). Other awards include the Martin Dibner Fellowship
and the Maine Literary Award. Jones’ whirlwind publishing success includes
two novels published in 2008, Love (and Other Uses for Duct Tape) and
her newest, Girl, Hero, both published by Flux. A member of The Class
of 2k7 (www.classof2k7.com), Jones is
currently running for a seat in the state legislature, representing House District
38, which includes her hometown of Ellsworth.
Robert Klose, a native of New Jersey, has been living in Maine since 1981. He is Associate Professor of biology at University College of Bangor, and the single father of two adopted sons, from Russia and Ukraine. A regular contributor of essays to The Christian Science Monitor, his work has also appeared in Newsweek, The Boston Globe, Reader’s Digest, Exquisite Corpse, and elsewhere. He is a four-time winner of the Maine Press Association's annual award for opinion writing. His most recent book, Small Worlds: Adopted Sons, Pet Piranhas, and Other Mortal Concerns (University of Missouri Press, 2006) is a collection of the cream of Klose’s Christian Science Monitor essays. Whether poignantly reflecting on the parent-child relationship or nostalgically recollecting the old-fashioned ice cream soda, Robert Klose is a writer whose voice rings true and is sure to appeal to fans of humorists like Garrison Keillor or Jean Shepherd.
Lynn Plourde is the author of more than
twenty picture books, including Pigs in the Mud in the Middle of the Rud,
Dino Pets, Science Fair Day, and The Dump Man’s Treasures. Her first
non-fiction children’s book is Margaret Chase Smith: A Woman for President
(Charlesbridge, 2008), a timeline biography of Plourde’s hometown hero,
Senator Smith. Lynn Plourde makes frequent visits to schools to teach students
how to plan and write their own stories. She currently lives with her family
in Winthrop, Maine.
Catherine Schmitt is the author of A Coastal Companion: A Year in the Gulf of Maine from Cape Cod to Canada (Tilbury House, 2008). She is a science writer for the Maine Sea Grant Program at the University of Maine in Orono and a contributing writer to the Atlantic Salmon Journal, Maine Environment, and other publications. A Coastal Companion is a journey through a year in the Gulf of Maine and its watershed. Part field guide, part almanac, the book also highlights writers, artists, and scientists who have chosen the Gulf of Maine as their subject matter. Poems by twelve contemporary poets open each chapter, and illustrations by two Maine artists are featured throughout the text. Schmitt will be joined at the Festival by contributing poets Kathleen Ellis, Leonore Hildebrandt, Annaliese Jakimides, and Patricia Ranzoni.
Jan West Schrock is the author of Give A Goat (Tilbury House, 2008), a true story about how even the smallest good-will efforts are rewarded with positive results. A template for adults and children who want to work together to experience the satisfaction of giving to others and making a difference in the world, the book illustrates the philanthropic process from inspiration through brainstorming to getting down to work, collecting funds and celebrating success. Schrock's father, Dan West, founded Heifers for Relief, and Jan herself, who spent 28 years as a classroom teacher, special needs teacher, and administrator, is now a senior advisor for Heifer International, an organization that has grown to serve over 8.5 million people in more than 125 countries. Jan lives in Westbrook, Maine, but travels the world to talk about "passing on the gift."
Matt
Tavares was born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1975 and grew up in Winchester,
a suburb just outside of Boston. Matt wrote and illustrated his first
picture book, Sebastian's Ball, as his senior thesis at Bates College.
Two years later, after much revision, Sebastian's Ball became Zachary's
Ball, his first published picture book, which went on to win an Oppenheim
Gold Seal Award, a Massachusetts Book Award Honor, and was named one of Yankee
Magazine's 40 Classic New England Children's Books. Since then, he has published
five more books, all with Candlewick Press, including Mudball, a finalist
for several state book awards and winner of a Parents' Choice Gold Award and
Oliver's Game, winner of a Parent's Choice Silver Honor and an International
Reading Association Children's Book Award. Tavares’ illustrations have
been exhibited at the Museum of American Illustration at the Society of Illustrators
and at the Brandywine River Museum. The dramatic illustrations for his newest
book, Lady Liberty: A Biography (Candlewick, 2008) with text by Doreen
Rappaport, have won outstanding praise from reviewers across the country. Matt
lives in Ogunquit, Maine with his wife, Sarah, and their two daughters.
Monica
Wood is a novelist, short-story writer, and teacher of fiction
workshops. Her most recent novel, Any Bitter Thing, (Chronicle Books,
2005) was a Top Ten Booksense pick, a Booksense Reading Group pick (Ballantine
Books, 2006), a top-ten finalist for "Best Spiritual Book of the Year"
at beliefnet.com and on the American Booksellers Association extended bestseller
list for 16 weeks. The San Francisco Chronicle called Any Bitter Thing
“[An] intimate exploration of love and faith, betrayal and penance [that]
illuminates the grace in the average and the everyday, the miracles that lie
within the ordinary life.” In addition to her novels and short stories,
Wood is the author of The Pocket Muse (Writers Digest Books, 2004)
and The Pocket Muse Endless Inspiration: New Ideas for Writing, (Writers
Digest Books, 2006) as well as anthologies and teaching guides for young adult
readers. Wood lives in southern Maine.
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