Ever wanted to have coffee or grab a bite to eat with a favorite author? Place your bids for the opportunity at the 22nd Annual Shelter House Book Sale Silent Auction March 30 & 31! Check out shelterhouseiowa.org/book- sale/ for more information. See you there! Marvin Bell served two terms as Iowa’s first Poet Laureate. Retired after forty years teaching for the Writers’ Workshop, he teaches for the brief-residency Prior to getting his PhD in 1986, Larry Baker was, MFA program located in Oregon at Pacific University. He has published 24 books and is known in no particular order in a list not meant to be also for his collaborations with other artists and for his comprehensive: a Pizza Hut manager, Pinkerton influential teaching. Bell has been called "ambitious security guard, emcee at a strip club, without pretension." Reviewers have said, "Marvin ad salesman, sports reporter, and Bell enlarges our understanding of what poetry can hotel desk clerk. Most do,” and "Bell's poems, beyond their formal mastery, importantly, he owned and constitute an admirable project whose interrogations operated movie theatres run deep. Bell edited poetry for five years for The throughout Oklahoma and North American Review at its rebirth and for two Texas for fifteen years. years for The Iowa Review at its birth. He began and Although he had been publishing edited for five years “New Poets / Small Books for short stories since he was a Lost Horse Press”, a series that published 15 poets, teenager, he was fifty before his first three to a volume. He designed and taught for five novel, The Flamingo Rising (Knopf-1997), was years a summer workshop for teachers published. Flamingo was one of three finalists for the from the urban program America Barnes and Noble “Great New Voices” award for SCORES. Recipient of “the 1997, a Los Angeles Times “Top 100” book for 1997, Lamont Award” for his first book, and chosen by the Iowa Center for the Book to Guggenheim and NEA represent Iowa at the 2010 National Book Festival in Fellowships, Senior Fulbright’s to Washington. It was also adapted for a Hallmark TV Yugoslavia and Australia, and movie in 2001. With those pro-family credentials awards from the Academy of established, Flamingo was also included on the American Poets and the American American Library Association’s “Banned Books” list Academy of Arts and Letters. for 2011. A short, snappy interview can be seen online in the His third novel, A Good Man (2009), was nominated "On the Fly" series at for “Book of the Year” by the Southeast Independent www.youtube.com/watch?v=lC1-Bt8n_Iw . Booksellers Association in 2010. A brief interview by Emily Sernaker, with photos, His fourth novel, Love and Other Delusions (2012), based on the poem “To Dorothy” and on Dorothy and was a dramatic departure for Baker in style and theme. Marvin’s history as a couple can be seen online at: As he says, "This is definitely not Hallmark material." www.therumpus.net/2018/03/poetry-is-a- Larry was included on the Iowa Literary Walk of manifestation-of-a-life-talking-with-marvin-bell/. Fame in 2010; joining other writers such as John “After the Fact: Scripts & Postscripts” is a sequence Irving, Marilynne Robinson, Kurt Vonnegut, Flannery of ninety paragraphs written back and forth between O’Connor, et al. poets Marvin Bell and Christopher Merrill, who first met in 1978. It has been called both "prose poetry” Iowa City. She received a bachelor’s degree (1977) in and "lyrical nonfiction." It is a conversation in which Journalism and a master’s degree (1979) in the authors take up matters biographical, Communication Studies from the University of Iowa. philosophical, sociopolitical, and aesthetic. Bell, Her Ph.D. was awarded in 1989 in Radio, TV and Iowa’s first Poet Laureate, sent his paragraphs from Film at the University of Texas in Austin. Iowa and two other U.S. locations, while Merrill, who She serves on the faculty each winter in the Solstice as Director of the International Writing Workshop low-residency creative writing program at Pine Manor undertakes cultural diplomacy missions for the State College in Chestnut Hill, MA and offers writing Department, sent his from all over the world. workshops every summer in the Iowa Summer Writing Festival, Hurston/Wright Foundation and the Venise Berry is the author of three national Black Writers Conference and Reunion. bestselling novels; So Good, An African American www.veniseberry.com/ Love Story (Dutton Penguin, 1996), All of Me, A Voluptuous Tale (Dutton Penguin, 2000), and Colored Sugar Water (Dutton Penguin, 2002). She is currently Andy Douglas is a writer and musician living in finishing her fourth novel Pockets of Sanity. Iowa City, Iowa. He holds an MFA in Nonfiction Writing from the University of Iowa, where he was Black-ish, Black Jesus, and the First Black American the recipient of the Marcus Bach Fellowship for President: Racialism and the Media is an examination Writing about Religion and Culture. His first book, a of mediated images and messages concerning African memoir, “The Curve of the American culture. It will be published in 2020. Berry World: Into the Spiritual Heart is the co-editor of an anthology, Black Culture & of Yoga” was published in Experience: Contemporary Issues (2015). Two non- 2013 and describes the seven fiction books on black film were also co-authored The years he lived in Asia — for Historical Dictionary of African American Cinema four of those years as a monk (Scarecrow Press, 2007 & 2nd Ed. 2015) and The 50 — studying and practicing Most Influential Black Films (Citadel 2001). yoga and meditation. His Berry is published widely in latest book, "Redemption creative and academic Songs: A Year in the Life of a circles with numerous Community Prison Choir," is about his experience short stories, journal singing with prisoners in the Oakdale Community articles, and book Choir, at the IMCC prison in Coralville. The book chapters. Her research reflects upon the idea of restorative justice as well as explores media, African many of the issues facing the criminal justice system. Americans and popular He’s active in the Community Sing movement, writes culture. Her first co-edited anthology, Mediated about environmental and other social issues, and leads Messages and African-American Culture: a kiirtan and meditation circle. www.andydouglas.net. Contemporary Issues (Sage, 1996) won the Meyers Center Award for the Study of Human Rights in North Michelle Edwards is the author of many books for America in 1997. children, most recently, A Hat for Mrs. She was honored in 2018 with an Iowa History Goldman: A Story about Knitting Makers Award from the African American Museum and Love, which received a in Cedar Rapids Iowa. In 2003, she received the “Sydney Taylor Silver Medal”, a “Creative Contribution to Literature” award for “Wilde Award”, and was a Colored Sugar Water from the Zora Neale Hurston Hicklebee’s Book of the Year Society. All of Me received a 2001 Honor Book and a Junior Library Guild Award from the Black Caucus of the American Selection. She is also the Library Association. author/illustrator of Stinky Stern Berry is an associate professor in Journalism and Forever “Gyphron Award” (Blue African American Studies at the University of Iowa in Crab), Chicken Man “National Jewish Page | 2 Book Award”, and A Knitter’s Home Companion, an and was part of the Speakers Bureau of Humanities adult title. Iowa for many years. Michelle writes about family, friendship, and During his retirement, Horton has published several community. Her work chronicles the large and small books on historical subjects, and has written 6 books victories and defeats of everyday life. She shares her of poetry. He has continued his teaching career, paintings and process on Instagram, Facebook, and mainly at the Iowa City/Johnson County Senior her website. Center, and for the Senior College of The University Michelle grew up in Troy, New York and now lives in of Iowa. Horton’s research interests include the social Iowa City, Iowa, where she shares, with her husband, history of the British Isles, the frontier history of the a house full of books, yarn, and the artifacts of their United States, and the causes and events of World three daughters’ childhoods. War I. His most recent book is a study of the meanings of the symbols used on the 19th century www.michelledwards.com/ grave markers. Currently Horton is at work on his 7th book of poetry. From a childhood on an Iowa farm, Lori Erickson grew up to become one of America's top travel writers Jon Kerstetter completed three combat tours in specializing in spiritual Iraq as a combat physician and journeys. When she's not on flight surgeon. He obtained his the road, she lives in Iowa M.D. degree from the Mayo City. She's the author of Medical School in Rochester, the 2017 memoir Holy MN. He also holds an MS in Rover: Journeys in Search business from the University of of Mystery, Miracles, and Utah and an MFA in creative God, as well as other travel- nonfiction from Ashland related books and more than a University. thousand articles for national and regional publications. She's also the creator of His essays have been published in Spiritual Travels (www.spiritualtravels.info), a Best American Essays and other literary website featuring holy sites around the world. journals. His essay, “Learning to Breathe”, won the Normal School Nonfiction Prize in 2014. Dr. www.lorierickson.net/ Kerstetter is the author of Crossings: A Doctor www.facebook.com/LoriEricksonAuthor/ Soldier’s Story, which was selected as one of the best reads in Military Literature in 2017 and was a finalist for the 2018 Colby Award.