The inaugural Cascadia Writers-in-Conversation evening took place on Thursday, August 8, with the eminently charming Sharma Shields as the first featured author. In a beautiful museum setting, with Z. Vanessa Helder’s magnificent watercolors of Eastern Washington on the walls, 60+ people had the great fortune to listen to a terrifically talented writer talk in depth about her life and her work.
Attendees called the evening “wonderful” and “thoroughly entertaining.” One marveled at how “emotionally open and revealing” Shields was, while another praised her for being “so engaging,” with “her love of literature on full display.”
Among the topics Shields discussed were: how she became a writer, how fairy tales can help us find an alternative path to a deeper reality, the source of her ability to write funny, a writer’s relationship to the serious issues of our times, and the importance in her life of Hans Christian Anderson (the subject of her next novel).
She also talked at length about the development and “weirdness” of her three books–Favorite Monster, The Sasquatch Hunter’s Almanac, and The Cassandra. One of the evening’s many treats was Shields’ reading of three short stories about witches that showcased her humor and love for tales as well as the unique blend of edginess and tenderness that characterizes much of her work.
On Thursday, September 12, McGregor will be interviewing the second featured writer in the monthly series: Debra Magpie Earling, author of Perma Red and The Lost Journals of Sacajawea. The conversation begins at 6 and lasts until 7:30. Click here for more information and a link to purchase tickets.
Writers-in-Conversation events take place on the second Thursday of each month at the Cascadia Art Museum in Edmonds, WA, and are sponsored by the Edmonds Bookshop and the Holman Company.
Photos by Gene Openshaw and Rod Ralston.
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