WVBF: Writing Workshop - Nora Shalaway Carptenter

Nora Shalaway Carpenter
Connecting Students to Writing by Reframing - Write What You Know

Nora will take attendees on her journey from loving writing as a kid to hating it as a teen to loving it again as an adult. Most importantly, she'll explain why her passion waned in her teen years and how that can be avoided with aspiring writers. She'll introduce a new interpretation to an old adage and show how attendees can use it to find joy in their own (and their students') writing process.​

Nora Shalaway Carpenter is contributing editor of the critically acclaimed short story anthology Rural Voices: 15 Authors Challenge Assumptions About Small-Town America, which was named an NPR Best Book of the Year, a YALSA Best Fiction YA selection, a TAYSHAS list selection, and a Bank Street Best Book of the Year, among numerous other honors. Her debut novel The Edge of Anything was named a Bank Street Best Book, a Kirkus Reviews Best book, and A Mighty Girl Best Book of the Year. Of her forthcoming novel, Fault Lines, set in her home state of West Virginia, WV Poet Laureate Marc Harshman praises: "I was happily reminded throughout of the masterful storytelling found in an earlier generation of Appalachian authors like George Ella Lyon and Cynthia Rylant...Highly recommended." Carpenter holds an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts and currently serves on faculty for the Highlights Foundation's Whole Novel Retreat. Connect with her at noracarpenterwrites.com.

Learn more and view the full 2023 West Virginia Book Festival Schedule at wvbookfestival.org.